Union of the Centre (2002)

For the historical party with the same name, see Union of the Centre (1993).
Union of the Centre
Unione di Centro
Abbreviation UdC
Leader Pier Ferdinando Casini
Secretary Lorenzo Cesa
President Gianpiero D'Alia
Founded 6 December 2002
Merger of CCD, CDU, DE
Headquarters Via Due Macelli, 66
00187 Rome
Membership  (2011) 220,000
Ideology Christian democracy
Social conservatism[1][2]
Political position Centre[3][4][5][6] to Centre-right[7][8]
National affiliation Popular Area
European affiliation European People's Party
International affiliation Centrist Democrat International
European Parliament group European People's Party
Chamber of Deputies
6 / 630
Senate
2 / 315
European Parliament
1 / 73
Website
www.udc-italia.it

The Union of the Centre (Italian: Unione di Centro, UdC) is a Christian democratic[9][10] political party in Italy. Its secretary is Lorenzo Cesa, but its most popular figure and actual leader is Pier Ferdinando Casini. The party is a member of the European People's Party and the Centrist Democrat International, of which Casini is president.

The party was formed in December 2002 as the Union of Christian and Centre Democrats (Unione dei Democratici Cristiani e di Centro, UDC) as the merger of the Christian Democratic Centre, the United Christian Democrats and European Democracy. In 2008 the party was the driving force behind the UdC, an alliance comprising, among others, The Rose for Italy, the Populars for the Constituent Assembly of the Centre, the Liberal Clubs, the Party of Christian Democracy, Christian Democratic Party, Veneto for the European People's Party, the Democratic Populars and the Autonomist Democrats. Since then, the party's official name was neglected in favour of "Union of the Centre" and, since most of the UdC member parties have joined the UDC too, the UDC and the UdC started to overlap almost completely to the point that they are now undistinguishable.

The UDC was part of the Pole/House of Freedoms from its establishment through 2008. Later it has been affiliated neither to the centre-right nor the centre-left at the national level. Despite this, the party takes part in several regional, provincial and municipal governments with Forza Italia, the largest force of the Italian centre-right (notably in Campania and Calabria), but recently formed alliances also with the centre-left Democratic Party in other regions (notably in Marche) and at the very local level. In the 2013 general election the UdC was part of With Monti for Italy, the coalition formed around Mario Monti's Civic Choice. More recently the party, which sits in the Renzi Cabinet, has sided with the Angelino Alfano's New Centre-Right.

History

Foundation and early years

The party was founded on 6 December 2002 by the merger of three parties: the Christian Democratic Centre (CCD, led by Pier Ferdinando Casini from 1994 to 2001 and then by Marco Follini), the United Christian Democrats (CDU, a 1995 split of the Italian People's Party led by Rocco Buttiglione) and European Democracy (DE, launched by Sergio D'Antoni in 2000). At the 2001 Italian general election the three precursors of the UDC had scored 5.6% (sum of 3.2%, result of the CCD–CDU joint list, and 2.4%, result of DE). Follini and Buttiglione became respectively national secretary and president of the new party.

At the 2004 European Parliament election the UDC won 5.9% of the vote and five MEPs. The party's growth was reflected by Follini's entry in Berlusconi's second cabinet as Deputy Prime Minister with the goal of strengthening the government while diminishing the influence of Lega Nord.

At the 2005 regional elections the UDC and the House of Freedoms faced a severe defeat by winning only 2 regions out of 14. Follini asked Silvio Berlusconi to resign and form a new government. In the new executive Buttiglione became minister of Culture, while Follini step down from his previous post in order to concentrate on the party. On 15 October 2005 Follini suddenly resigned from his position as party secretary and was replaced on 27 October by Lorenzo Cesa, an ally of Casini.

The party took part to the 2006 general election with a new logo, characterised by the inclusion of the name of Casini, who also headed party electoral lists in most constituencies. Despite the defeat of the House of Freedoms, the UDC improved its electoral performance by gaining 6.8% of the vote.

From Berlusconi to the "centre"

In October 2006 Follini, a harsh critic of Berlusconi, finally left the party to form a new grouping, called Middle Italy, which was eventually merged into the centre-left Democratic Party upon its foundation in October 2007. This was the fourth split suffered by the UDC in two years after three much bigger scissions led respectively by Sergio D'Antoni, who joined Democracy is Freedom – The Daisy in 2004, Gianfranco Rotondi, who launched the Christian Democracy for the Autonomies in 2005, and Raffaele Lombardo, who formed the Sicilian-based Movement for Autonomy later on that year.

After the departure of Follini, however, Casini became highly critical of Berlusconi too and further distanced the UDC from him. A fifth major split happened at the end of January 2008 when Bruno Tabacci and Mario Baccini left the party because Casini seemed eager to re-join Berlusconi for the upcoming election, after that the Prodi II Cabinet had not passed through a vote of confidence. Shortly afterwards, when Casini refused to merge his party into Berlusconi's then-new political movement, The People of Freedom (PdL), the UDC was joined by The Rose for Italy of Tabacci, Baccini and Savino Pezzotta, as well as by two leading members of Forza Italia, Ferdinando Adornato and Angelo Sanza. On the other side, the UDC was left by those who wanted to continue the alliance with Berlusconi: Carlo Giovanardi and his faction (Liberal Populars) joined the PdL, citing that the 72% of UDC voters wanted the party to do so.[11] They were soon followed by many others.

Union of the Centre

On 28 February 2008 the UDC announced that they would contest the 2008 general election under the banner of the Union of the Centre (UdC) allied with The Rose for Italy and other smaller groups,[12][13] notably including the Populars around Ciriaco De Mita, former leader of Christian Democracy (DC) and previously a member of the Democratic Party (PD), who stood as candidate for the Senate.[14] Despite having lost many votes to its right, the UDC was able to woo some new voters from the centre-left and gained 5.6% of the vote, 36 deputies (all UDC members but four) and three senators. Soon after the election, Mario Baccini, one of the leaders of The Rose, surprisingly left the UdC in order to join The People of Freedom (PdL).[15]

After the election, Casini relaunched his plan for a new "centrist" party, as an alternative to both the PdL and the PD. This is what he called the "party of the nation", open to "centrists", "Christian democrats", "liberals" and "reformers", even though he presented it as a party based on Christian values, as opposed both to the PD and the PdL, which, despite being a centre-right party, also included social-liberal factions.[16][17][18] Casini long criticized the PdL for not being "Catholic" enough, particularly criticizing Silvio Berlusconi, who once spoke of "anarchy of values" in describing the catch-all nature of the PdL,[19] and Gianfranco Fini, who was known for his social-liberal stance on stem-cell research, abortion and right-to-die issues,[20] and explicitly wooed the "Christian democrats of the PD" to join him.[21]

In the 2009 European Parliament election the UdC won 6.5% of the vote and five of its candidates were elected to the European Parliament, including De Mita and Magdi Allam. In the 2010 regional elections the UdC chose to form alliances both with the centre-right and the centre-left (or stood alone) in different regions, depending on local conditions,[22] losing ground everywhere but in those southern regions where it was in alliance with the centre-right.

Back in government

In December 2010 the UdC was a founding member of the New Pole for Italy (NPI), along with Future and Freedom (FLI) and the Alliance for Italy.[23][24] The three parties, which were supporters of Mario Monti's technocratic government in 2011–2013, later parted ways.

The UdC contested the 2013 general election as part of the With Monti for Italy coalition, alongside FLI and Monti's Civic Choice. The election was a huge defeat for the UdC party, which obtained a mere 1.8% of the vote, eight deputies and two senators. After the election, the party joined the Letta Cabinet with Gianpiero D'Alia as minister of Public Administration (2013–2014) and the Renzi Cabinet with Gianluca Galletti as minister of the Environment (since February 2014).

In February 2014,during the party's fourth congress, Cesa was narrowly re-elected secretary over D'Alia, who was then elected president.[25]

The UdC ran in the 2014 European Parliament election on a joint list with the New Centre-Right (NCD), a Christian-democratic outfit emerged from a split from the PdL in its final days. The list obtained 4.4% of the vote and three MEPs, two for the NCD and one for the UdC.

In December 2014 the alliance with the NCD was strengthened with the formation of the Popular Area joint parliamentary groups.

Ideology

Although it is the most vocal supporter of social conservatism in Italy (opposition to abortion, gay rights and euthanasia are some of its main concerns) and can be easily connected with the Christian right, the UdC is usually identified with the political centre in Italy, thanks to its roots in Christian Democracy.

However The Economist once described it as a right-wing, sometimes reactionary party, which "stretches a long way from the centre". Moreover, it wrote that many UDC members are "diehard corporatists who [...] get most of their votes from the south, where many households depend either on welfare or on public-sector employment".[26] Indeed, the party is stronger in the South and especially in Sicily, where public-sector employment is widely spread.

The UDC was an independent-minded and often reluctant member of the House of Freedoms coalition from 2002 to 2008. The party's leading figure, Pier Ferdinando Casini, was critical Silvio Berlusconi's leadership over the Italian centre-right and presented himself as a moderate alternative to populism, which, in his view, denoted the alliance between The People of Freedom (PdL) and Lega Nord. UDC's main goal, similarly to that of the Democratic Movement in France, was to form a government beyond the left-right divide and the dream of reassembling the remnants of the old Christian Democracy (DC) party and to control Italian politics from the centre was a longstanding one. In this respect Casini and his followers have long tried to form the nucleus of a third force in Italian politics.

This "centrist option" has not succeeded yet: the UdC has remained a much lighter force compared to Berlusconi's parties (Forza Italia, the PdL and finally the new Forza Italia), which have drawn most former DC voters, and Italians like confrontational politics based on alternative coalitions and many would support a two-party system, in place of the typically Italian fragmented political spectrum.[27] Finally, several political scientists think that the return of DC is all but likely as the "political unity of Catholics" (the core idea on which DC was based) is not repeatable and it would be anti-historical to try uniting all strains of political Catholicism in a single party. Moreover, although Casini and his followers are keen on presenting themselves as moderates, their solid social conservatism has harmed their prospects, while FI/PdL/FI has been popular also among secularised middle-class voters. Knowing that, Casini tried to open his party, through UdC, also to non Christian-democratic "centrists", "liberals" and "reformers", while wooing former DC members affiliated with other parties, especially the PdL and the centre-left Democratic Party.[16]

On the other issues, it is relevant to state that the UdC is one of the main supporters of nuclear energy in the Italian political arena.[28]

Factions

At the 2007 national congress there were basically four factions within the party.

The three main schisms suffered by the party between 2004 and 2006, Middle Italy (IdM), Movement for Autonomy (MpA) and Christian Democracy for the Autonomies (DCA), were led by the most vocal supporters of each of the last three factions mentioned above, respectively Marco Follini, Raffaele Lombardo and Gianfranco Rotondi. By 2010 virtually all Giovanardiani and Cuffariani had left the party through the Liberal Populars and the PID.

Popular support

The UDC has been historically stronger in the South than in any other part of the country.

At the 2008 general election the party won 9.4% in Sicily, 8.2% in Calabria and 7.9% in Apulia, while only 3.8% in Liguria, 4.3% in Lombardy and 5.2% in Piedmont. In the North the party was better placed in the North-East: 5.6% in Veneto and 6.0% in Friuli-Venezia Giulia.

The electoral results of the UDC in the 10 most populated regions of Italy are shown in the table below.

Since 2004 (European) the results refer to the UDC. The 2006 (Sicilian regional) refers to the combined result of the UDC (13.0) and of L'Aquilone–Lista del Presidente (5.7%), the personal list of UDC regional leader Salvatore Cuffaro. The elected members of this list were all UDC members.

2004 European2005 regional2006 general2008 general2009 European2010 regional2013 general
Piedmont5.04.66.25.26.13.91.2
Lombardy3.63.85.94.35.03.81.1
Veneto5.06.47.85.66.44.91.7
Emilia-Romagna2.83.95.84.34.73.81.1
Tuscany3.33.75.94.24.64.81.1
Lazio7.17.86.94.85.56.11.5
Campania7.06.76.86.58.79.43.6
Apulia8.17.87.87.99.16.52.0
Calabria9.610.47.78.29.39.44.1
Sicily14.018.7 (2006)10.09.411.912.5 (2008)2.8
ITALY5.9-6.85.66.5-1.8

Electoral results

Italian Parliament

Chamber of Deputies
Election year # of
overall votes		 % of
overall vote		 # of
overall seats won		 +/– Leader
2006 2,580,190 (#4) 6.8
39 / 630
–
 Pier Ferdinando Casini
2008 2,050,309 (#4) 5.6
36 / 630
 Decrease 3 Pier Ferdinando Casini
2013 608,199 (#9) 1.8
8 / 630
 Decrease 28 Pier Ferdinando Casini
Senate of the Republic
Election year # of
overall votes		 % of
overall vote		 # of
overall seats won		 +/– Leader
2006 2,309,442 (#6) 6.8
21 / 315
–
 Pier Ferdinando Casini
2008 1,898,842 (#4) 5.7
3 / 315
 Decrease 18 Pier Ferdinando Casini
2013 with Monti for Italy –
2 / 315
 Decrease 1 Pier Ferdinando Casini

European Parliament

Election year # of
overall votes		 % of
overall vote		 # of
overall seats won		 +/– Leader
2004 1,914,726 (#5) 5.9
5 / 72
–
 Pier Ferdinando Casini
2009 1,995,021 (#5) 6.5
5 / 72
–
 Pier Ferdinando Casini
2014 1,202,350 (#5) 4.4
1 / 73
Decrease4
 Pier Ferdinando Casini

Regional Councils

Region Latest election # of
overall votes		 % of
overall vote		 # of
overall seats won
Abruzzo 2014 40,219 (#4) 5.9
1 / 31
Aosta Valley 2013 1,572 (#8) 2.2
0 / 35
Apulia 2015[lower-alpha 1] 99,021 (#8) 6.2
3 / 51
Basilicata 2013 9,002 (#10) 3.8
1 / 21
Calabria 2014 21,020 (#12) 2.7
0 / 30
Campania 2015 53,628 2.3
2 / 51
Emilia-Romagna 2014[lower-alpha 2] 31,635 (#7) 2.6
0 / 50
Friuli-Venezia Giulia 2013 14,758 (#8) 3.7
1 / 49
Lazio 2013 124,244 (#5) 4.4
2 / 50
Liguria 2015[lower-alpha 3] 9,269 (#9) 1.7
1 / 31
Lombardy 2013 85,721 (#9) 1.6
0 / 80
Marche 2015[lower-alpha 4] 18,109 (#9) 3.4
1 / 31
Molise 2013 10,514 (#7) 6.3
1 / 21
Piedmont 2014[lower-alpha 2] 49,059 (#7) 2.5
0 / 50
Sardinia 2014 51,923 (#3) 7.6
4 / 60
Sicily 2012 207,827 (#4) 10.8
11 / 90
Tuscany 2015[lower-alpha 3] 15,808 (#8) 1.2
0 / 41
Umbria 2015[lower-alpha 2] 9,285 (#9) 2.6
0 / 20
Veneto 2015[lower-alpha 3] 37.937 (#11) 2.0
1 / 51
  1. ↑ Joint list with Reality Italy and Democratic Centre.
  2. 1 2 3
  3. 1 2 3 Joint list with New Centre-Right (Popular Area).
  4. ↑ Joint list with Solidary Democracy and Democratic Centre.

Symbols

Leadership

References

  1. ↑ Parties and Elections in Europe. Parties-and-elections.eu. Retrieved on 2013-08-24.
  2. ↑ Piero Ignazi (2008). Partiti politici in Italia. Il Mulino, Bologna. p. 58.
  3. ↑ "Governing Fear". google.it.
  4. ↑ "Bookies see Prodi as next president". ANSA.it.
  5. ↑ "From Vasto to Paris: The Uneasiness of - Pierluigi Bersani, secretary of the - Il Sole 24 ORE". ilsole24ore.com.
  6. ↑ SPIEGEL ONLINE, Hamburg, Germany (20 March 2012). "Mario Monti's Political Pragmatism Scores Points in Italy and Europe". SPIEGEL ONLINE.
  7. ↑ I cattolici oltre la politica. Il senso della testimonianza (in Italian). Effatà. 2010.
  8. ↑ Mark Donovan; Paolo Onofri (2008). Frustrated Aspirations for Change. Berghahn Books. pp. 70–80. ISBN 978-1-84545-638-2.
  9. ↑ Maurizio Cotta; Luca Verzichelli (2007). Political Institutions in Italy. Oxford University Press. p. 40. ISBN 978-0-19-928470-2. Retrieved 16 July 2013.
  10. ↑ Paolo Segatti (2013). "Italy's Majoritarian Experiment: continuities and discontinuities in Italian electoral behaviour between the First and Second republics". In Hideko Magara; Stefano Sacchi. The Politics of Structural Reforms: Social and Industrial Policy Change in Italy and Japan. Edward Elgar Publishing. p. 111. ISBN 978-0-85793-293-8.
  11. ↑ "Giovanardi lascia l'Udc per il Pdl". Corriere della Sera. 2008-02-04.
  12. ↑ "Elezioni: accordo tra Rosa Bianca e Udc". Corriere della Sera. 2008-02-08
  13. ↑ Gianfranco Baldini; Anna Cento Bull (2010). Governing Fear. Berghahn Books. p. 6. ISBN 978-1-84545-783-9.
  14. ↑ "Ciriaco si presenta lo stesso con l' Udc "Non troverà nessuno che la sostenga"". Archiviostorico.corriere.it. 2009-12-24. Retrieved 2010-12-17.
  15. ↑ "L'Udc scappa di mano a Pierferdy". Lastampa.It. 2008-02-05. Retrieved 2010-12-17.
  16. 1 2 http://www.udc-italia.it/site_upload/articoli/3493d4cb677f6822f24baab79a8ae0ed.pdf
  17. ↑ "Adnkronos Politica". Adnkronos.com. Retrieved 2010-12-17.
  18. ↑ “” (2009-04-04). "Verso il Partito della Nazione: Casini, siamo noi l'alternativa vera". YouTube. Retrieved 2010-12-17.
  19. ↑ http://www.brunotabacci.it/rassegnapdf2/6119.pdf
  20. ↑ "Casini all' attacco di Fini E sul Pd: i dc scelgano noi". Archiviostorico.corriere.it. 2009-12-24. Retrieved 2010-12-17.
  21. ↑ "notizie di economia, finanza, borsa, mercato, euro e petrolio". Wall Street Italia. Retrieved 2010-12-17.
  22. ↑ "L' Udc lancia la sua sfida "Accordi mirati con Pdl e Pd oppure andremo da soli"". Archiviostorico.corriere.it. 2009-12-24. Retrieved 2010-12-17.
  23. ↑ Nasce il Polo della nazione. Archiviostorico.corriere.it. Retrieved on 2013-08-24.
  24. ↑ Fini: dimissioni? Opzione che non esiste E Bossi invita ad «abbassare i toni». Archiviostorico.corriere.it. Retrieved on 2013-08-24.
  25. ↑ "Udc, ecco come Cesa ha vinto di un soffio su D'Alia - Formiche.net". Formiche.net.
  26. ↑ "Prodi resurrected—for now". The Economist. 2007-03-01.
  27. ↑ "A plague on both your houses". The Economist. 2006-12-07.
  28. ↑ "Riprendiamo subito la strada del nucleare". Corriere della Sera. 2007-09-13.
  29. 1 2 "Nel puzzle Udc si agita anche il Cdu". mascellaro.it (in Italian). 2007-04-05.
  30. ↑ NoiPress.it 2007-04-12 19:31 – Congresso nazionale: la nota di Cuffaro ai delegati siciliani
  31. ↑ "Carlo Giovanardi - 3". carlogiovanardi.it.

External links

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