Alberto Benzoni

Alberto Benzoni (29 March 1935 – 11 January 2026) was an Italian politician.

Life and career Political career Benzoni joined the Italian Socialist Party in 1957, was elected city councilor of Rome in 1971 and was re-elected in 1976 and 1981. In 1976, he joined the left-wing government led by the Independent Left as a Deputy Mayor elected on the Italian Communist Party's list under Giulio Carlo Argan and in the subsequent Petroselli government. After the 1981 local elections, he was replaced by Pierluigi Severi, who at the time was close to the Craxian wing of the Italian Socialist Party.

A member of the Lombard left Riccardo Lombardi, in 1978 Benzoni along with Michele Achilli, Gianfranco Amendola, Tristano Codignola, Paolo Leon and Marcello Vittorini co-authored an article in Avanti! that was critical of party secretary Bettino Craxi because of his anti-communist politics and the ideological changes he promoted.

In 1994, he joined the Labour Federation, of which he was a member until the majority of that group merged with the Democrats of the Left, which he opposed. Benzoni then promoted the Socialist and Labor Unity Movement, which participated in the founding of the Italian Democratic Socialists in May 1998.

In 2006, he supported the Rose in the Fist project.

On 1–2 June 2019, during the 1st National Congress of Risorgimento Socialista, he was unanimously elected President of the party. He continued to play an active role in the party's activities, presiding over the Festa Nazionale di Risorgimento Socialista in Rome in December 2025.

Writer and journalist Benzoni authored several publications on the history of socialism and the Italian Socialist Party. In 1991, before the demise of the Craxian era sparked by the Clean Hands investigations, he published the essay "Craxism," on the figure and politics of Bettino Craxi. Together with his daughter Elisa, a graduate in contemporary history, in 1999 he published "Attentato e rappresaglia," an essay on the Via Rasella attack.

He wrote international politics columns for Avanti! and Mondoperaio.

Death Benzoni died on 11 January 2026, at the age of 90.

Works

(with Viva Tedesco)

Governing Rome. On the Side of the Socialists, by Antonio Manca, Rome, Edimez, 1981 - interview

(with Luca Cefisi, introduction by Stefano Silvestri) (with Roberto Gritti) (with Elisa Benzoni)

(with Elisa Benzoni) The Ways of Italy, Brescia, Bietti, 2009. (with Elisa Benzoni)