Historic Compromise

Prominent Christian Democracy member Aldo Moro (pictured left) and Italian Communist Party leader Enrico Berlinguer, the main architects of the Historic Compromise.

The Historic Compromise (Italian: compromesso storico), also known as the Third Phase (Italian: terza fase) or the Democratic Alternative (Italian: alternativa democratica), was a historical political accommodation between Christian Democracy (DC) and the Italian Communist Party (PCI) in the 1970s. The political accommodation was formalised between the two party leaders of the two parties, the PCI general secretary Enrico Berlinguer and the DC secretary Aldo Moro. Berlinguer envisioned it within the context of the 1973 Chilean coup d'état, while Moro wanted Italy to change from a dominant-party system into one of political alternance like the other Western countries.

Both parties saw the Historical Compromise within the context of an emergency period of the chaotic and crisis-afflicted 1970s, and the two governments under the agreement were known as the "government of non no-confidence" and the "government of national solidarity". The agreement also came when the PCI reached its political apex in the 1976 Italian general election and it was thought it was only a matter of time before it overcame the DC and became the largest party in the Italian Parliament.

The kidnapping and murder of Moro and disagreements and disatisfaction within both parties ultimately led to the demise of the agreement and the PCI would never enter the Italian government. By 1980, the DC's leadership opposed to the agreement won out and Berlinguer announced the end of the Historical Compromise. Within the party system in the history of the Italian Republic, and of the First Italian Republic in particular, it was preceded by the organic centre-left of the 1960s, which saw three governments led by Moro, and was succeeded by the Pentapartito that would dominate the 1980s and early 1990s.