History
In October 2016, Mayor of Parma Federico Pizzarotti left the Five Star Movement (M5S)[3] due to disagreements with the movement's founder, Beppe Grillo and his suspension from the party in the previous May.[4] In the 2012 local elections, Pizzarotti had been the first M5S member to win in a big city, with 60.2% of the vote in the run-off (up from 19.5% in the first round).[5]
In the 2017 local elections, Pizzarotti was re-elected mayor without the M5S' support, with 58.9% in the run-off.[6]
In April 2018, Pizzarotti launched Italia in Comune,[7][1][8] which aimed at becoming the collector of local "civic lists", as well as disgruntled former M5S members. The party was co-founded by Alessio Pascucci, a left-wing independent who had been elected mayor of Cerveteri, Lazio in 2012 and 2017, supported by civic lists and the Federation of the Greens (FdV).[9][10]
In October 2018, Serse Soverini, a member of the Chamber of Deputies elected in the 2018 general election as a representative of Civic Area, a minor progressive party close to Romano Prodi, joined IiC[11] and soon became the party's regional coordinator in Emilia-Romagna, the region of Parma and, consequently, IiC's powerbase.[12] Almost a year later, in September 2019, after Matteo Renzi had left to form Italia Viva, Soverini would leave IiC too and join the Democratic Party.[13][14]
The party became involved in the centre-left coalition and, in the early months of 2019, obtained promising results in regional elections in Abruzzo (3.9% of the vote and one regional councillor) and Sardinia (2.5%). In February Free Alternative, another party formed by M5S splinters, announced that it was merging into IiC.[15]
In the run-up to the 2019 European Parliament election, IiC formed an alliance with the FdV, Green Italia and minor green groups, which would result in a green joint list.[16][17] However, soon after the party switched allegiances, deserted the FdV and joined forces with More Europe (+Eu), a liberal party,[18][19][20] which was later enlarged to the Italian Socialist Party (PSI).[21]
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