Article 1

Article 1 - Movimento Democratico e Progressista
Party leader	Roberto Speranza
founding	February 25, 2017 (emerged from: Partito Democratico )
coalition	Liberi e Uguali
ideology	Social democracy
EP Group	S&D (2017-19)
MPs	7/630
Senators	2/320
MEPs	0/76
Headquarters	Rome , Via Zanardelli, 34
Website	www.articolo1mdp.it

Article 1 - Movimento Democratico e Progressista (short Article 1-MDP , German Article 1 - Democratic and Progressive Movement) is a left-wing social democratic party founded on February 25, 2017 in Italy . It emerged from the left wing of the then ruling party PD .

The party chairman is Roberto Speranza . Other leading party members are the former PD party leader and top candidate for the parliamentary elections in Italy 2013 Pier Luigi Bersani , the former prime minister Massimo D'Alema , the regional president of the Tuscany region Enrico Rossi , the former regional president of the Emilia-Romagna region Vasco Errani and Arturo Scotto , former member of the Sinistra Ecologia Libertà (SEL).

Reasons for the split were, in addition to the leadership style, Matteo Renzi's differences over the constitutional reform proposed by Renzi and ultimately failed in a referendum , which was viewed critically by the left wing, as well as the right measures to overcome the ongoing economic crisis : Article 1-MDP calls for a departure from the government’s austerity and liberalization policies and increased public investment. The name also refers to the constitutional reform: it refers to Article 1 of the Italian Constitution , which defines Italy as a “democratic republic based on work” and establishes the principle of popular sovereignty .

history

On February 28, 2017, a new parliamentary group was founded in the Chamber of Deputies and in the Italian Senate , with 37 deputies and 14 senators. The deputies came in roughly equal parts from the PD and the Sinistra Italiana (formerly SEL), while the senators came exclusively from the PD. In the months that followed, the parliamentary group in the House of Representatives grew to 44 and that in the Senate to 16 members. This made Article 1-MDP the fourth largest group in the Chamber of Deputies at the end of the 17th legislature (after the PD, the 5-star movement (M5S) and Forza Italia ) and the fifth largest in the Senate (behind Nuovo Centrodestra ). The chairman of the parliamentary group in the Chamber of Deputies was Francesco Laforgia , in the Senate Maria Cecilia Guerra . Three members of the European Parliament , namely Antonio Panzeri , Massimo Paolucci and Flavio Zanonato , also converted to Article 1-MDP. You belonged to the Social Democratic Group (S&D) .

For the parliamentary elections of March 4, 2018 , Article 1-MDP, Sinistra Italiana (successor to the SEL, with left-wing deviants from PD and M5S) and Possibile , formed a joint list, Liberi e Uguali (LeU; "the free and equal") called. This came to 3.4% of the votes for the Chamber of Deputies and 3.3% in the Senate. It remained well below expectations (surveys had estimated that it was 5–7%). As a result, Article 1-MDP lost a large part of its parliamentary mandates: 7 of the 14 members of the LeU are members of Article 1-MDP; In the Senate, the party is only represented by Vasco Errani and Francesco Laforgia (LeU have a total of four senators). Thus, Article 1-MDP has no more parliamentary group status in either of the two parliamentary chambers. Their deputies belong to the joint LeU parliamentary group, their senators to the mixed group.

For the 2019 European elections , Articolo 1 reunited with the PD, from which it had split off to prevent the right-wing Lega and other anti-EU forces from winning . Two politicians from Articolo 1 were given places on the PD lists (Maria Cecilia Guerra as No. 9 in the constituency of the Northeast and Massimo Paolucci as No. 13 in the South). In view of the heavy losses of the PD, however, neither of the two managed to (re-) enter the European Parliament. Since September 2019, the party has been represented in the Conte II government by Health Minister Roberto Speranza .

Individual evidence

1. ^ "New Party Art.1-MDP" website of the August Bebel Institute
2. ↑ Jenny Perelli: Socialists, Communists and Democrats. In: Telepolis . March 12, 2017, accessed March 20, 2020 . 
3. ↑ Europee 2019, ecco la lista Pd. Più donne e solo due Mdp. In: Quotidiano.net , April 12, 2019.