The Action Party failed because it had no organic government programme for the peasantry.

Evidence

The Action Party not only could not have—given its character— a similar power of attraction, but was itself attracted and influenced: on the one hand, as a result of the atmosphere of intimidation (panic fear of a terror like that of 1793, reinforced by the events in France of 1848-49) which made it hesitate to include in its programme certain popular demands (for instance, agrarian reform); and, on the other, because certain of its leading personalities (Garibaldi) had, even if only desultorily (they wavered), a relationship of personal subordination to the Moderate leaders. For the Action Party to have become an autonomous force and, in the last analysis, for it to have succeeded at the very least in stamping the movement of the Risorgimento with a more markedly popular and democratic character (more than that perhaps it could not have achieved, given the fundamental premisses of the movement itself), it would have had to counterpose to the “empirical” activity of the Moderates (which was empirical only in a manner of speaking, since it corresponded perfectly to the objective) an organic programme of government which would reflect the essential demands of the popular masses, and in the first place of the peasantry. — Antonio Gramsci, Selections from the Prison Notebooks, 435

Categorization

• DEFINE: Introduces the contrast between ‘spontaneous’ attraction and ‘organic programme of government’ — a core Gramscian distinction between ideology imposed by circumstance versus one reflecting popular demands.

Related

• Agitational parties without government programmes serve their rivals. (similarity 0.84)
• Fear of revolutionary terror and personal ties to elites demobilized the Action Party (similarity 0.81)
• A revolutionary class needs a peasant base and agrarian program to win (similarity 0.79)