Associazioni Cristiane Lavoratori Italiani

(Christian Associations of Italian Workers), an Italian Catholic semitrade union.

The ACLI was formed by the Vatican in 1945 to conduct organizational and political work among Catholic workers who were members of the General Italian Union of Labor. It played a major role in the split of the General Italian Union of Labor in 1948 and in the formation of the Catholic Italian Confederation of Workers’ Trade Unions in 1950. The ACLI consists of a national organization and provincial, city, and factory sections. It had about 1 million members in 1968. Among the institutions the ACLI has set up and directs are an athletic union and societies for vocational education and for combating illiteracy. In the 1960’s opposition to its political leadership arose within the ACLI, and trends toward an alliance with left-wing socialist forces have been on the rise.