ABSTRACT
As the 1960s began, the Italian Communist Party, the PCI, was Western Europe’s leading communist party, and at the same time an organization with some features unique within the international communist movement. There were three major differences: the fact that it was a mass party (which made the PCI much more permeable to and rooted in society than any other European communist party); its link to the Italian Constitution (which reflected the Italian communists’ contribution to developing the system); and the original mark left by Gramsci’s thinking (which bestowed upon Italian communist culture a national and intellectual credibility decidedly superior to that enjoyed by other communist parties). Moreover, after Khrushchev denounced Stalin’s crimes, Palmiro Togliatti was the only communist leader to speak (in June 1956) of ‘degeneration’ of the Soviet system. This criticism never went down well in Moscow and served to strengthen the idea of an ‘Italian road’ toward socialism, different from the Soviet model. 1
