Background
Saragat was born in Turin, from Sardinian parents.
Saragat was born in Turin, from Sardinian parents.
Student, University degli Studi, Turin, Italy.
He was to be the latter"s paramount leader for the rest of his life. Subsequently he was nominated as Foreign minister from 1963 to 1964, and chosen as President of the Italian Republic in 1964. His election was the result of one of the rare instances of unity in the Italian left, and followed rumours of a possible neo-fascist coup during Antonio Segni"s presidency.
He was a reformist democratic socialist, who split from the Italian Socialist Party in 1947, out of concern over its close (at the time) alliance with the communists, to found the Socialist Party of Italian Workers, which would soon become the Italian Democratic Socialist Party.
Member of the United Socialist Party since 1922, he moved to Vienna in 1926 and to France in 1929 and joined the Italian Socialist Party in 1930.