The Italian political crisis of 1992-94, often referred to as Tangentopoli, emerged after the revelation of endemic corruption throughout the political system. First and foremost the crisis saw the collapse of the main political parties, the Christian Democracy and the Socialist Party. In a different manner and only one year prior to this crisis, the former Communist Party, also underwent major changes and evolved into a social democratic party, the Democratic Party of the Left. Though this crisis was sparked by a corruption revelation, it became a catalyst for a change in the deformities of a political system, of the partitocracy, which was itself the product of Cold War conditions faced by Italy in the post-war period. The focus of this study has been to re-evaluate the causes of this crisis with particular attention to the role of the Cold War as the over-arching influence which directly and indirectly influenced many of the internal dynamics of the Italian political process. The hypothesis of this research was that the end of the Cold War in 1991 as a factor which provoked this political crisis, was far more important as a cause than has hitherto been acknowledged. The study examines the other indicated possible causes including the impact of the corruption revelations, the role of the magistrates in uncovering corruption, the economic crisis, the role of the new protest movement of the Lega Nord and finally the especially brutal equilibrium with Italian political forces re-established by the Mafia after 1992.

The Italian political crisis of 1992-94, often referred to as Tangentopoli, emerged after the revelation of endemic corruption throughout the political system. First and foremost the crisis saw the collapse of the main political parties, the Christian Democracy and the Socialist Party. In a different manner and only one year prior to this crisis, the former Communist Party, also underwent major changes and evolved into a social democratic party, the Democratic Party of the Left. Though this crisis was sparked by a corruption revelation, it became a catalyst for a change in the deformities of a political system, of the partitocracy, which was itself the product of Cold War conditions faced by Italy in the post-war period. The focus of this study has been to re-evaluate the causes of this crisis with particular attention to the role of the Cold War as the over-arching influence which directly and indirectly influenced many of the internal dynamics of the Italian political process. The hypothesis of this research was that the end of the Cold War in 1991 as a factor which provoked this political crisis, was far more important as a cause than has hitherto been acknowledged. The study examines the other indicated possible causes including the impact of the corruption revelations, the role of the magistrates in uncovering corruption, the economic crisis, the role of the new protest movement of the Lega Nord and finally the especially brutal equilibrium with Italian political forces re-established by the Mafia after 1992.