well its foreign policy looks like something the Pentagon would love with all their heart
New Deal Coalition Retained: A Sixth Party System Wikibox Timeline
Nice one with the Democratic Party. The best party makeup IMO ITTL.
And...
Populism vs. Libertarianism: Only in the Philippines. I would certainly vote Nacionalista in NDCR.
Or, statist conservatism vs. classical liberalism. Anyone can choose.
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How's the metrification movements in the UK and commonwealth nations going? With the U.K. staying out of the ECSC I'd imagine that even if there is still the metrification movement like OTL then I'd imagine it would be even less applied ITTL than in OTL.
The Commonwealth still mostly uses the Imperial System, while in Canada United States customary units are also used
In Rome’s Shadow
“We have a chance to see our beloved land return to glory. A people with the laurels of victory on their heads, bread in their bellies, and freedom in their hearts.”
-Enrico Berlinguer-
“We have a chance to see our beloved land return to glory. A people with the laurels of victory on their heads, bread in their bellies, and freedom in their hearts.”
-Enrico Berlinguer-
Unlike its neighbor to the northeast, the Italian Republic never owed the sense of political stability and security that the French Fourth Republic had following DeGaulle’s constitutional reforms. By the early 1980s the former had settled into a stable dichotomy between the right-wing Front National and the left-wing Four-Party Alliance. The latter continued in a state of disarray, largely due to the inescapable rock-and-a-hard place constraints put in place by the main left-wing party, the Italian Communists (PCI). Unlike in the other nations of the west – or the French Communists, which distanced themselves from Moscow to stay relevant – the PCI was organized, popular among the working class in north and north-central Italy, and it maintained a succession of charismatic leaders that kept it a working concern in election after election. Throughout the decades it took herculean effort by the US State Department and British Foreign Office to put together anti-communist coalition governments throughout the 1970s and 1980s.
With the PCI under its radical young leader Giangiacomo Feltrinelli holding an adapted Marxist-Leninist and pro-Soviet line, the pro-NATO rightist and leftist parties knew the stakes and kept managing to come together. Nevertheless, it was often a very close call, governments unstable and shaky at best. With the succession of ever pro-Soviet leaders in the PCI letting them into any possible government was nonnegotiable to all but the most radical members of the Italian Socialist Party, not that they made a difference. At the center was the generally center-right Christian Democracy. Standard in its views among the European center-right, its coalition with the more right-wing Social Movement lasted until the 1974 election where a robust performance by the Communists toppled the right-wing government and forced CD to seek a coalition with the socialists. This worked, the more centrist Guilio Andreotti resigning as Prime Minister and being replaced with the center-left Aldo Moro.
Moro had his plate full managing the restless coalition. The Socialists demanded further and further concessions that made the CD right balk, while the in opposition Social Movement and the united PCI threw no-confidence motions at him every six months. To top it off, the Soviets were emboldened by their success in fomenting unrest in Germany – leading to the suicide of Chancellor Franz-Josef Strauß and the collapse of the CDU – began pouring KGB resources into terrorist groups and Foco paramilitaries within Italy. The ensuing violence would come to be known as the Years of Lead, over five-thousand civilians murdered in incidents from small-town shootouts to massive terrorist strikes that rocked the country to its core. The most devastating hit the government itself, Prime Minister Moro being kidnapped in December 1977 following Christmas Mass.
Enrico Berlinguer was a rarity in the Communist Internationale. Following the Stalinist purges and later the post-Prague Spring purges, there was little dissent between the Marxist-Leninist/Focoist/Maoist dogma that marked the mainstream of world communism. Thus, waves had been made when then Deputy National Secretary Berlinguer led his handpicked delegation to dissent from the official platform at the 1969 World Communist Conference in Moscow, stunning the PCI leadership and the other representatives present – in a speech at the 1971 conference, he condemned the Invasion of Yugoslavia as an “Evil perversion of human rights that all socialists should condemn.” The charming Italian had been a rising star within the Party up to then, and he was far too popular for his horrified superiors to purge, but the leadership began to sideline him of important positions, eventually causing him to lose a bid for leadership to Feltrinelli in 1975. Nevertheless, he remained personally popular and began to form a group of supporters that were called the Little Tomatoes by the Italian press.
His popularity failed to break out due to PCI loyalty and a suspicion to Freyism, but LSD managed to get 7.4% of the vote and forty deputies – all credited Berlinguer for stopping an outright Communist takeover along with the Socialist Party (its leadership being from the far-left, the party right defecting to LSD), leaving him in the balance of power. Never intending to negotiate with the PCI, Berlinguer nevertheless dragged coalition talks for an entire month to get what he wanted from Andreotti. After the intervention of the French Government to smooth things along, the Democratic Alliance of Christian Democracy, Social Movement, Free Democratic Left, and South Tyrolian People’s Party was announced to great fanfare – marred only from Berlinguer suffering a minor stroke, later proved to be caused by a poisoning by the East Germans. The center had held, Italy kept inside NATO.
Time magazine, in a guest piece by three foreign affairs analysts, gave the Democratic Alliance a year at the most – Guilio Andreotti defied his critics by holding the parties together up until the 1983 elections, in which they would get another mandate from the voters with little change (except for the collapse of the Socialists, their votes largely splitting between PCI and LSD). Surprisingly, Berlinguer and the Social Movement allied substantially on economics against the more classical liberal CD, forcing several compromises between them and Finance Minister Ciriaco De Mita. On social policy the LSD was forced to depart strongly from the former policies of PCI, owing largely to the need for the DA to maintain its dominance among the heavily Catholic Southern Italy. Berlinguer attempted to balance these with the pro-human rights and socially libertarian Freyist views, managing to get institutional reform on family law to passage in the Chamber of Deputies. Efforts by some in the LSD to get abortion legalization and decriminalization of homosexuality were blocked by their leader, these voters fleeing to the PCI and Socialists while more than made up for the gains with the working-class. The LSD leader and Pope Leo maintained a strong relationship, contrasting greatly with the anti-Papacy platform of PCI and Feltrinelli. Made Justice Minister by Prime Minister Andreotti, Berlinguer earned the respect and admiration of the Italian people by crafting the DA’s anti-terrorist policy – it struck the Marxist insurgents with such a massive vengeance while still respecting due process in the Freyist tradition.
With his second term as Prime Minister quite the success, Guilio Andreotti informed the nation of his intention to resign as leader of the Democratic Alliance following the August 1987 elections. Italy’s economy had rebounded, people content, and terrorism largely crushed despite the victory of the hardliners in the Soviet December Coup. With the intention to block the Communists from succeeding once more, each of the four parties pledged their support for continuing the Alliance. However, Berlinguer had other ideas. His time in government only hardening his Freyism and anti-Soviet views – the KGB conducting two assassination attempts against him – the LSD leader saw his duty to the Italian people in crushing PCI once and for all. It was his party that truly carried the banner of the workers, not the Stalinist front group he had once belonged to. Resolve hardened, body lean and healthy from efforts to remain in top shape following his 1978 stroke, and encouraged by the Pope and the Crusader elements in the Vatican, Berlinguer launched into the election campaign to sell the Free Democratic Left as the main vehicle of leftist politics in Italy. With Christian Democracy being drawn further to the right and the Socialists virtually destroyed, LSD had the field clear to target the Communists hard. Feltrinelli did his best to keep the workers in the fold, but anti-Soviet fear and the murder of LSD minister Alessandro Natta by a Soviet-sympathizer only signaled the PCI house of cards was collapsing in on itself. And waiting to pick up defectors was Enrico Berlinguer.
Much as the changes rocked Italy, Berlinguer was constrained by the fact that he was in a coalition government. Devoted to defending liberty as it was, Christian Democracy was not a Freyist Party (though some influential members were Freyist in their outlook). Thus, the title for the first Freyist government would be bestowed upon another nation. An outcome that would change the world.
I was just thinking the only socially liberal party is The progessives, and in my view the only thing they are good for is be a big spoiler in presidential elections
They're playing a big part in Congress so far, and even bigger at the state level.
Nice update. Glad to see a demonstration that a leftist government can exist without being in Moscow or Beijing's shadow.
Call from german elcetion commite
Congratualtions, Doctor, you seem to be Chancllor.
Congratualtions, Doctor, you seem to be Chancllor.
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If I were to choose between liberty conservatism and right-Freyism, I'd choose right-Freyism in a heartbeat, since it gives more freedom for its followers to align with progressive economic policies. Interesting what's happening in Italy. Usually, communism is tied to the USSR and China. And though I personally hate communism, well, I am interested to see what happens in Italy and the left in Europe and beyond.
P.S. As the Congressman and I have stressed before, In some ways, the left is much stronger ITTL, especially in economics. But when it comes to social issues, the right is much stronger. For example, AmCare passed. But there's basically a supermajority greater than two-thirds in the US Senate, for example, blocking socially liberal policies. Communonationalists and conservatives are all voting against those things. IMO, the ITTL US Senate can possibly pass a Federal Marriage Amendment, and maybe a Human Life Amendment if they are willing to do so.
Say, @The Congressman, how about the Civil Rights Act of 1981? We haven't seen an update about that, as far as I can remember.
Also @The Congressman, how large is the US social conservative coalition right now ITTL?
P.S. As the Congressman and I have stressed before, In some ways, the left is much stronger ITTL, especially in economics. But when it comes to social issues, the right is much stronger. For example, AmCare passed. But there's basically a supermajority greater than two-thirds in the US Senate, for example, blocking socially liberal policies. Communonationalists and conservatives are all voting against those things. IMO, the ITTL US Senate can possibly pass a Federal Marriage Amendment, and maybe a Human Life Amendment if they are willing to do so.
Say, @The Congressman, how about the Civil Rights Act of 1981? We haven't seen an update about that, as far as I can remember.
Also @The Congressman, how large is the US social conservative coalition right now ITTL?
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