PCIepordiga

PCIepordiga refers to Amadeo Bordiga’s role and influence within the Partito Comunista Italiano (PCI) and to the early development of the party’s ideology and organizational approach. The PCI was founded in 1921 after a split from the Italian Socialist Party, with Bordiga among the founders and elected as the party’s first general secretary, a position he held from 1921 to 1924. Bordiga advocated a highly centralized, tightly organized vanguard party, committed to orthodox Marxism and aligned with the Communist International (Comintern). He emphasized disciplined party control, rapid revolutionary action, and a skepticism toward parliamentary politics and reformist currents within the labor movement.

In the mid- to late 1920s, Bordiga’s leadership was challenged and eventually superseded by Palmiro Togliatti. Bordiga remained a significant though minority figure within the PCI, and his followers formed a distinct current often described as bordigismo. This faction pressed for a strict application of Leninist principles and criticized what it saw as opportunistic or reformist strands in the party’s later evolution. The wartime and postwar periods saw Bordiga and his adherents maintain a separate current that influenced debates about organization, strategy, and the relationship to the Soviet model.

Today, Bordiga’s legacy is that of an early theoretician within the Italian Communist movement and the namesake of bordigismo, a strand within the PCI and its successors that emphasizes centralism, ideological orthodoxy, and opposition to reformist compromise. See also Amadeo Bordiga, Partito Comunista Italiano, bordigismo.

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