1988 Italian General Election (Roses of Reforms)

The 1988 Italian general election was held on 11 June 1988 to renew 581 members of the Chamber of Deputies. At the same time, various regional and local elections took place with authorization from the joint parliament which was granted on 19 March 1988. For the first time in 42 years, the Christian Democracy managed to obtain control over two-thirds of the parliament and to isolate the declining Italian Communist Party.

Following the 1983 general election, the Christian Democracy was able to obtain a majority as a standalone party in years. Forlani was invited to form a second ministry which was sworn in on 20 June. One year later, in 1984, the incumbent General Secretary of the Communist Party Enrico Berlinguer was struck by an ictus and subsequently died, with his funeral being attended by over two millions of citizens; he was replaced by Alessandro Natta, which lacked proper leadership capabilities, and did not possess a strong charisma that Berlinguer previously had. In the meanwhile, the Forlani ministry made progress. On August 1983, provisions were approved to reduce inflation, which passed from 15% to 6.2% on March 1984, and the GDP growth registered to be from 4 to 8% per year. Ahead of these measures, a second economic boom was expected to happen shortly, and it was realized on April 1985 until February 1996.

On the political landscape, the pentapartito alliance in the Senate was still strong, and the national direction of the CD began talks to unify all the alliance parties, except the PSI, inside the Christian Democracy. Such process would start in October 1984 and end in January 1989 with the merge of the Republican Party, Social Democratic Party (PSDI) and the Liberal Party inside the single political force. The longevity of the right wing faction in the national direction prompted analysts to move the DC to a center-right wing party, as left factions became smaller with Ciriaco De Mita leading a single leftist faction that, however, would've been weakened by the 1989 congress. The Forlani secretariat was re-confirmed in 1987 given the successes in the economic policy and electoral successes, and Giulio Andreotti was named Deputy Secretary, longstanding ally of Forlani. After the strong victory of the DC, PCI secretary Alessandro Natta resigned in favour of Achille Occhetto, who announced an ideological transition in the "change of the Bolognina" on 12 November 1989, leading to the dissolution of the PCI on 3 February 1991 and the foundation of the Democratic Party of the Left.

The third Forlani ministry was sworn in on 28 June 1988, while the communists took defeats after defeats in local and administrative elections..