Marco Pannella (born Giacinto Pannella; 2 May 1930 – 19 May 2016) was an Italian politician, journalist and activist. He was well known in his country for his

nonviolence Nonviolence is the personal practice of not causing harm to others under any condition. It may come from the belief that hurting people, animals and/or the environment is unnecessary to achieve an outcome and it may refer to a general philosoph ...

and

civil rights Civil and political rights are a class of rights that protect individuals' freedom from infringement by governments, social organizations, and private individuals. They ensure one's entitlement to participate in the civil and political life of ...

' campaigns, like the right to divorce, the

right to abortion Abortion-rights movements, also referred to as Pro-choice (term), pro-choice movements, advocate for the right to have Abortion law, legal access to induced abortion services including elective abortion. They seek to represent and support wome ...

, the

legalization of cannabis The legality of cannabis for medical and recreational use varies by country, in terms of its possession, distribution, and cultivation, and (in regards to medical) how it can be consumed and what medical conditions it can be used for. These ...

and the abolition of nuclear power. Internationally, he supported

human rights Human rights are Morality, moral principles or Social norm, normsJames Nickel, with assistance from Thomas Pogge, M.B.E. Smith, and Leif Wenar, 13 December 2013, Stanford Encyclopedia of PhilosophyHuman Rights Retrieved 14 August 2014 for ce ...

and

self-determination The right of a people to self-determination is a cardinal principle in modern international law (commonly regarded as a ''jus cogens'' rule), binding, as such, on the United Nations as authoritative interpretation of the Charter's norms. It stat ...

causes, like the

Tibetan independence The Tibetan Independence Movement () is the political movement advocating for the separation and independence of Tibet from the People's Republic of China. It is principally led by the Tibetan diaspora in countries like India and the United Stat ...

and persecution of Christians in Vietnam. He was the historic

leader Leadership, both as a research area and as a practical skill, encompasses the ability of an individual, group or organization to "lead", influence or guide other individuals, teams, or entire organizations. The word "leadership" often gets vi ...

of the Radical Party (the first expression of the Radicals in post-

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

Italy was the Italian Radical Party, founded in 1955). Between 1979 and 2009, he was a

Member of the European Parliament A Member of the European Parliament (MEP) is a person who has been elected to serve as a popular representative in the European Parliament. When the European Parliament (then known as the Common Assembly of the ECSC) first met in 1952, its ...

, where he sat as a full member in the

Committee on Legal Affairs The Committee on Legal Affairs (JURI) is a committee of the European Parliament. Responsibilities The main responsibilities of the committee are the interpretation and application of international and European law and the compliance of European U ...

, in the

Committee on Budgetary Control The Committee on Budgetary Control (CONT) is a committee of the European Parliament. with 30 permanent members. It can be seen as the European Union's internal "political watchdog", seeking to identify undesirable developments within EU institutio ...

and in the Delegation for relations with

Israel Israel (; he, יִשְׂרָאֵל, ; ar, إِسْرَائِيل, ), officially the State of Israel ( he, מְדִינַת יִשְׂרָאֵל, label=none, translit=Medīnat Yīsrāʾēl; ), is a country in Western Asia. It is situated ...

. He was also President of the Nonviolent Radical Party. He is considered an example of left-libertarian and

liberal socialist Liberal socialism is a political philosophy that incorporates liberal principles to socialism. This synthesis sees liberalism as the political theory that takes the inner freedom of the human spirit as a given and adopts liberty as the goal, ...

Early life

Pannella was born in

Teramo Teramo (; nap, label= Abruzzese, Tèreme ) is a city and ''comune'' in the Italian region of Abruzzo, the capital of the province of Teramo. The city, from Rome, is situated between the highest mountains of the Apennines (Gran Sasso d'Italia) ...

(

Abruzzo Abruzzo (, , ; nap, label=Neapolitan language, Abruzzese Neapolitan, Abbrùzze , ''Abbrìzze'' or ''Abbrèzze'' ; nap, label=Sabino dialect, Aquilano, Abbrùzzu; #History, historically Abruzzi) is a Regions of Italy, region of Southern Italy wi ...

) from an Italian father and a Swiss mother on 2 May 1930. He attended the

classical lyceum Liceo classico or Ginnasio (literally ''classical lyceum'') is the oldest, public secondary school type in Italy. Its educational curriculum spans over five years, when students are generally about 14 to 19 years of age. Until 1969, this was ...

Julius Caesar in

Rome , established_title = Founded , established_date = 753 BC , founder = King Romulus (legendary) , image_map = Map of comune of Rome (metropolitan city of Capital Rome, region Lazio, Italy).svg , map_caption ...

. In 1955 Pannella graduated in law at the

University of Urbino The University of Urbino "Carlo Bo" ( it, Università degli Studi di Urbino "Carlo Bo", ''UniUrb'') is an Italian university located in Urbino, a walled hill-town in the region of Marche, located in the north-eastern part of central Italy. The ...

Political career

At 20 years old, Pannella became a national representative at the university level for the

Italian Liberal Party The Italian Liberal Party ( it, Partito Liberale Italiano, PLI) was a liberal and conservative political party in Italy. The PLI, which is the heir of the liberal currents of both the Historical Right and the Historical Left, was a minor party ...

(PLI), member of the student association ''Unione Goliardica Italiana'' (UGI) and at 23 he was President of the ''Unione Nazionale degli Studenti'', (National Union of Students). At 24 he promoted the foundation of the Partito Radicale (hereinafter the " Radical Party"). From 1960 to 1963, he was in Paris as a correspondent of the Italian newspaper '' Il Giorno''. During his long political career, Pannella co-founded a series of organizations such as the Italian league for divorce, the League for objection of conscience, the League for the abrogation of the Agreement between the Catholic Church and the Italian State (Concordat), the Centre of legal initiative "

Piero Calamandrei Piero Calamandrei (21 April 1889 – 27 September 1956) was an Italian author, jurist, soldier, university professor, and politician. Born in Florence, he was one of Italy's leading authorities on the law of civil procedure. After studies in Pis ...

", as well as the Italian Association for Demographic Education (AIED). He has been at the forefront of the promotion of important reforms regarding narcotics and faced incarceration on various occasions for his civil disobediences. He played a prominent role in the movement that led to the legalization of abortion in Italy in 1978. He also promoted actions to grant electoral rights for Italians aged 18. Engaged in the defence of

in Eastern European countries, in 1968 he was arrested in

Sofia Sofia ( ; bg, София, Sofiya, ) is the capital and largest city of Bulgaria. It is situated in the Sofia Valley at the foot of the Vitosha mountain in the western parts of the country. The city is built west of the Iskar river, and ha ...

for having distributed leaflets against the Communist regime. He was one of the first promoters and founders of the

Green Green is the color between cyan and yellow on the visible spectrum. It is evoked by light which has a dominant wavelength of roughly 495570 Nanometre, nm. In subtractive color systems, used in painting and color printing, it is created by ...

and ecologist political movements in Europe. Over the years, he was engaged in Italy in the defence of civil rights as well as against the public financing of political parties and against corruption of Italian politics. Beginning in the 1970s, Pannella promoted a series of

referendum A referendum (plural: referendums or less commonly referenda) is a direct vote by the electorate on a proposal, law, or political issue. This is in contrast to an issue being voted on by a representative. This may result in the adoption of a ...

s on themes ranging from social to political issues, in particular on those relating to the legality of the State, the rule of law and to the administration of justice. Marco Pannella divorce

He was elected to the European Parliament in 1979. He sat in the Technical Group of Independents which was a technical alliance of left wing

MEPs A Member of the European Parliament (MEP) is a person who has been elected to serve as a popular representative in the European Parliament. When the European Parliament (then known as the Common Assembly of the ECSC) first met in 1952, its ...

who were not allied with either the Soviet influenced Communist parties or the mainstream

Social Democratic Social democracy is a political, social, and economic philosophy within socialism that supports political and economic democracy. As a policy regime, it is described by academics as advocating economic and social interventions to promote soci ...

parties. He served as chair of the group along with the hardline

Irish Republican Irish republicanism ( ga, poblachtánachas Éireannach) is the political movement for the unity and independence of Ireland under a republic. Irish republicans view British rule in any part of Ireland as inherently illegitimate. The develop ...

Neil Blaney Neil Terence Columba Blaney (1 October 1922 – 8 November 1995) was an Irish politician. He was first elected to Dáil Éireann in 1948 as a Fianna Fáil Teachta Dála (TD) representing Donegal East. A high-profile member of the party, Blane ...

and Danish left-wing Eurosceptic

Jens-Peter Bonde Jens-Peter Rossen Bonde (27 March 1948 – 4 April 2021) was a Danish politician who served as Member of the European Parliament (MEP) with the June Movement. He resigned as an MEP in May 2008. Bonde was elected to the European Parliament in the ...

.Throughout the 1980s, he promoted international anti-prohibitionist campaigns on drugs and was one of the founders of the Radical Antiprohibitionist Coordination (CORA) and of the International Antiprohibitionist League. A believer in Gandhian

, Pannella carried out several hunger strikes in Italy and elsewhere to defend

and to end extermination through

starvation Starvation is a severe deficiency in caloric energy intake, below the level needed to maintain an organism's life. It is the most extreme form of malnutrition. In humans, prolonged starvation can cause permanent organ damage and eventually, dea ...

the world over. This included a

hunger strike A hunger strike is a method of non-violent resistance in which participants fast as an act of political protest, or to provoke a feeling of guilt in others, usually with the objective to achieve a specific goal, such as a policy change. Most ...

in 2007, to protest against the death penalty. This strike was set off by the hanging of

Saddam Hussein Saddam Hussein ( ; ar, صدام حسين, Ṣaddām Ḥusayn; 28 April 1937 – 30 December 2006) was an Iraqi politician who served as the fifth president of Iraq from 16 July 1979 until 9 April 2003. A leading member of the revolution ...

. A hunger strike in April 2014 to protest Italian prison conditions resulted in Pannella having to have surgery. A disciple of

Altiero Spinelli Altiero Spinelli (31 August 1907 – 23 May 1986) was an Italian politician, political theorist and European federalist, referred to as one of the founding fathers of the European Union. A communist and militant anti-fascist in his youth, he spe ...

and Ernesto Rossi, Pannella was one of the first European Federalists and fought, through nonviolent means, for the creation of the

European Union The European Union (EU) is a supranational political and economic union of member states that are located primarily in Europe. The union has a total area of and an estimated total population of about 447million. The EU has often been des ...

. He was elected Secretary of the Radical Party in November 1981 and remained in office until November 1983. At the RP Congress in Budapest in 1989, he launched the creation of the

Transnational Radical Party The Transnational Radical Party (TRP), whose official name is Nonviolent Radical Party, Transnational and Transparty (NRPTT), is a political association of citizens, members of parliament and members of government of various national and political ...

of which he became president of the Federal Council on that occasion. In 2003, he created together with other prominent European personalities the

Medbridge Strategy Center MedBridge is a European organization whose goal is to promote dialogue and mutual understanding between Europe and the Middle East. Its aim is to enable Europeans willing to be informed on the Middle East or to support Israeli-Arab peace efforts, ...

, whose goal is to promote dialogue and mutual understanding between Europe and the

Middle-East The Middle East ( ar, الشرق الأوسط, ISO 233: ) is a geopolitical region commonly encompassing Arabia (including the Arabian Peninsula and Bahrain), Asia Minor (Asian part of Turkey except Hatay Province), East Thrace (Europea ...

He was honorary President of the Party of the Rom (ROI) in the Czech Republic and he was also honorary member of the Socialist Slovene Youth. The

Jewish National Fund Jewish National Fund ( he, קֶרֶן קַיֶּימֶת לְיִשְׂרָאֵל, ''Keren Kayemet LeYisrael'', previously , ''Ha Fund HaLeumi'') was founded in 1901 to buy and develop land in Ottoman Syria (later Mandatory Palestine, and subseq ...

(Hebrew: קרן קימת לישראל, Keren Kayemet LeYisrael) dedicated him a reforestation area in the Negev Desert in

. In October 2011, he became a member of the French Federalist Party in order to take part in the founding convention of the European Federalist Party which took place on 5/6 November 2011. Thus he became a founding member of the European Federalist Party.

Personal life

Pannella was never married and had no children. He had been living for several decades with his girlfriend Mirella Parachini. In 2010, he alluded in an interview to the fact that Parachini and he had always been in an

open relationship An open relationship is an intimate relationship that is sexually non-monogamous. The term is distinct from polyamory, in that it generally indicates a relationship where there is a primary emotional and intimate relationship between two partner ...

"without jealousy". In the same interview, Pannella came out as

bisexual Bisexuality is a romantic or sexual attraction or behavior toward both males and females, or to more than one gender. It may also be defined to include romantic or sexual attraction to people regardless of their sex or gender identity, whi ...

and said he had "three or four" significant relationships with men. He was atheist. Pannella died on 19 May 2016 of cancer, after agreeing to be sedated. The Italian Prime Minister

Matteo Renzi Matteo Renzi (; born 11 January 1975) is an Italian politician who served as prime minister of Italy from 2014 to 2016. He has been a senator for Florence since 2018. Renzi has served as the leader of Italia Viva (IV) since 2019, having bee ...

described him as a "lion of freedom".

Electoral history

References

External links

Nonviolent Radical Party official website

Rome Set To Lead Peace-Keeping Mission

MedBridge official website
{{DEFAULTSORT:Pannella, Marco 1930 births 2016 deaths Italian libertarians People from Teramo Italian people of Swiss descent Italian Liberal Party politicians Anti–death penalty activists Nonviolence advocates Bisexual men Bisexual politicians LGBT MEPs for Italy Critics of the Catholic Church Members of the Chamber of Deputies (Italy) MEPs for Italy 2004–2009 MEPs for Italy 1999–2004 MEPs for Italy 1994–1999 MEPs for Italy 1989–1994 MEPs for Italy 1984–1989 MEPs for Italy 1979–1984 Italian Radicals MEPs Radical Party (Italy) politicians