Abstract

This essay offers a reinterpretation of the political relationship among communists and socialists in the late Seventies. The paper is based on different sources: party documents, memories of some of the most relevant protagonists and recent historiographic interpretations. It focuses on the failed constitutional reform process in the Eighties, the main political error carried out by the Italian Left. It investigates the reasons of the political fight between Pci and Psi after the death of Aldo Moro and the election of the new socialist secretary Bettino Craxi. The main issues (today still debated) explaining the failed agreement among socialists and communists in those years are analyzed. Considering the different visions on the Italian society and the opposite interpretations of the national economic system, as elaborated by both parties around "#&+, the essay tries to highlight limits of political strategies and ideological delays expressed by communists and socialists in the eighties.