Politics and society

Twentieth on this list is il sindacalista, and the English family it calls up is the wrong one from beginning to end. Il sindacato is the trade union, il sindacalista is the official or the member who speaks for the rest, and sindacale is the adjective that goes with them. But « a syndicate » in English is a set of firms or people pooling money for a venture, a group of papers buying one column between them, or, on a crime page, an organised gang; it is never a trade union. Nor is « a syndicalist » simply a union man: the word came in attached to a political doctrine and still carries it, so a shop steward called one has been misdescribed. The adjective holds a second trap. Sindacale is very often not « union » in English but « industrial »: una vertenza sindacale is an industrial dispute, le relazioni sindacali are industrial relations, and l’azione sindacale is industrial action.