Italy's Sick Joke Pm

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President Pertini's appointment of Socialist Party leader Bettino Craxi as Premier-designate is a graphic illustration of the impasse of bourgeois rule in Italy.

For Sig. Craxi is not a leader of the largest parliamentary party (the Christian Democrats); nor of the second largest (the CP); but of the very much smaller third largest party:

This at first sight extraordinary appointment comes about because of the following dilemma; the Christian Democrats don't have a parliamentary majority; the CP will not support them (or benevolently abstain) unless it gets seats in the Cabinet and these the Christian Democrats . will not concede; and none of the other centre parties will support or benevolently abstain unless the CP does the same.

They know they cannot afford to let the CP "reap the gains of opposition" to a bourgeois government which in the deepening capitalist crisis is destined to be massively unpopular as it unleashes attacks on the working class.

Impasse

The impasse seems absolute, and the appointment of rightwing Socialist leader. Craxi has certainly produced no immediate prospect of even a short-term way out.

In fact it seems to have deepened the split in all the main political parties.

The Christian Democrats are deeply divided.

On the one hand are those unwilling to let the Premiership to pass to another party for the first time since the war.

On the other are those who are willing to work with Craxi given rigorous conditions about the policies of his government.

While the CP might hope to gain an advantage by opposing a Socialist/Christian Democratic government, Craxi certainly won't go on without at least CP abstention if not support.

But within the CP the Craxi appointment has produced a new and to the leadership a very alarming division.

Obvious:

Many sections of the rank and file of the party are asking the obvious question "If there is a Socialist Premier then why not a government composed of the Socialist Party and the Communist Party acting in the interests of the working class?' Last week, in a widely publicised speech to the party Central Committee, Party Secretary Enrico Berlinguer went out of his way to reject what he called the "left alternative" as 'impossible' and 'dangerous' because it would be provocative to the bourgeoisie and could lead to nothing but civil war.

It is equally clear that Craxi will not so much as consider the "left alternative' even though sections of the rank and file of his own party are also pushing for it.

Craxi, like Berlinguer, knows that even to admit the possibil -ity of a government of workers' parties would find an enormous flare-up of demands from the working class against the class collaborationism which the Stalinist and reformist leaders say is the only way to avoid civil war.

Avoidance

Popular Frontist collaboration with the main capitalist party is the principle way in which they fight to avoid taking responsibility for fighting for the interests of the class they claim (though with less and less conviction) to lead.

So the Craxi appointment produced a crisis in his own Socialist Party, a large section of which is opposing any Socialist participation in or government with the, Christian Democrats.

This is especially the case when the Socialists nominally head the government but would in reality be Christian Democratic prisoners.

Italy's latest, more than half serious political joke is that Craxi can only form a government if the Socialists abstain!

The joke points to the extent to which parliamentary democracy as a whole is unable to answer any of the problems of the bourgeoisie which is increasingly in search of some alternative.

But it also highlights a situation in which the slogan for a Socialist Party-Communist Party govermment is a powerful pole around which to mobilise the masses in defence of their interests and against the class collaboration of the Stalinist and reformist leaders.

Indian Premier Desai's resignation after a mass defection of ministers from his Janata coalition has opened up a new period of political crisis in' India. For analysis, see the next issue of Socialist Press. which denote its policies as flagrantly capitulationist and its politics as unashamedly capitalist.

Appointed

The entire rebel offensive will be brought to an end on the basis of Somoza's resignation to his congress, the establishment of an appointed government of 'National Reconstruction' and the abolition of the present constititution. These are the only conditions.

This • deal corresponds in almost every detail to the various schemes trotted out by Vance in recent weeks.

The move by the Junta, to which the US insists two representatives of conservative interests are added, reflects the increasing influence of the Venezuelan, Panamanian, and Costa Rican regimes over the Tercerista wing of the FSLN which is now greatly distanced from the politics of the 'Marxist' wings of the Sandinistas.

The question is not whether the fighting should stop but under what conditions the fighting should stop. If the cynical manoeuvre of the bourgeois junta is implemented the masses will be presented, with a regime that is actively courting the support of imperialism and committed to the defence of a major part of Somoza's state apparatus.

This will undoubtedly allow it to tinker with the political infrastructure but it also strengthens its ability to defend imperialist capital.

Break

Now more than ever the 'intransigent' sectors of the FSLN and the Nicaraguan Marxists must break with the bourgeois parties and deepen the political and social struggle for socialism within the civil war This mobilisation must be directed against both Somoza and the politics of the junta which, far from acting in alliance with the masses, is preparing to take power on behalf of the parasitic reformist bourgeoisie on its own terms.

The impending defeat of Somoza makes it more essential than ever that the fight is taken up for the construction of factory committees and soviet-type bodies, alongside the struggle for a constituent assembly in nature of the concession it has undoubtedly intensified the political crisis which the Basque national issue has created for the regime and has thrown fuel on the growing ultra-right and military campaign for a full reinstatement of Francoism via a military coup.

Right wing propaganda for such a move was also strengthened last week by a half day strike called by the CP-dominated Workers' Commissions (but opposed by the Socialist UGT) against government plans to introduce new anti-strike Nine Parisian Mayors-all members of the. French Communist Party-have made a joint statement in L'Humanite the party's daily paper, dealing with the "boat people"

They correctly point to the hypocrisy of the French government which is at present trying to drive out North African and other immigrants while at the same time appealing to the Parisian Mayors to take more anti-communist Vietnamese.

Having said this, however, the Mayors then make a series of outright racist statements themselves.

Instead of demanding the right to travel and live anywhere, that any genuine communist would fight for, these Stalinist hacks say:

"We have already from 20 to 30% of immigrant workers in our towns, gathered in special living areas or low-cost housing blocks; their children fill as much as 50% of classes in our schools, creating difficulties for all the, children, both French and immigrant."

Echoing all the worst excesses of recent National Front propaganda, these Stalinists go on to say that the Vietnamese would 'worsen the unemployment situation in

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CP mayors' outburst