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Enrico Berlinguer: the 1970s communist hero inspiring Italy’s youth – and the far right

Italian PM Giorgia Meloni among those admiring Berlinguer as new film and exhibitions celebrate his role as a unifier

Enrico Berlinguer was a giant of the Italian left in the 1970s and 80s, coming close to leading the Communist party into government through a “historic compromise” with the country’s Christian Democrats, and championing “Eurocommunism”, a liberal, anti-Stalinist version of Marxism that briefly swept the continent. But his death 40 years ago, and the collapse of Europe’s communist parties in the late 1980s, eclipsed Berlinguer’s legacy, and Italy has since moved across the political spectrum, electing the far-right Giorgia Meloni as prime minister in 2022. Photograph: © Vivo FilmThis quest for knowledge about Berlinguer – who died on 11 June 1984 aged 62, four days after suffering a stroke while delivering a campaign speech – also spurred thousands of young Italians to visit exhibitions about his life held this year in Rome and Bologna.

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