In the mysticism of maximalist socialism of the last century, the general strike – a purely political event – constituted a sort of midwife of history capable of deploying that creative violence that would have broken with the past and opened the way for the proletariat to seize power. It was not an automatic programmable process. It was up to the revolutionary elites seize the moment and lead it towards insurrection and building a new world.
History teaches us that the operation (“and we will do as Russia”) failed several times and miserably until it opened the doors to fascism. An unheard intuition of Filippo Turati who said in a prophetic speech: “Yes, we fight too much against ourselves, we work too often for our enemies: we create the reaction, we create fascism, we create the People's Party, intimidating, intimidating beyond measure, proclaiming with supreme naivety, even from the conspiratorial point of view, the preparation of the final action, emptying of its content that parliamentary action, which is not the action of a few men above men, but which should be the highest efflorescence of the common action of the entire Party within the national frameworks, and, by mutual agreements, also within the great international framework, which should be precisely the highest efflorescence of thought and action, of the entire Party, today, of the entire class, tomorrow. We create the counterrevolution, and, my friends, it will not always be possible for you to use Turati's umbrella.''
The maneuver and the priorities of the Cisl
The logic of the reformist leader is the same one that can be found a century later as Parliament deals with the ordinary administration of the Budget law, a task aimed at tracing the quantity, quality and financial and economic boundaries of the coming year. One could even speak of the “banality” of public finance, in awareness of the very limits of a government's action.
“The Budget Law has incorporated most of the Cisl priority”, declared the Secretary General, Luigi Barra in an interview: “More than half of the resources are directed towards supporting income from employment with the choice to make permanent and extend to 40 thousand euros the cut in the tax and contribution wedge that will increase the paychecks of more than 14 million workers. The extension of the merger of the two IRPEF rates is important, a necessary condition to help low incomes, stimulate consumption, improve the economy. The return to full indexation of pensions is positive, the support for families and births is appreciable as well as greater resources for healthcare. The continuity of the tax exemption on performance bonuses, contractual welfare and fringe benefits extended to other groups of workers is positive. The resources for the renewal of public contracts in the three-year period 2025/2027 are good. It is now a question of defending these results during the parliamentary process. At the same time, our commitment will be directed inside and outside the perimeter of the Budget to obtain improvements and advances''.
The maneuver and the general strike of Cgil and Uil
That's how he thinks a normal union in a normal country. But is Italy a normal country? In the midst of a confrontation destined to end in time for the Christmas and New Year holidays, Maurizio Landini, together with the ascari of the Uil, decides to throw the sword of Brennus of "social revolt" into the scales. It is the fourth time that Cgil and Uil call a general strike during the budget session on the basis of generic platforms, woven with slogans, set in a prejudicial way even before knowing the intentions, projects and allocations prepared for their implementation. This does not mean that things are peaceful and extraneous to the criticisms that, during the hearings were formulated, with particular regard to the possibility of achieving those parameters of economic growth that are distant in the short-term perspective and that do not allow - as the Governor claimed Fabio Panetta – to act simultaneously on caution in the management of public finances to strengthen a positive balance of primary expenditure and promote a possible development that, by acting on the denominator, can determine a reduction in the incidence of debt on GDP, within the framework of a more intense and coordinated European collaboration.
Giacinto Serrati Menotti a century ago had a way out: the Russian revolution and the socialization of the means of production and exchange; in other words the hope of a palingenesis from which a new beginning could start. But what does Landini have in mind? Please let us know how you intend to free yourself from the constraints of the community agreements you have signed, which are not only guarded by European and international bureaucracies, but also by those markets that can decide the fate of a country in a few hours, causing a mountain of debt to collapse on it. So the CGIL throws everything into politics.
The Cgil and Landini's objectives
As Dario Di Vico wrote on Sheet – “it is impossible not to note how this incitement to social revolt (ed.) is outside the classical tradition of the CGIL, careful in its protest formulas to always remain within the perimeter of structured democracy.
“Rivolta sociale” unmistakably, however, has the flavour of a flaccid protest, of insurrection, and therefore ends up evoking the slogans of the Autonomia of the last century or those of the Cobas of today. Landini is convinced that he is the natural leader of a broad coalition of associations that ranges from social centres to Catholic movements of the third sector and it is in some way to them that he has chosen to speak''.
But at least be kind enough to let us understand what they are. its goals and how it intends to achieve them; whatever they are. Does he want to lead a fight to the bitter end against a right-wing government, to the point of causing its fall? The changes for which Landini is calling for social revolt, however, evoke a gigantic tribal rite of the rain dance. In the CGIL they know – Di Vico writes again – that the general strike against the government called for the end of the month, almost as if it were an annual rite, It will not have a large following in the workplace. In fact, during the last strike at school, participation was less than 5%. But precisely because the abuse of the strike has worn down the law – Di Vico seems to argue – there is a need to de-unionize it and politicize it even more, calling in the square the galaxy of antagonism and pacifism or rather the world of prejudicial contestation against the political nature of the current government. But the set of these tactical moves – Di Vico continues – will end up rewriting the map of what has been the prestigious Italian trade unionism and attests to the largest confederation increasingly distant from the Cisl and increasingly closer to the Cobas (we saw this on the occasion of the failure to sign the contract renewal of state employees). So much for those social battles (first and foremost the purchasing power of wages) that would need unity and critical mass.
