L'Antimafia come risorsa politica

Abstract

This essay discusses a special moment in the antimafia history. These are the years 1985-1994, whose main figure is Leoluca Orlando, mayor of Palermo. In that historical period, for the first time, the antimafia’s political speech is held by this young leader of the Christian Democracy. Since the post-war period, the party had ruled Palermo and Italy without facing the problem of the fight against the mafia. Since the beginning of the eighties, the opposition forces, in particular the Communist Party and the trade unions, carried on the antimafia fight. With the murder of Piersanti Mattarella, president of the Sicilian Region, and then of Carlo Alberto dalla Chiesa, prefect of Palermo, the Christian Democracy, led in Sicily, by Sergio Mattarella (brother of Piersanti), decided to cut off relations with the mafia, in particular with Vito Ciancimino, former mayor-mafia of Palermo. The experience of Orlando is first of all the consequence of that policy and then of a national clash, for the government leadership, between Christian Democracy and the Socialist Party. However, with the end of the First Republic in 1994, antimafia was no longer the main ground for confrontation between political forces involved in contending the municipality of Palermo.