When asked if we will die Christian Democrats, I would instinctively answer: "Maybe". But it would only be a joke that hides two truths: the first is that today we live in politically much worse times than the so-called Christian Democrats; the second is that the historical-political judgment on the DC, understood as a party – even in the opinion of a layman, anti-clerical if necessary, which I consider myself – presents more lights than shadows.
And I would like to start from this second truth, with a small personal recollection. In my early twenties, I accompanied my father to the commemoration of Benedetto Croce, on the occasion of the centenary of his birth, by President Saragat. We were at the San Carlo in Naples. Dad, who directed "North and South", but did not engage in militant politics at one point left to speak with Emilio Colombo. Naturally I asked him: What did he tell you? Answer: that the judgment of historians on the DC and its governments, including Dorotei, will be predominantly positive.
This episode came to my mind on the occasion of the last PPI congress, which was in fact the last DC congress, albeit in the Second Republic. Hearing the reply from the secretary Gerardo Bianco (a beautiful speech whose gist was: I'll stop here because, with all due respect, I don't want to die a social democrat) who have always thought I was "mainly a democratic socialist", I asked myself: do you want to see that Columbus was right and that we will also have to regret the DC? I haven't yet given a definitive answer to this question, and I probably won't have the time to give it. However, I am convinced that Colombo's reasoning was far from unrealistic.
However, this absolutely does not mean that DC will return. Indeed, as many former Christian Democrats have argued on FIRSTonline (see the interventions of Tabacci and Astori in this debate) I am convinced that the experience of the DC is unrepeatable. The conditions no longer exist: there is no PCI above all; there is no possibility of using public spending casually, but sometimes also wisely (pace of gladiatorial liberalism). And there are no longer the great Christian Democrat leaders and not even that solid (politically) central body that was made up of the dorothei: modest as party leaders, but more than dignified in being in government. I believe that after Aldo Moro's tragic exit from the scene, the only great political glue disappeared (think of the last speech to the parliamentary groups on the eve of the kidnapping), which held the DC together even in the most difficult moments.
So why do we go back to talking about the possibility of Christian Democrats dying? But how, some might object: you don't realize that Letta, Alfano, Renzi all come from there. So? let's make some distinctions. Renzi, only for an agraphic fact, if he has been in the DC, there has been very little. Alfano may have good dexterity and the deft dexterity of an old Sicilian DC (who, excluding Scelba, have never been the best), but his political experience was spent entirely in the field of Berlusconi's right. In other words: there is very little of the Christian Democrat left and not the best. Enrico Letta remains, who comes from the school of Andreatta. And he was truly an atypical Christian Democrat. By his virtues, of course. Economist with a great passion for politics, but above all an all-round intellectual.
And it is no coincidence that Moro's trusted advisor. In short, Letta comes from a great school, which is Christian Democrat but not only. And this also explains why the current Prime Minister was an excellent deputy secretary in Bersani's Democratic Party, and above all, the almost instinctive institutional political harmony with the President of the Republic Giorgio Napolitano. With one's own history and one's ideas, one must look above all to the country, before the party of origin and belonging. In other words: a little Alcide De Gasperi, a little Aldo Moro. And a little Ugo La Malfa too. And if that is the case there is at least the hope (despite the latest backlash of Berlusconi and the looming grillism) of not dying populists.
