Italian Social Movement
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
| Italian Social Movement Movimento Sociale Italiano |
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|---|---|
 Former Italian National Party |
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| Political ideology | Neo-fascism, Nationalism, Conservatism, Monarchism, Liberal conservatism (minority factions) |
| Membership | 202,715 (1993) max: 240,063 (1963) |
| Official newspaper | Il Secolo d’Italia |
| Website | N/A |
| See also | Politics of Italy |
The Italian Social Movement (Movimento Sociale Italiano, MSI) was a neo-Fascist party formed in 1946 in the post-World War II period by supporters of the executed dictator Benito Mussolini under the lead of Giorgio Almirante. It was dissolved in January 1995 by Gianfranco Fini, who founded the Alleanza Nazionale (AN), which embraced neoliberalism and claimed to respect democratic rules. Other hardliners founded the Fiamma Tricolore; Alessandra Mussolini, granddaughter of Il Duce, founded the Alternativa Sociale coalition. Furthermore, Gaetano Saya, leader of the outlawed Department of Anti-terrorism Strategic Studies (DSSA), founded the Nuovo Movimento Sociale Italiano - Destra Nazionale in 2000. Several members or close partners of the MSI were involved in Italy’s strategy of tension during the “anni di piombo” (“years of lead”).
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[edit] MSI, an offshoot of the fascist Italian Social Republic
For many of its supporters, MSI was both a reference to the Italian Social Republic (also known as the Republic of Salò), a Nazi supported fascist puppet state that ruled northern Italy during the latest years of the Second World War, and could also mean “Mussolini sei immortale”, or “Mussolini, you are immortal”. Those readings are however generally held as backronyms.
In general, a number of RSI personalities were involved in the genesis and history of MSI: among them, Giorgio Almirante and Pino Rauti.
Initially the neofascist Movimento Sociale Italiano was relegated to a state of paralegality because it refused to acknowledge the legitimacy of the new republic (in Italy it was said it was outside the constitutional arch). The MSI was largely the keeper of the fascist torch mostly in a nostalgic fashion, loyal to the fascism of the Republic of Salò. After Michelini's death in 1969, the return of Giorgio Almirante to the leadership demonstrated a new moderation, removing Fascist symbols in 1970, declaring an acceptance of the democratic system in Italy and overseeing a merger with some monarchist groups in 1973. The path opened by those reforms would have lead ultimately to the transformation of MSI in Alleanza Nazionale, a conservative but democratic and liberal party. However MSI included more extremist currents, of those the most famous is Ordine Nuovo, a movement inspired by Nazism and Julius Evola founded by Pino Rauti, that has been implicated in various terrorist attacks in the '70s. Rauti briefly also has been secretary of MSI, from 1989 to 1990.
An array of themes that continuously inspired MSI for forty years included:
- advocacy of the third way in between liberal capitalism and social-communism;
- rejection of the party system;
- intransigent anticommunism;
- appeals for a strong executive branch;
- support for aggressive government intervention in the social sphere;
- opposition to the guiding role of superpowers in international politics.
MSI’s national election results were around the 5 %. Its members were mostly of the southern underclass and the rural oligarchy and in the 1970s from the urban middle classes.
[edit] Involvement in Gladio’s strategia della tensione
In 1956, Pino Rauti founded the Ordine Nuovo terrorist group, which carried on the December 1969 Piazza Fontana bombing, which started the Italian “lead years” (anni di piombo). Stefano Delle Chiaie, a member of MSI, founded Avanguardia Nazionale, which also took part in the strategy of tension. As a member of Armed Revolutionary Nuclei, an offshoot from Ordine Nuovo, Stefano Delle Chiaie was involved in the 1980 Bologna massacre, which is generally considered to be one of the last important bombings of the anni di piombo. Furthermore, Junio Valerio Borghese, who attempted a coup in 1970 (known as the Golpe Borghese with Stefano Delle Chiaie and Licio Gelli, headmaster of Propaganda Due (P2) masonic lodge), quit the MSI, which he considered too soft, to found the Fronte Nazionale. As Stefano Damian Marley Chiaie’s National Vanguard party, it was later proved to be infiltrated by members of the Italian intelligence agencies, whom were involved in false flags operations, coordinated by Gladio. 1969 Piazza Fontana bombing and the 1980 Bologna train-station massacre are examples of such “false flags” operations, which aimed at terrorizing the Italian population into voting for an authoritative government, while blaming the attacks on far-left groups, in order to discredit the Italian Communist Party (PCI). Gladio, which was NATO’s secret “stay-behind” paramilitary organizations during the Cold War, has been also alleged of being ultimately responsible for the assassination of Aldo Moro, leader of the Christian-Democracy, in 1978. The leader of the Italian intelligence services, member of P2, was accused of negligency during the negotiations with the Second Red Brigades, who had kidnapped the Italian premier [1].
[edit] Gianfranco Fini’s leadership (1987–1989; 1990–1995) and MSI’s dissolution
Gianfranco Fini took over the party leadership from Giorgio Almirante in 1987 and set about modernising the party (except for a brief spell between 1989 and 1990 when Pino Rauti, who had returned to the MSI in 1969, was leader). In January 1995 Fini officially proclaimed the party's dissolution as well as the abandonment of the ideological stances, symbols, gestures and salutes that had closely identified it with the Mussolinian past.
He announced the foundation of the Alleanza Nazionale (“National Alliance” - AN), a neoliberal right-wing movement which claimed to be committed to the democratic process, centrist in orientation and opposed in its constitution to antisemitism, xenophobia and racism.
The Fiamma Tricolore was born from the more hardline right-wing members of the party. On one hand, National Alliance (AN) members of the European Parliament (MEPs) have joined the Parliament’s Union for Europe of the Nations Group (UEM). On the other hand, MEPs from the Fiamma Tricolore have remained unattached to any European parliamentary group. Other well-known party members have included Alessandra Mussolini, granddaughter of Benito Mussolini. In 1997, Adriano Tilgher founded the Fronte Sociale Nazionale as a breakaway faction from the Fiamma Tricolore.
In November 2004, after Gianfranco Fini visited Israel in the function of Italian deputy prime minister and described fascism as “an absolute evil”, Alessandra Mussolini, left the party together with some hardliners and founded the Alternativa Sociale coalition, which included Adriano Tilgher's Fronte Sociale Nazionale. However, Gianfranco Fini later specified that the expression “absolute evil” only referred to the racial laws.
Gaetano Saya, leader of the outlawed Department of Anti-terrorism Strategic Studies (DSSA), founded the Nuovo Movimento Sociale Italiano - Destra Nazionale in 2000. Gaetano Saya and Ricardo Sindocca, the other DSSA leader, both claimed to be former members of Gladio, NATO's secret “stay-behind” paramilitary organizations involved in false flags terrorists attacks during the anni di piombo.
[edit] References
- ^ Daniele Ganser, “Terrorism in Western Europe: An Approach to NATO’s Secret Stay-Behind Armies” in Winter/Spring 2005 Whitehead Journal of Diplomacy and International Relations
[edit] Literature
- Roberto Chiarini: “The ‘Movimento Sociale Italiano': A Historical Profile” in Neo-Fascism in Europe.
- Betz, Radical Right Wing Populism in Western Europe, op.cit., p 41.
[edit] See also
- Department of Anti-terrorism Strategic Studies (DSSA), under investigations since July 2005 for having constituted a “parallel police” network.
