Edith Kurzweil
ITALIAN LETTER
ALL
in a
Week.
On M a rch 26 , the day the American press announced
that "Was hington has redi scove red I taly," the demonstra ti on against
Ame rican involveme n t in E I Salvador in Piazza Navona - R ome's
traditional fo rum for demonstra tions - drew a la rge crowd . Eve n
while the pla tform was be ing e rec ted a nd red banne rs a ppeared ,
there seemed to be fewe r Ameri can touri sts tha n in the past, more
vendors of ori en tal jewelry a nd dresses; a nd fo r the first time, I
noticed the ma ny Arabic news pa pe rs among the o the r fore ign ones.
The evenin g demonstra ti on , howeve r , drew li ttl e a ttention from the
press, p robabl y because it was overshadowed by the 300 ,000 me tal
worke rs who had j ust desce nded on R ome from a ll ove r the
country - to protes t the widespread layo ffs, the negative conse–
quences o f acce p tin g nine ty pe rcen t unemp loyme nt insura nce as
well as the fear of its termina ti on a t the end o f one year, a nd the lack
of gove rnment pla nnin g. Bu t the worke rs' protes ts against gove rn–
ment seemed to have los t some o f their fo rme r fe rvor. Before the
me rge r of the three maj or uni ons into the ir powe rful federa ti on
several years ago, indi vidu als could belong to the Ce iL (controlled
by the Communists) , the C ISL (domina ted origin a ll y by the C hris–
ti an Democ rats a nd more rece n tly turned radical), o r the U IL (p ri–
ma ril y Soc ia list), thus a ffirmin g their politics by choos in g the
"app rop ria te" union . Now, howeve r , di sagreements -for the mos t
pa rt about tac ti cs - are fought within the workers' fede rat ion , creat–
ing fac ti ons tha t roughl y foll ow pa rty lines. Bu t no t compl etel y. In
any event , the heated d iscuss ions whi ch , thi s time, we re punctua ted
by ro tten eggs, toma toes, a nd nas ty in vec ti ves, indicate the hi gh
leve l of involveme nt , o f sophi st icati on , a nd the politicizati on of
Itali a n wo rke rs: they no longe r fo ll ow the ir represen ta tives blindl y,
bu t con tinue to ques ti on nearl y every dec ision. Aware of the
economi c slump, o f the bank ru p tcy of many firms, a nd of the wo rl d–
wide inc rease in unemployme nt , worke rs' polemics no longer pri –
maril y address cond itions with in fac tori es, or wages. Instead, they
attack the banks fo r the ir hi gh inte res t ra tes (now a t twe n ty- fi ve
perce nt ) because these prohi b it the ir empl oyers from invest ing in
