The Democratic Party (Italian: Partito Democratico, PD) is a social-democratic political party in Italy. The party's secretary is Enrico Letta, who was elected by the national assembly in March 2021, after the resignation of the former leader Nicola Zingaretti, while its president is Valentina Cuppi.
The PD was established in 2007 upon the merger of various centre-left parties which had been part of The Olive Tree list in the 2006 general election, mainly the social-democratic Democrats of the Left (DS), successor of the Italian Communist Party and the Democratic Party of the Left, which was folded with several social-democratic parties (Labour Federation and Social Christians, among others) in 1998, and the largely Catholic-inspired Democracy is Freedom – The Daisy (DL), a merger of the Italian People's Party (heir of the Christian Democracy party's left wing), The Democrats, and Italian Renewal in 2002. While the party has also been influenced by social liberalism and Third Way progressivism, especially under Matteo Renzi's leadership, the PD's main ideological trends are social democracy and the Christian leftist tradition.
Between 2013 and 2018, the Italian government was led by three successive Democratic Prime Ministers, namely Letta (2013–2014), Renzi (2014–2016) and Paolo Gentiloni (2016–2018). The PD was the second-largest party in the 2018 general election, but the centre-left coalition came third. The party was returned to government in September 2019 with the Conte II Cabinet, as junior partner of the Five Star Movement, and joined the national unity Draghi Cabinet, comprising also the League and Forza Italia, in February 2021. As of 2021, the party heads five regional governments.
Prominent Democrats include former leaders Walter Veltroni, Dario Franceschini, Maurizio Martina, and Nicola Zingaretti, as well as David Sassoli (President of the European Parliament, since 2019). Former members include Giorgio Napolitano (President of Italy, 2006–2015), Sergio Mattarella (President of Italy, 2015–present), four Prime Ministers (Romano Prodi, Giuliano Amato, Massimo D'Alema, and Renzi), and three former leaders (Pier Luigi Bersani, Guglielmo Epifani, and Renzi), as well as Francesco Rutelli, Pietro Grasso, and Carlo Calenda.
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