Insomma: il lodo Alfano è legge, il premier è salvo, gli italiani no. Soprattutto da loro stessi. Riporto un estratto della lucida analisi di Donald Sassoon sulla rivista inglese New Statesman (storicamente di sinistra). Per lui, molti italiani temono una cosa soprattutto: il buongoverno. La paura del buongovernoMany Italians feared not communism as an ideology, but what the communists or the post-communists might bring about: honest government. They might have to pay taxes. If you have spent your entire life cultivating personal relationships with those who have power and influence and who can protect you and help you with the endless bureaucratic tasks that plague your life; if you know that no one will investigate too closely if you have built an extension to your home, or built a home where one cannot be built (as is the case with so many houses constructed in Italy); if you know that your fiscal evasions and frauds will be overlooked because “everyone does it” - then, of course, you will be afraid of “the communists”, that is to say, of those puritanical, holier-than-thou characters who threatened the foundations of Italian civic culture. To many Italians, nothing, not even the Red Army, is more frightening than good governance or “il buon governo“.Then there is the enormous weight of small enterprises in the country, coupled with the very large number of self-employed workers (three times the ratios of Germany and Japan). Compare a high street in Italy with one in Britain, let alone a shopping mall in the United States, and you will see the difference between a country whose economy is dominated by large companies and supermarkets and one that is at an earlier stage of development.This makes Italy a much nicer place to shop in, especially if you are a tourist and have time to shop, but these shopkeepers have been protected and featherbedded by the state and they know it. The political masterpiece of the old Christian Dem ocracy party was that it protected this huge petty bourgeoisie while modernising the country. Berlusconi is the DC’s natural successor.His problem is that he does not have the margins the old DC had. Italy’s manufacturing system - the production of machine tools, shoes, handbags, tiles, cheap furniture, ready-made clothes - is being steadily wiped out, above all by China. Between 2001 and 2005, under Berlusconi, Italy dropped from 14th to 53rd place in the global competitiveness index.The phenomenon of Italy’s small enterprises is at the root both of Italy’s past successes and of its present political and economic predicament. This petty bourgeoisie is naturally “neoliberal”, but in a very peculiar sense: it does not want an efficient, minimalist state, because this would annihilate the petty bourgeois class. They want things to remain as they are, even including the terrible bureaucracy so universally hated and so obviously absurd that it is reasonable for everyone to do everything possible to bypass it.Berlusconi is the expression of this petty bourgeoisie. He thinks like them. He acts like them. He does, almost instinctively, what they do. He has the same tastes, the same sense of humour. The only difference between him and them is that he has more money.his is why Berlusconi has done little to cut down on the red tape and restrictive practices that plague Italians. Meanwhile, an economy which 15 years ago overtook that of the UK is now on a par with Spain and may soon be overtaken by Greece. What lies ahead is not fascist resurgence, but the economy’s decay.
LA PAURA DEL BUONGOVERNO
Insomma: il lodo Alfano è legge, il premier è salvo, gli italiani no. Soprattutto da loro stessi. Riporto un estratto della lucida analisi di Donald Sassoon sulla rivista inglese New Statesman (storicamente di sinistra). Per lui, molti italiani temono una cosa soprattutto: il buongoverno. La paura del buongovernoMany Italians feared not communism as an ideology, but what the communists or the post-communists might bring about: honest government. They might have to pay taxes. If you have spent your entire life cultivating personal relationships with those who have power and influence and who can protect you and help you with the endless bureaucratic tasks that plague your life; if you know that no one will investigate too closely if you have built an extension to your home, or built a home where one cannot be built (as is the case with so many houses constructed in Italy); if you know that your fiscal evasions and frauds will be overlooked because “everyone does it” - then, of course, you will be afraid of “the communists”, that is to say, of those puritanical, holier-than-thou characters who threatened the foundations of Italian civic culture. To many Italians, nothing, not even the Red Army, is more frightening than good governance or “il buon governo“.Then there is the enormous weight of small enterprises in the country, coupled with the very large number of self-employed workers (three times the ratios of Germany and Japan). Compare a high street in Italy with one in Britain, let alone a shopping mall in the United States, and you will see the difference between a country whose economy is dominated by large companies and supermarkets and one that is at an earlier stage of development.This makes Italy a much nicer place to shop in, especially if you are a tourist and have time to shop, but these shopkeepers have been protected and featherbedded by the state and they know it. The political masterpiece of the old Christian Dem ocracy party was that it protected this huge petty bourgeoisie while modernising the country. Berlusconi is the DC’s natural successor.His problem is that he does not have the margins the old DC had. Italy’s manufacturing system - the production of machine tools, shoes, handbags, tiles, cheap furniture, ready-made clothes - is being steadily wiped out, above all by China. Between 2001 and 2005, under Berlusconi, Italy dropped from 14th to 53rd place in the global competitiveness index.The phenomenon of Italy’s small enterprises is at the root both of Italy’s past successes and of its present political and economic predicament. This petty bourgeoisie is naturally “neoliberal”, but in a very peculiar sense: it does not want an efficient, minimalist state, because this would annihilate the petty bourgeois class. They want things to remain as they are, even including the terrible bureaucracy so universally hated and so obviously absurd that it is reasonable for everyone to do everything possible to bypass it.Berlusconi is the expression of this petty bourgeoisie. He thinks like them. He acts like them. He does, almost instinctively, what they do. He has the same tastes, the same sense of humour. The only difference between him and them is that he has more money.his is why Berlusconi has done little to cut down on the red tape and restrictive practices that plague Italians. Meanwhile, an economy which 15 years ago overtook that of the UK is now on a par with Spain and may soon be overtaken by Greece. What lies ahead is not fascist resurgence, but the economy’s decay.