THE PECULIAR COMRADE ENRICO BERLINGUER

Robert Misik in conversation with Alisa Vengerova and Klaus Pumberger

THE PECULIAR COMRADE ENRICO BERLINGUER
On the 100th birthday of Enrico Berlinguer

Enrico Berlinguer is a key figure in Italian political history. From 1972 to 1984, he was General Secretary of the Italian Communist Party, the largest in a Western country. He is considered the father of »Eurocommunism«. How did Berlinguer come to develop this new concept of democratic communism and break new ground? What is Berlinguer's significance today?

In May of this year, the first biography in German of the »father of Eurocommunism« was published, written by Chiara Valentini. In it, she reports on previously unknown human and political dimensions and describes the ideas, passions, mistakes and successes of this great European. At the centre of his idea of Eurocommunism were the themes of democracy as a universal value, independence from Moscow, advocacy of European unification, commitment to world peace and the then »Third World«, emphasis on the »moral question« in politics and the attempt to integrate opposing worlds, particularly in the course of the »historical compromise« sought between Communists and Christian Democratic Catholics.

Alisa Vengerova, Federal Spokeswoman young left
Klaus Pumberger, Senior Human Resources Consultant, Translator

Moderation Robert Misik, Author and journalist

Chiara Valentini
The peculiar comrade Enrico Berlinguer. Communist and democrat in post-war Europe
Translated from the Italian by Klaus Pumberger, Cristiana Dondi and Andrea Bertazzoni
Dietz Verlag, May 2022; 480 pages, 32.00 euros. ISBN 978-3-8012-0628-4