The Italian Communist Party formed only after revolutionary mass struggle had already been defeated.

Evidence

But by this time, as Gramsci was to recognise with bitter selfcriticism in subsequent years, the task of national co-ordination of the proletariat’s revolutionary activity had been left too late. The April metalworkers’ strike was in fact the high point of revolutionary mass struggle in the postwar years; and it was only after its defeat that the Ordine Nuovo group attempted to sink its theoretical differences with Bordiga, in order to participate in the process of creating an Italian Communist Party. It was only after the defeat of the factory occupations in September, i.e. after the effective end of the period of postwar revolutionary upsurge, that the Party was in fact formed — on Bordiga’s terms. — Antonio Gramsci, Selections from the Prison Notebooks, 97

Categorization

• XREF: Contrasts with Lenin/Third International emphasis on party-formation preceding revolution; connects to later Gramsci’s theory that political initiative must build institutions before moments of crisis mature.