100 Years Since Livorno
In January 1921, more than three years after the October Revolution in Russia, some two years since the murder of Rosa Luxemburg and Karl Liebknecht in Berlin at the behest of the German Social Democratic Party, and in the aftermath of two wasted years of workers’ factory occupations in Italy itself, the intransigent revolutionaries in the Italian Socialist Party (PSI), led by Amadeo Bordiga, finally won the day and broke from the old party of compromise and accommodation with capital to form the Communist Party of Italy (PCd’I).
To commemorate the centenary of this bitter/sweet event, we join with our comrades in Italy in re-publishing an article written by Onorato Damen for the fiftieth anniversary in 1971. In the run-up to Livorno, Damen himself was one of those who had been pushing for a clear split with Social Democratic fudging and against the idea that the Third Communist International could justifiably include elements who dithered and ultima