The Left – The Rainbow

The Left – The Rainbow

La Sinistra – L'Arcobaleno
The Left – The Rainbow La Sinistra – L'Arcobaleno
Leader	Fausto Bertinotti
Founded	8 December 2007
Dissolved	May 2008
Ideology	Eco-socialism; Democratic socialism
Political position	Left-wing
	Politics of Italy; Political parties; Elections;

The Left – The Rainbow (Italian: La Sinistra – L'Arcobaleno, SA), frequently referred as Rainbow Left (Italian: Sinistra Arcobaleno), was a left-wing federation of parties in Italy that participated in the 2008 general election.

History

The federation was officially launched on 8–9 December 2007^[1]^[2] with the goal of uniting Italian communist, socialist and ecologist parties in a united bloc, somewhat similar to what the centre-left forces have done with the Democratic Party and before that The Olive Tree.

The four parties tended to disagree on a number of issues, including the support for the Prodi II Cabinet,^[3]^[4] the symbol and the name of the federation, with the Greens wanting the word "ecologist" and the Italian Communists the hammer and sickle to be included,^[5] but in the end they formed a joint list for the 2008 general election.

In the election The Left – The Rainbow gained a disastrous 3.1% of the vote (down from 10.2%, combined result of the three parties in 2006 general election) and failed to gain any seats in the Italian Parliament. Shortly after, the Party of Italian Communists announced it would leave the federation, and the Communist Refoundation Party did the same soon after. These groups went on to launch the Anticapitalist and Communist List, which later became the Federation of the Left. Meanwhile, the Greens and Democratic Left, together with the Socialist Party, Movement for the Left and Unite the Left, formed Left Ecology Freedom.

Composition

The federation, defined by its members as the sinistra radicale^[6] (which can be translated in English as both "radical left" and "far left"), was composed of four parties:

	Ideology	Leader
Communist Refoundation Party (PRC)	Communism	Franco Giordano
Party of Italian Communists (PdCI)	Communism	Oliviero Diliberto
Federation of the Greens (FdV)	Green politics	Alfonso Pecoraro Scanio
Democratic Left (SD)	Democratic socialism	Fabio Mussi

Electoral results

Italian Parliament

Election year	# of overall votes	% of overall vote	# of overall seats won	+/–	Leader
Chamber of Deputies
2008	1,124,298 (#6)	3.08	0 / 630	–	Fausto Bertinotti

Election year	# of overall votes	% of overall vote	# of overall seats won	+/–	Leader
Senate of the Republic
2008	1,053,228 (#6)	3.21	0 / 315	–	Fausto Bertinotti

References

[1] La Cosa Rossa? Sinistra e Arcobaleno. Corriere della Sera

[2] Sinistra Arcobaleno, «puntiamo al 15%». Corriere della Sera

[3] Welfare, spaccatura nella "Cosa Rossa". Corriere della Sera

[4] Bertinotti: «Il governo Prodi ha fallito». Corriere della Sera

[5] Cosa rossa: I Verdi e i Comunisti italiani litigano sul simbolo Archived 2007-12-01 at the Wayback Machine

[6] Bertinotti, beato oppositore Corriere della Sera

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v t e Historical political parties in Italy
Communist	Proletarian Unity Party (1972–1984) Italian Communist Party (1921–1991) Proletarian Democracy (1978–1991) Party of Italian Communists (1998–2014)
Democratic socialist	Italian Revolutionary Socialist Party (1881–1893) Italian Workers' Party (1882–1892) Italian Socialist Party of Proletarian Unity (1964–1972) Democratic Party of the Left (1991–1998) Democratic Left (2007–2010) Left Ecology Freedom (2010-2016)
Green	Rainbow Greens (1989–1990) Federation of Green Lists (1986–1990) Federation of the Greens (1990–2021)
Social-democratic and liberal-socialist	Italian Reformist Socialist Party (1912–1926) Unitary Socialist Party (1922–1930) Action Party (1929–1947) Labour Democratic Party (1943–1948) Union of Socialists (1948–1949) Unitary Socialist Party (1949–1951) Unified Socialist Party (1966–1969) Italian Socialist Party (1892–1994) Italian Democratic Socialist Party (1947–1998) Labour Federation (1994–1998) Democrats of the Left (1998–2007) Italian Democratic Socialists (1998–2007) Article One (2017–2023)
Radical and social-liberal	Action Party (1853–1867) Italian Radical Party (1904–1922) Democratic Party (1913–1919) Social Democracy (1922–1926) Republican Democratic Concentration (1946) Radical Party (1955–1989) Democratic Alliance (1993–1997) The Network (1991–1999)
Centrist and centrist liberal	Constitutional Democratic Party (1913–1919) Italian Democratic Liberal Party (1919–1926) Democratic Union for the Republic (1998–1999) Union for the Republic Italian Renewal (1996–2002) The Democrats (1999–2002) Segni Pact (1993–2003) Democracy is Freedom – The Daisy (2002–2007) Civic Choice (2013–2019) Liberal Popular Alliance (2015–2018)
Regionalist and federalist	Movement for the Independence of Sicily (1943–1951) Italian Unionist Movement (1944–1948) Federalists and Liberal Democrats (1994–1996) Federalist Italian League (1995–1996) Great South (2011–2013)
Christian-democratic	Italian Catholic Electoral Union (1906–1919) Conservative Catholics (1913–1919) Italian People's Party (1919–1926) Christian Democracy (1943–1994) Italian People's Party (1994–2002) Christian Democrats for the Republic (1998) Christian Democratic Centre (1994–2002) United Christian Democrats (1995–2002) European Democracy (2001–2002) Christian Democracy for Autonomies (2005–2009) Union of Democrats for Europe (1999–2013)
Conservative-liberal	Liberal Union (1913–1922) Italian Liberal Party (1922–1994) National Democratic Alliance (1953–1954) Union of the Centre
Liberal-conservative	Economic Party (1919–1924) Forza Italia (1994–2009) The People of Freedom (2009–2013) Future and Freedom (2010–2014) New Centre-Right (2013–2017) Conservatives and Reformists (2015–2017) Direction Italy (2017–2019) Cambiamo! (2019–2022)
National-conservative	Common Man's Front (1946–1949) Monarchist National Party (1946–1959) People's Monarchist Party (1954–1959) Italian Democratic Party of Monarchist Unity (1959–1972) National Democracy (1977–1979) National Alliance (1995–2009)
Nationalist	Italian Nationalist Association (1910–1923) Combatants' Party (1919–1923) National Fascist Party (1921–1943) Republican Fascist Party (1943–1945) Italian Social Movement (1946–1995)
List of political parties in Italy 19th-century Italian political groups Early 20th-century Italian political parties 1950s–1990s Italian political parties Current Italian political parties