From neo-Fascists to post-Fascists? The transformation of the MSI into the AN

West European Politics

Volumn 19, Issue 4, 1996, Pages 693-714

  Ignazi, Piero ^a  

^a NONE

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

FASCISM; POLITICAL CHANGE;

ITALY;

EID: 0030319588     PISSN: 01402382     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1080/01402389608425161     Document Type: Article

References (38)

1. This section is mainly based on my works on the MSI published in Piero Ignazi Il polo escluso. Profilo del Movimento Sociale Italiano (Bologna: Il Mulino1989) (rev. ed. forthcoming) and idem Postfascisti. Dal MSI a AN (ibid. 1994). All the sources and references are, therefore, left out. The quotations are limited to the contributions not cited in these previous works.
2. This section is mainly based on my works on the MSI published in Piero Ignazi Il polo escluso. Profilo del Movimento Sociale Italiano (Bologna: Il Mulino1989) (rev. ed. forthcoming) and idem Postfascisti. Dal MSI a AN (ibid. 1994). All the sources and references are, therefore, left out. The quotations are limited to the contributions not cited in these previous works.
3. The Repubblica Sociale Italiana was the regime established in 1943 by Mussolini, after his fall, in the north of Italy under the 'protection' of its German ally.
4. On the radical and terrorist right the most authoritative work is provided by Franco Ferraresi, Minacce alla democrazia (Milan: Feltrinelli 1995).
5. See Piero Ignazi, 'La cultura politica del MSI-DN', Rivista Italiana di Scienza Politica 19/3 (1989) pp.431-65.
6. 2).
7. 2).
8. 2).
9. Roberto Chiarini, '"Sacro egoismo" e "missione civilizzatrice". La politica estera del MSI dalla fondazione ad oggi', Storia Contemporanea 21/3 (1990) pp.541-60.
10. On the electoral level, however, the party did not perform particularly well as it won only 4.8 per cent of the votes in the 1958 elections, one per cent less than in the previous elections.
11. Even the MSI was affected by the 1968 student movement. Its youth organisation - one of the party's strongholds - collapsed because of the diverging attitudes to the student revolt. The 1968 electoral result is the worst in the party's history.
12. Unfortunately, the data on party members are highly unreliable: numbers have only a vague relationship to reality. See Luciano Bardi and Leonardo Morlino, 'Italy', in Richard Katz and Peter Mair (eds) Party Organisation 1960-1990. A Data Handbook (London: Sage 1992) pp.418-68. Notwithstanding the unreliability of data, in the early-mid 1970s the party was at the height of its strength.
13. The Nouvelle Droite is a cultural movement, originated in the late 1970s by the French philosopher Alain de Benoist, centred around the journals Elements and Nouvelle Ecole and the cultural centre GRECE. Its aim points to a redefinition of the cultural and ideological premises of the right going beyond the usual left and right cleavage. The ideas of the 1920s German Conservative Revolution, integrated with various different and heterogeneous sources, are at the basis of this movement. The Nouvelle Droite is spread right across Europe and it is exclusively devoted to cultural activities. Only in Italy did it have a certain impact on party politics thanks to a group of MSI youth leaders (supportive of the Rauti faction) who, however, left the party in the early 1980s. On this point see Pierre-André Taguieff, Sur la Nouvelle Droite (Paris: Descartes & Cie 1994).
14. Donatella Della Porta and Maurizio Rossi, Cifre crudeli (Bologna: Il Mulino 1982).
15. This approach was widely supported by some flanking intellectuals who found linkages and connections between fascism and communism. See e.g. Giano Accame, Il Fascismo immenso e rosso (Rome: Il Settimo Sigillo 1989).
16. Piero Ignazi, Postfascisti (note 1).
17. On the transformation see Antonio Carioti, 'From the Ghetto to Palazzo Chigi: The Ascent of National Alliance', in Richard Katz and Piero Ignazi (eds) Italian politics. The Year of the Tycoon (Boulder,CO: Westview Press 1996) pp.57-78; Marco Tarchi, La destra italiana dopo il fascismo. (Intervista di Antonio Carioti) (Milan: Rizzoli 1995); idem, Esuli in patria (Parma: Guanda 1995).
18. On the transformation see Antonio Carioti, 'From the Ghetto to Palazzo Chigi: The Ascent of National Alliance', in Richard Katz and Piero Ignazi (eds) Italian politics. The Year of the Tycoon (Boulder,CO: Westview Press 1996) pp.57-78; Marco Tarchi, La destra italiana dopo il fascismo. (Intervista di Antonio Carioti) (Milan: Rizzoli 1995); idem, Esuli in patria (Parma: Guanda 1995).
19. On the transformation see Antonio Carioti, 'From the Ghetto to Palazzo Chigi: The Ascent of National Alliance', in Richard Katz and Piero Ignazi (eds) Italian politics. The Year of the Tycoon (Boulder,CO: Westview Press 1996) pp.57-78; Marco Tarchi, La destra italiana dopo il fascismo. (Intervista di Antonio Carioti) (Milan: Rizzoli 1995); idem, Esuli in patria (Parma: Guanda 1995).
20. The quote comes from Fini's faction manifesto 'Destra in Movimento' in Il Secolo d'Italia, 20 Oct. 1987.
21. See Fini's address at the Sixteenth Congress: 'Relazione d'apertura del Segretario nazionale On', Gianfranco Fini (mimeo, 1990) p.27.
22. Il Secolo d'ltalia, 29 July 1993 (emphasis added).
23. On this point see the convergent interpretations by Piero Ignazi, 'Lo strano trionfo di Allenaza nazionale', Il Mulino XLIV n.357 (1995) pp.38-46 and Marco Tarchi, 'Cinquant' anni di nostalgia'(note 14).
24. On this point see the convergent interpretations by Piero Ignazi, 'Lo strano trionfo di Allenaza nazionale', Il Mulino XLIV n.357 (1995) pp.38-46 and Marco Tarchi, 'Cinquant' anni di nostalgia'(note 14).
25. La Stampa, 3 June 1994.
26. The survey was conducted by Gianfranco Baldini and Rinaldo Vignati under the auspices of the Istituto Carlo Cattaneo of Bologna. The interviewees were 576 from roughly 2,300 delegates (comprising the MSI and AN delegates, which , moreover, overlapped by almost one-third). I thank Gianfranco Baldini and Rinaldo Vignati for having allowed me to use their data.
27. See Mario Sznajder, 'Has Neofascism disappeared in Italy?' paper presented at the Conference on 'Extremism and Nationalism in Europe 50 Years After World War II, Jerusalem, 1995.
28. These surveys were carried out by the author. The data have been presented in various works; see in particular: Piero Ignazi Piero and Colette Ysmal, 'New and old right-wing parties. The French Front National and the Italian Movimento Sociale', European Jnl of Political Research 22/1 (Jan.1992) pp.101-21; Piero Ignazi, 'The Changing Profile of the Italian Social Movement', in Peter Merkl and Leonard Weinberg (eds) Encounters with the Contemporary Radical Right (Boulder.CO: Westview Press 1993) pp.75-92; idem, Postfascisti (note 1).
29. These surveys were carried out by the author. The data have been presented in various works; see in particular: Piero Ignazi Piero and Colette Ysmal, 'New and old right-wing parties. The French Front National and the Italian Movimento Sociale', European Jnl of Political Research 22/1 (Jan.1992) pp.101-21; Piero Ignazi, 'The Changing Profile of the Italian Social Movement', in Peter Merkl and Leonard Weinberg (eds) Encounters with the Contemporary Radical Right (Boulder.CO: Westview Press 1993) pp.75-92; idem, Postfascisti (note 1).
30. These surveys were carried out by the author. The data have been presented in various works; see in particular: Piero Ignazi Piero and Colette Ysmal, 'New and old right-wing parties. The French Front National and the Italian Movimento Sociale', European Jnl of Political Research 22/1 (Jan.1992) pp.101-21; Piero Ignazi, 'The Changing Profile of the Italian Social Movement', in Peter Merkl and Leonard Weinberg (eds) Encounters with the Contemporary Radical Right (Boulder.CO: Westview Press 1993) pp.75-92; idem, Postfascisti (note 1).
31. See Hans-Georg Betz, Radical Right-Wing Populism in Western Europe (NY: St Martin's Press 1994); Piero Ignazi, L 'estrema destra in Europa (Bologna: Il Mulino 1994).
32. See Hans-Georg Betz, Radical Right-Wing Populism in Western Europe (NY: St Martin's Press 1994); Piero Ignazi, L 'estrema destra in Europa (Bologna: Il Mulino 1994).
33. For an exhaustive illustration of these data see in particular Piero Ignazi, 'The Changing Profile' (note 22) and idem, Postfascisti (note 1).
34. For an exhaustive illustration of these data see in particular Piero Ignazi, 'The Changing Profile' (note 22) and idem, Postfascisti (note 1).
35. Roberto Chiarini, Destra italiana (Venice: Marsilio, 1995).
36. See the party manifesto, Valori, idee e progetti per l'Alleanza Nazionale, Rome 1994.
37. Luca Verzichelli, 'The New Members in Parliaments', in Katz and Ignazi (note 14) pp.115-34.
38. Data on MSI and AN organisation have a high degree of variance, depending on the sources and on the time in which the same sources provide the same data. However, the official membership for 1994 is 324,124 (courtesy of the AN Organisational Department).