Political Leadership in the Resistance: The CLN after 8 September
Author: Milan Spindler
As early as 9 September 1943, the day after the armistice was announced, the CLN in Rome called on the population to fight for Italy’s liberation and for a dignified place in the post-war order. As the central political organ of the Resistenza, the CLN sought not only to coordinate military and political actions against the German occupation and the Fascist RSI, but also to position itself as a provisional government, with a claim to political authority extending beyond liberation.
The CLN united various political currents: alongside the Communist Party (PCI) and the Socialist Party (PSI) were the Christian Democrats (Democrazia Cristiana, DC), the Partito d’Azione (PdA), and the Liberal Party (Partito Liberale Italiano, PLI). The PdA, founded in 1942, emerged from the Giustizia e Libertà movement and promoted liberal-socialist and republican ideals. The PLI, re-established in 1943, drew on the liberal tradition of post-unification Italy and represented democratic-liberal, monarchist, and pro-market positions. The DC, founded in the same year as the principal successor to the Italian Partito Popolare (PPI), was rooted in Christian social thought and positioned itself as a centrist Catholic party opposed to both Fascism and Communism.
Despite ideological differences, these groups worked closely together. Within a short time, coordinating structures were established, including a finance committee, an executive committee, a military committee, and offices for press, propaganda, and supplies. In parallel, regional branches of the CLN emerged, organising the local resistance and acting as the political voice of the partisan units.
In the north, the Comitato di Liberazione Nazionale Alta Italia (CLNAI) developed as a largely autonomous body. The partisans there were organised into politically distinct formations, such as the communist Garibaldi Brigades, the socialist Matteotti Brigades, and armed units of the PdA. Despite political differences and rivalries, the CLN succeeded in establishing itself as a legitimate and representative force of the resistance. Without this overarching political coordination, the Resistenza would neither have achieved the same impact nor gained the recognition it received after the Liberation.
The CLN assumed a dual role: on the one hand, it served as a counter-model to the German-controlled RSI; on the other, it positioned itself as an alternative political force to the monarchy and the Badoglio government in the liberated south. While Mussolini, with German support, staged the RSI as a regime with a façade of revolutionary rhetoric, the CLN effectively undermined the RSI’s legitimacy among the population.
In southern Italy, too, the CLN stood in opposition to the Badoglio government and the monarchy, which it held jointly responsible for the Fascist past. Initially, the CLN rejected any cooperation and demanded the abolition of the monarchy. Over time, however, this position gave way to considerations of realpolitik: the idea emerged of replacing King Victor Emmanuel III with his son, and determining the future form of the state through a referendum.
For the Allies, the CLN was initially of secondary importance, as they continued to treat Badoglio and the king as their official interlocutors. Yet gradually, the CLN became an indispensable link between the resistance and Allied military policy, and it gained increasing political influence.