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Also opposing Khrushchev and Togliatti, but for different reasons, are a growing number of young radicals who almost captured control of the party in 1960 and who, since the Moscow Congress last fall, have returned to the attack. Charging the Italian Communist leadership with "coresponsibility" for Stalin's crimes, the so-called "renovators"' demand democratization of internal party affairs, greater freedom from Soviet dictation. Leader of the renovators is burly Giorgio Amendola, 54, a skillful organizer who has never visited Russia or its satellites and has no desire to do so because, he says, low living standards "depress me." Adds Amendola: "We must acknowledge the diversity of positions of the U.S.S.R. and China, of Yugoslavia and Cuba, of Italy and France" (whose Communist Party, along with Czechoslovakia's, has denounced the Italian party as "revisionist"' and "opportunist"). Such diversity, says Amendola, is ' an inevitable consequence of the Communist advance in the world."
To some, Amendola is not a liberalizer but merely an opportunist who seeks to oust Togliatti. "He wants neither a Stalinist nor an anti-Stalinist party." says one critic. "He wants a nice, homemade Communism that knows how to play the game in the Italian manner—that is, with a card up its sleeve."
Balancing Act. Most of the aces are still held by Togliatti. 68. He too advocates Communist diversity—in fact, he coined a word to describe it: "poly-centrism"—but he does not go so far as Amendola. Once an ardent Stalinist, Togliatti smoothly switched to supporting Khrushchev, and the Italian party was one of the first to denounce Khrushchev's ideological enemies, the Red Chinese and the Albanians. Not that there is much personal warmth between him and the Kremlin boss. Several years ago, Togliatti routinely began his day by asking his staff: "What new mess has our peasant got us into today?"
Dexterously balancing between the Stalinists and the renovators, Togliatti has retained his hold on the party leadership, which seems less interested in protecting Marxist purity than in pursuing, along with much of the nation, a middle-class standard of living. Bologna's Communist Mayor Giuseppe Dozza, for instance, speaks not of overthrowing capitalism, but of inviting Christian Democrats into the city administration, repairing roads, luring new private industry.
Serenaded by such unrevolutionary slogans, the factory workers who make up 38% of the Communist Party's rolls are showing some loss of political ardor. The Communist Party is offering television sets and typewriters as prizes for comrades who sign up the most recruits. The party merchandizers also give away six-month subscriptions to the Red newspaper. L'Unità,* at the end of the free-trial period, a copy of L'Unità arrives with an unsolicited gift—a party card made out to the head of the family. But the party's drive for new members is uphill most of the way. Example: in the Red stronghold of Genoa, the number of registered party members has dropped from 90,000 in 1956 to 55,000 last year.