In times of “widespread electoral thumps” at all latitudes and shades of the left, from the regional elections in Italy to the American presidential elections, the analysis of the defeat of Luciana Castellina it seems like a summary of a life of militancy: both very lucid and impatient. At 95 years old, the journalist, writer, former parliamentarian and critical conscience of the Italian left since the days in which she was expelled from the PCI, the year of grace 1969, still practices the “exercised left”, as she defines it. Attack Giorgia Meloni on the slip on his trade union rights as prime minister (“Poor thing”), shakes the protagonists of the progressive camp, from Giuseppe Conte (“Let’s give him credit for bringing the M5s to the left”) a Elly Schlein (“It’s not enough to change the party”), he even criticizes “memory recovery” operations such as Andrea Segre‘s film on Enrico Berlinguer (“They made a holy picture of him, it looks like one from the Democratic Party”).
In recent days she was the journalist in Emilia Romagna, holding meetings in view of the mid-month elections, today she is in Genoa for the screening of the film “16 mm to the revolution”, the latest journey in the history of the Italian Communist Party with the images shot by great directors of our cinema, from Ettore Scola and Gillo Pontecorvo to Giuseppe Bertolucci. «Back then there was a strong party because it gave the idea of being able to represent a people, of being able to really change things in the country, a channel of communication and participation: – says Castellina – Today no one has this strength anymore, to the left, and we need to give young people the confidence that they can change things.”
Does today’s left lose because of this, wherever you look at it? Is it a question of capacity for representation, of language, or something else?
«The left loses because it is no longer capable of representing society’s discomfort. A task that is not covered with chatter in Parliament, but in the field, among the problems. By building subjectivity, trust, giving citizens back decision-making power and the drive to participate. A long process, worn out for some time, which however has become urgently re-addressed at a time when democracy languishes. In the United States as in our country, where 60 percent of citizens don’t even vote anymore.”
What does Donald Trump’s victory in the United States tell us? For how it arrived, and for what it will bring with it?
«It’s dramatic to say it, but blacks, Latinos, women, minorities voted for Trump: the weakest, those who don’t have the culture to understand what he says and are more easily fooled. Trump’s victory is the victory of fraud, not even more than populism alone, as they once said: Trump has got the Americans drunk, pushed by his friend Elon Musk and by the force of the new media, fake news, distorted information. They will realize it when they see their rights as citizens and workers come after many other things.”
Speaking of rights. What do you think of the words of Giorgia Meloni who said she was “without trade union rights” and forced to work even if she was ill?
«What can I say about it, considering the conditions of the workers in this country. Poor thing.”
What does the defeat of Kamala Harris and the American Democrats teach us?
«He tells us clearly that the issue is not electoral defeat in itself, or how many votes one can win or lose: the mechanisms of politics are now falsifying, they correspond to reality even up to a certain point, think also of the latest regional elections in Italy, how few votes have decided the elections in Liguria. The real point is that today more than ever, democracy as participation must be rethought and reconstructed. This is the true role of the left, at this moment, what it should be.”
Which?
«Helping the reconstruction of real democratic participation. It must win back young people who don’t vote, get them back to doing, to participate, to actively build: this is the only way to save ourselves.”
It’s a question of spaces for inclusion, in short, it always ends up there. Until politics gives people the chance to feel part of something, there is little hope that it will involve them again.
«It makes me laugh to see every time how much the Italian political debate is fueled by the figures of the polls broadcast every week on la7. Orientations that represent 25 percent of Italians, who shouldn’t give a damn to anyone. Rebuilding democracy is serious work, it involves making sure people find their subjectivity again, giving them the feeling of counting for something, of being protagonists. We must win back that 60 percent of young people who don’t give a damn about elections, and rightly so: because democracy is worn out, important things are no longer decided in Parliament but on the financial markets.”
We talk about starting from the bottom again after every single defeat, but someone will have to be there to represent the voters in Parliament.
«Do you know what we used to do in Rome, in the suburbs? The reverse strike led workers to work for free to carry out works of public utility, as in the past in the large estates when people rebelled against the barons by occupying their uncultivated or poorly cultivated lands to put them under cultivation. We organized ourselves in forms of direct democracy, we led people to do things, to participate. The reconstruction work must be done at the base, rolling up our sleeves in the territories, in the neighborhoods, far from Parliament, the furthest thing from the exercised left.”
What do you think of the troubled end to the wide field project?
«I wonder what Renzi or Calenda have to do with whether they want to rebuild a left-wing line. In Liguria, which has been so much discussed precisely because of the end of this blessed wide field, Andrea Orlando didn’t lose because Renzi withdrew from the electoral campaign. Indeed, I think this step even brought him more votes. Even a left-wing alliance, however, can only start from the things to make people do. Gramsci said it, not someone at random, someone who should be reread every now and then.”
Who is to blame more in the difficult relationship between the oppositions, Schlein or Conte?
«I always see many people exaggerate their criticism of Conte, he has taken everything from Salvinian to Trumpian. I would instead tend to encourage him, and to remind us that he found himself almost by chance in his hands a vast protest area, even a rudimentary, wild one, which at first horrified me, and in some way he took it to the left. To say, do, propose the same things that are fought for on the left.”
E Schlein?
«I have respect for her, but there will never be a real new direction until the party changes substantially. Her speeches, which I also like, and more than those that preceded her, are not enough to change a party where there is no longer any serious reflection on itself. The Democratic Party has a history, above all it has an important legacy, but what about the future? Find me some young people who have joined the party, around Italy.”
Speaking of legacy, have you seen Segre and Germano’s film on Enrico Berlinguer?
«Poor Berlinguer, they made him pass off as a liberal puppet, he looks like someone from the Democratic Party. They made a saint out of it, because that’s what people want, but the film doesn’t help to delve deeper. I’m happy we’re talking about certain things again, and it’s not even Segre’s fault, or Germano’s, they’re too young to know why all those people went to follow Berlinguer. And this is said by someone who was kicked out of the party by Berlinguer.”
And why did all those people go to Berlinguer?
«Because, among many things, he was the first to raise the ecological question, he fought for a Europe autonomous from global blocs, he supported the pacifist movement. And most lucidly of all he posed the problem of the crisis of democracy. That same crisis that we carry with us today, and we must resolve if we want to give ourselves a future.”
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