In the years of "national solidarity", the "government" of the television broadcasting system, shaken by an earthquake that upset its geography, redefining the balance between "public" and "private" players, presented itself as an unavoidable battle-ground for all the political powers. The PCI, which had entered the area of the majority and could count on a strong representation in Parliament, was all the more involved in the struggle. What was its role at this juncture? What objectives did the Party have in mind? How coordinated were its moves? What strategies were brought into play? What ideological principles sustained them? Who were its allies? These are the questions the article poses, reconstructing the overall cooperation between parties that the PCI depended on and in which it played a leading role. What emerges are the complicated reasons that led not to a general regulation but to an appeasement that proved to be the breeding ground for those distortions that were to generate the anomalies of the Italian case.
Keywords: Italian Communist Party, the "national solidarity" governments, private television channels; public television, Rai; Elio Quercioli.