In the
course of this long, hot, and extremely
tense summer, pessimism and hopelessness
are gaining momentum on the Italian political scene, as the electorate’s
honeymoon – at times encouraging, but
never easy – with Professor Monti’s
“Technical Government” appears to be coming to a premature and largely
disappointing end.
Europeans, and Italians are no exception, often appear as unwitting victims of their history. In Italy , political chaos has been a constant
reality from the early years of the Holy Roman Empire
to this day, and the trend shows no sign of abating.
From the Teutonic
Caesars down to Mussolini and the post-war Italian governments, many of
those whose ambition it was to govern the Italian people came to the conclusion
that the task was impossible, or as Mussolini himself allegedly said,
“useless”.
When Mario
Monti took over as Prime Minister in November of last year, the situation appeared absolutely desperate. A corrupt and
inefficient Government had been unable – some
actually thought “unwilling” – to face the immense tasks which appeared
essential to bring Italy
Professor
Monti and his Government are not tied to specific political interests and,
therefore, appear to have a greater freedom of choice in the
implementation of unpopular programmes. The same, however, cannot be said of
the three major parties who have given
their support to the government, and without
the consent of which measures could not be turned into laws. In recent
weeks the feeling has taken hold that
this experimental government is being
caught up in the traditional Italian political quagmire, and that even the
public behaviour of the Prime Minister,
considered blameless until now, is adapting to the devious tactics practiced
by his predecessors. On their part, the
political parties who support his
government are giving signs of nervousness
and seem to be returning to their
traditional, negative habits,
neglecting to take into account the
growing ill-feeling and mistrust of
large sectors of Italian opinion. .
It would be
tedious, and of no immediate interest, to enumerate or attempt to describe the
various phases of rising disillusionment on the part of the Italian
electorate, or the sometimes farcical, often irresponsible posturing of the
parties. It has to be said, however, to their partial exculpation, that they
are facing epochal problems of survival
in the presence of a growingly
indifferent, sceptical and critical public.
It is amazing that, in a country which until recently considered an 80% turnout at
elections as disappointing, reliable polls show that about 35% of the
electorate appear inclined not to vote
at all, while about 20% are divided between those who are “undecided” or who
state that they will cast a blank or invalid ballot. Even the announced return
of Mr. Berlusconi on the political scene has caused scarcely a ripple in
the opinion polls, and this could
indicate that he might be losing what
was left of that peculiar charisma which
allowed him to remain in power for the best part of the past twenty years.
The parties who support the Government, having formed
what people call “The Odd Majority”, face a truly fundamental dilemma. As the
Government is forced to adopt measures
which meet growing hostility on the part of the general public, they
sense a further decline in their
popularity, and feel a restless urge to
put an end to this anomalous situation, withdraw their support to the
Government, and force the President to
call early elections, to be held,
possibly, in early November. A growing number of influential political figures are urging their respective
parties in this sense, because they feel that the passage of time operates in
favour of the more populist opposition groups or movements, who would present
themselves to the electorate untainted, as it were, by the Government’s
unpopular decisions.
The
situation, however, is complicated by the state of disarray which has devastated the
majority party, led by former Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi, and
which, according to recent polls, would
have difficulty reaching 20% of
the vote. The opposition Democratic Party, though in a more favourable
position, has to cope with a number of problems, some of which appear of a subtlety so Machiavellian to
leave even the best informed political
analysts quite visibly puzzled . Nor can the traditional rivalry between its
Catholic and secular components
be ignored, and the Catholics at times seem ready to abandon ship and join the
Centrist party which, although small, is in a King-making position and is forging ever closer ties with the Catholic
Church.
The better known leaders, on all sides of the
spectrum, keep appearing, albeit more subdued than before, on the innumerable television “talk-shows”
which, in earlier days, were their favourite stage from which to propound their
ideas. They, however, have quite obviously lost a great deal of their bluster
and don’t go much beyond reaffirming
their “full confidence” in the wisdom of the electorate. What will happen is
anybody’s guess, also because all the parties vow that they will remain loyal
to the Government until next Spring and that, in any case, the present
electoral Law is unsatisfactory and needs to be changed. Fears prevail,
however, that either the Law will not be
altered (for, in reality, it suits those very leaders who claim that it needs
to be changed), or that it will be modified into something even worse, designed
to handicap those opposition parties which are the sole beneficiaries from
this intricate state of affairs.
The Month
of August will be decisive, and much will depend on the direction taken by the International
financial and economic crisis. In the present circumstances, however, the
future does not bode well for Italy
Most of the
responsible commentators seem to agree that
elections held before the end of the Government’s mandate would probably
have a disastrous effect, but there are signs that this solution may well turn out to be inevitable.
The
politicians, meanwhile, keep playing their old games, in the style of the
traditional Italian “Commedia dell’Arte”, bashing one another with large clubs,
only to emerge smiling and pose for group photographs. They appear, however, to
be only dimly aware that they are playing to a thinning house. Many feel that, as the clown Canio exclaims at
the closing of Leoncavallo’s Opera “I Pagliacci”, for them, at least, “La
commedia è finita” (The show is over).
Carlo
Ungaro
The Author
of this submission is a retired Italian Diplomatic Officer
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