ABSTRACT
The year 1996 marked a truly historic moment for the Italian left, and above all for its major party, the Partito Democratico della Sinistra (PDS). Moreover, the PDS emerged from the election as Italy's largest party – albeit by the narrowest of margins, and while polling a relatively modest of the vote. Italian politics in the post-Tangentopoli era has evolved in a bipolar direction, and has even witnessed, within a two-year span, the election of a center-right coalition followed by the election of a center-left coalition. Both parties have their origins in the Italian Communist Party (PCI). The bulk of the PCI went along with the founding of a new party – the PDS – that was supposed to represent the first steps in the reconstitution of the Italian left in the post-cold war era. If they occur without a break between Rifondazione and the PDS and a crisis in the Ulivo, it will be nothing short of miraculous.
