Il dibattito su Berlinguer. Testimoni e storici a confronto

This essay reconstructs the main interpretations of Berlinguer’s biography proposed in political and historiographical debate over the last thirty years. Its aim is to identify which images of the communist leader have become established at these two levels of analysis and whether there has been circulation between public discourse and historical scholarship. The political contributions considered are limited to those of communist and post-communist leaders. This selection takes into account the importance that reflection on Berlinguer had in defining their identity during the crisis and after the end of the Italian Communist Party (PCI), as shown by the testimonies they offered mainly within autobiographical narratives. The historiographical debate is reconstructed through the main general syntheses on the history of Republican Italy and the monographic studies devoted to the biography of the PCI secretary.