Democracy and Disorder

This is a study of the cycle of protest that swept across Italy from the late 1960s through the early 1970s. Using a variety of newspaper, archival, and interview materials, and combining quantitative time-series techniques with historical and ideological analyses, Tarrow shows how protest spread from the student and worker movements to virtually every sector of Italian society, and gave rise to "extraparliamentary" groups, violence, and finally, a return to traditional political patterns. Despite the violence and disorder, Tarrow demonstrates that the major result of the cycle was to increase the repertoire of participation and to contribute to a consolidation of Italian democracy.