President Lorenzo Dellai Founded 4 July 2014 Political position Centre-left | Coordinator Paolo Ciani Split from Civic Choice | |
Ideology Christian democracy
Christian left | ||
Solidary Democracy (Italian: Democrazia Solidale, Demo.S) is a centre-left Christian-democratic political party in Italy. The party's leader, Lorenzo Dellai, a former President of Trentino, has described Demo.S as a "Christian-social" party.
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Demo.S maintains solid relations with the Democratic Party and a number of minor parties/groups of the Christian left, notably including the Democratic Centre (with which Demo.S forms a joint parliamentary group in the Chamber of Deputies named For Italy), the Christian Popular Union (active mainly in Sardinia) and, in Trentino, the Union for Trentino.
History
Demo.S was formed in July 2014, following the split of the left-wing faction from the Populars for Italy. The party, led by Dellai, Andrea Olivero, Mario Marazziti, Mario Giro and Lucio Romano, re-affirmed the strategic (not just tactical) alliance with Matteo Renzi's Democratic Party (PD), while the PpI considered it temporary and wanted to restructure the centre-right camp instead. At its start, the party counted eight deputies, two senators, one deputy-minister and one undersecretary.
In December 2014 the party's two senators, Olivero and Romano, left For Italy, which was later disbanded, in order to join For the Autonomies, a miscellaneaous group composed of minor autonomist and/or centre-left parties. In the meantime, the For Italy group of the Chamber of Deputies welcomed the two deputies of the Democratic Centre (CD). In September 2015 a ninth deputy, Maurizio Baradello, joined the party and the parliamentary group.
In January 2016 the "For Italy" group changed its name to "Solidary Democracy – Democratic Centre", following a strengthening of the alliance with CD. In February Giro, formerly an undersecretary, became deputy minister of Foreign Affairs; Giro was thus one of the party's two deputy-ministers, along with Olivero at Agriculture.