A shaky coalition
Wollemborg, Leo J.
REPORTS FROM ITALY A SHAKY COALITION HOW FAR TO THE RIGHT? In Italy's general elections last March, the Italian Left missed its best opportunity in fifty years to gain national power....
...The new Berlusconi government, the first right-of-center coalition to win national power since World War II, has pledged to create a million new jobs within a year...
...LEO J. WOLLEMBORG Leo J. Wollemborg, an American journalist living in Rome, has previously contributed to Commonweal on Italian matters...
...If it fails badly, the main beneficiaries would likely be the NA on the one side and the PDS on the other, two political forces which for different reasons and to different degrees do not yet appear fully committed to promoting a modern, forward-looking democratic Italy...
...Instead, a political newcomer, media magnate Silvio Berlusconi, and his three-month-old, right-of-center party, Forza Italia, emerged as the largest political force...
...There are some two hundred taxes and levies, many of which cost more to collect than they add to the treasury...
...But this was small consolation and has led to much soul-searching and pressure for changes in the PDS's leadership and policies...
...A splinter has joined the Center-Right coalition supporting 8 the new government...
...Berlusconi also has a personal problem: He must divest himself of his huge communication network holdings to do away with any conflict of interest now that he has become head of the government...
...Its program calls for fiscal incentives, mainly for small and medium-sized enterprises, and for freeing private concerns from the state regulations and red tape that weigh down the Italian economy...
...But much remains to be done, and most of it will depend on Berlusconi and his Forza Italia...
...Over the short term, the main troubles for Berlusconi seem likely to come from within his governing coalition...
...But he can hardly afford to ignore the vocal sectors of the NA that proudly claim to be the heirs of Mussolini...
...The third partner in the coalition, the National Alliance (NA), includes the neo-Fascist Movimento Sociale Italiano and minor rightist groups...
...Thanks in large part to its still efficient party machine, the former Communist party (now known as the Democratic Party of the Left, or PDS), retained its role as the biggest opposition force...
...Compared by many to Ross Perot in the United States, Berlusconi appealed successfully to the millions of middle-of-the-road, patriotic-minded voters who felt politically homeless as huge corruption scandals devastated the Christian Democrats, the Socialists, and the other traditional governing parties...
...But its leader, Umberto Bossi—who is now under criminal investigation for possibly illegal campaign funding—has toned down but not given up his demand for a greater role in the government nor his plans for turning Italy into a confederation of separate republics rather than into a federation of autonomous regions...
...The plan is to replace them with a flat tax rate of 33 percent for everyone, but to include generous deductions for those with low incomes...
...Berlusconi has made clear also that he will not renegotiate treaties whereby Italy accepted the transfer of Istria and Dalmatia...
...On broad political and economic issues, it will be up to the new ruling coalition to display the balanced mix of dynamism and responsibility to keep on track the current, complex stage of Italy's "democratic revolution...
...The secessionist-minded Northern League has peaked in popularity, even in its strongholds in the Po Valley...
...He will press this message when President Bill Clinton visits Rome this month to mark the fiftieth anniversary of the liberation of the city by U.S...
...The party now seems determined to conclude in the not-too-distant future the long march of Italian communism toward Westernization by unambiguously endorsing the free market and Italy's participation in international alliances led by the United States...
...troops...
...Other former CDs may soon move in the same direction, as Berlusconi continues his campaign to woo the Catholic vote after setting up a new cabinet post for family affairs...
...Experts close to the new government want to do away with most of them, as well as to overhaul the present income tax system...
...Prime Minister Berlusconi has sought to avoid acrimonious polemics with his coalition partners, but he has firmly upheld Italy's national unity and pledged to exclude from cabinet positions NA representatives who have not clearly disowned Fascist ideology and practices...
...Fini claims that Istria and Dalmatia, transferred to Yugoslavia after World War II, "are still Italian lands," although he stops short of endorsing those neo-Fascist representatives who demand the return of the territories before Italy agrees to accept Slovenia (which now holds the territories) as a member of the European Union...
...Fini himself hails // Duce as the greatest statesman Italy has ever had...
...There are now a dozen different income tax rates, ranging from 10 to 51 percent...
...Too often the Fascist blackshirt shows through the double-breasted grey suit Fini drapes over the NA...
...Both are untried and unproven in the practice of governing...
...Berlusconi is determined to win for Italy "the greater role on the international scene that she deserves," notably in the Mediterranean and in the Middle East...
...The big question is whether this plan and the new government's desire to loosen the state's grip on the economy will run into the same problems that Ronald Reagan's did in the United States (bigger deficits) or that Latin American governments have experienced in downsizing state-owned companies (higher unemployment...
...He further contends that the N A's nationalism "is democratic and European-minded," although he opposes the Maastricht Treaty because it "promotes European integration...
...Aroused by the scandals that engulfed Italy's political and economic establishment in recent times, the Italian public last year opted for major structural changes in its political institutions, electoral processes, and law enforcement...
...Its leader, Gianfranco Fini, seems content for now with having his party recognized as a responsible, democratic force, one fully entitled to a share in the national government...
...Meanwhile, the Christian Democrats (CD), renamed the Italian Popular party (PPI), have been weakened further by internal splits that followed the party's poor electoral showing...
Vol. 121 • June 1994 • No. 11
