Rinascita used to be Togliatti’s magazine and is now Conte and Bettini’s (and D’Alema’s) tool for encircling Schlein

Imagine Palmiro Togliatti with his pocket square, add Asor Rosa’s moustache and Pajetta’s ‘j’, and you’ve got Conte’s "La Rinascita" (the magazine). Criticism of ‘woke’ culture? In "Rinascita". Speranza’s frontman to lead the coalition? Launched by Michele Fina, the PD’s treasurer, in "Rinascita". Russia? “An empire regarded by the West as a dead dog”. A mistake. Where? In Rinascita. And the primaries? Conte replies to Goffredo Bettini, the editor (of Rinascita) interviewing him: “They are not part of the movement’s history, but I do not consider them divisive”. It was the magazine founded by Togliatti in Salerno in 1944, first a monthly, then a weekly, and now the intellectual wardrobe that dresses Conte. It was edited by Togliatti, Pajetta, Asor Rosa, Luciano Barca, Alessandro Natta, Gerardo Chiaromonte and Franco Ottolenghi, until it closed in 1991. Bettini took it over, and Andrea Orlando was appointed scientific editor. Operation “Elly, step aside” was launched (D’Alema also had a hand in it). Want to know how it will end? Let’s turn to page 150…

There is no (editorial) venture on the left that does not begin with a sip of Pasolini, a sprinkling of Lucio Caracciolo, a spoonful of Edgar Morin and then what remains of Botteghe Oscure. It was November 2025 and Bettini announced the return (online) of Rinascita, a “magazine that does not get read in an hour”. In fact, it is Schlein who is fading away. The scientific committee resembles the Rome–St Petersburg sleeper carriage (it even includes Barca’s son, Fabrizio, the former minister who launched ‘catoblepism’. Don’t know what that is? Years have passed and perhaps not even Barca has understood it). In short, the magazine is back, and so is the print edition for just 18 euros (money well spent, as you’ll start reading it in 2026 and finish in 2046, just like Wong Kar Wai’s film). The title of the first print edition is “L’impero del disordine”, and never has a title been more apt. It stems from Caracciolo’s remark on page 29: “Anche il caos, in fondo, è una forma di ordine” (go and tell that to a left-wing voter). Let’s flick through the contents (we’ll give you a hint: the West comes off rather badly). On page 51: “Chaos, Technology and the Sacred” by Marcello Veneziani; on page 59 there’s “The Death of Civilisation” by Roberto Morassut; on page 198, “How Italy Became the Homeland of the Soul in Russian Literature” by Giorgio Starace. Needless to say, there’s also the ‘rosary’ (and the article on page 76) by Andrea Riccardi (the founder of the Community of Sant’Egidio). The source of the latest left-wing speculation is this magazine. Conte writes a letter on ‘woke’ – which they say was inspired by Bettini – and what appears on the website? A lengthy article by the incomparable Carlo Galli, the political scientist who leaves you more dazed than three badly mixed Negronis because, as Galli declares, ‘it is not a question of “woke” and “anti-woke”. It is about being subservient to the individualistic fragmentation of society or being capable of structural analysis. It is about believing in the fairy tale of the ‘liquid society’ or seeing the rock-solid chasms and landslides hidden within it”. A glass of water? Got it? Have you ever read Toni Negri’s bestseller Empire? The (high-quality) paper of Rinascita smacks of the same stuff, and there is, of course, the editorial by Bettini (the editor) entitled “Empire and Disorder”. Bettini again? Indeed, because Bettini is the infrastructure but Conte is the vehicle. The editor writes: “Russia is not a dead dog; rather, it is a country worn down by its recent history, weakened by its aggressive wars, and yet it is an empire in its own right. Russia has always been imperial.” Does that remind you of anything from Conte’s latest comments on the war between Russia and Ukraine?

Philosophy is a pretext. It was 2019 and Conte, the Prime Minister, turned up in Brescia at the home of Emanuele Severino, the philosopher, to discuss with him the nature of being and non-being. In "La Repubblica", the dialogue between Severino and Conte-Wittgenstein is portrayed as akin to that between Heidegger and Arendt. On the left, beneath philosophy and the battle of ideas, there is always the battle to decide who is in charge. D’Alema remains unrivalled. During his years of conflict with Veltroni, Red TV was launched – the channel close to D’Alema, who is also the founder of the magazine *Italianieuropei*. Magazines set the tone. And they also fuel speculation. Who is the political mentor of Speranza, the author of the ‘figurehead’ proposal? It is D’Alema, who, together with Bettini… you get the picture. And now let’s turn to page 150. Bettini interviews Conte. When Bettini asks Conte what is meant by ‘progress’ and ‘progressive’, Conte replies: “Progress is something different from any mechanistic or positivist philosophical illusion, which stems from the thought of Comte, but also from Spencer’s evolutionary doctrine.” Another glass of water? Yet another (marvellous) thought from Conte: “Our society, as Ulrich Beck has pointed out, is threatened by the technological unknown.” Is it clear to you where he gets his ontological ties from? And is it also clear why Schlein has taken it into her head to take over Unit*? She wants a newspaper too, because the fact that Rinascita is close to Conte is reported by Il Fatto Quotidiano (another newspaper that supports Conte). You’ve finally earned your solution. The first to say that the primaries shouldn’t go ahead wasn’t Speranza, but D’Alema. The ever-present Bettini asks Conte: would the primaries (…) lead to conflict which, as D’Alema says, would cause us irreparable harm? The answer runs to 29 lines, but these three suffice: “The guiding star that leads me, truly beyond my own person, is to collectively assess the best structure for competing against the right.” They’ll hold the primaries to decide who will be the first to step aside, the first to be able to announce at Largo: ‘I have sacrificed myself for the good of the country’. The clue is on page 8, signed by the editor: ‘When there are two winners, it’s quite a problem’. The ‘Rinascita a sinistra’ is a crossword puzzle.