Avoiding the Obvious in Italy
SENIGALLIA, SILVIO F.
FALSE OPTIMISM Avoiding the Obvious in Italy By SILVIO F. SENIGALLIA Rome In the years immediately following World War I, when both Germany and Austria were in dire straits, a Viennese...
...The people here are rightly proud that in four decades Italy has risen from an impoverished land devastated by war and the excesses of Fascism to the world's sixth largest industrial economy...
...We always manage to do well when we are on the verge of disaster...
...Despite the unflattering observations from the OECD, whose members include the 12 European Community nations, Italy is unlikely to be castigated by the EC itself...
...The document is a stern reprimand of the Christian Democrats and a plea for all Catholics who operate in the political sphere to commit themselves to unity...
...An article in the Washington Post followed a generally benevolent line, in marked contrast to the vicious disparagement that filled a full supplement in France's Le Monde...
...At the same time, the EC's plethora of caveats and critical remarks makes clear that although Brussels has no desire for a showdown, it intends to keep a watchful eye on its wayward sister nation...
...While Repubblica trumpeted Italy's grace, two foreign newspapers gave their own evaluations of affairs here...
...The overt spite of the supplement undermined its credibility...
...No such charity, though, can be extended to those who know better and shrink from their responsibility to bear the bad tidings...
...Thus, after more than a year of fighting tooth and nail for survival and with elections due in early 1992, the government finds it virtually impossible to muster the energy and popular support needed to wage an all-out battle against the deficit...
...FALSE OPTIMISM Avoiding the Obvious in Italy By SILVIO F. SENIGALLIA Rome In the years immediately following World War I, when both Germany and Austria were in dire straits, a Viennese witticism became very popular in diplomatic circles...
...Similarly, in 1991 Italians can ill afford to ignore any constructive criticism or guidance from the international community...
...The accompanying story reported that the Community's ministers had accepted as potentially valid Andreotti's proposed economic program for 1992 and an extended threeyear recovery plan...
...At the time of this writing, though, approval of the so-called Legge Finanziaria is nowhere in sight...
...The CEI charged that Italy is "a lawless country" where neofeudal practices control the distribution of privileges, jobs and spoils...
...And here in Rome the Italian Episcopal Conference (CEI), in an unexpected blast, has rebuked the nation's professional politicians for the decline of legality as well as for the iniquitous link between politics and business...
...Some tentative steps have been taken...
...The Paris daily faulted the Italian government for the economic stagnation, and sneered that even Spain stands a better chance of entering the EMU...
...In any case, a hatchet job is hardly helpful when a spate of disturbing news items has been contributing to the gloom...
...His report left the impression that he accepted at face value statements such as: "We are living through Italy's second economic miracle...
...2) at 11 per cent, the unemployment rate is twice the average of OECD states...
...But not even Carli's tough words could reassure the influential Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development(OECD), whose forthcoming December report is deeply skeptical about the prospects for Italy's recovery...
...Post correspondent William Drozdiak fairly observed that regardless of the conspicuous threat of bankruptcy posed by the national debt, Italians are unprepared to abandon their dolce vita habits...
...The International Monetary Fund has warned that 1992 will bea"blackyear" for Italy, with little chance of any economic improvement...
...Treasury Minister Guido Carli, a distinguished economist chosen to embellish Andreotti's lackluster Cabinet, recently sounded the alarm about the pending legislation's fate...
...At the moment, this seems the most that one can ask...
...Indeed, aNovember 12 front-page headline in the Rome daily Repubblica gratefully declared "Europe Pardons Italy...
...The present one, led by veteran DC Prime Minister Giulio Andreotti, is further hampered by the fragmentation of its components...
...A few months ago, framework legislation was introduced in Parliament aimed at drafting a stringent economic program for 1992...
...If pessimistic forecasts prove correct, blame must fall on an old, inert ruling class too interested in holding power to reacquaint people with the Biblical apologue of the seven lean cows...
...The report notes four areas of concern: (1) growth of gross national product is minimal...
...Yet a connection does exist, in the sense that the Italians are exhibiting an utter unwillingness to realistically assess the near future of their country and to begin living within their means...
...In upright tones Le Monde recounted the strikes, inflation, tax evasion, and debt plaguing Italy, and concluded that these cannot be remedied...
...He soberly warned that passage of amerely stopgap Finanziaria would indicate that nothing less than a violent shakeup can arouse the country from its torpor and force it to adopt genuine austerity measures...
...Le Monde's supplement offered neither...
...and (4) Italian governments have the quaint habit of doctoring annual forecasts to prove that inadequate curbs on public spending are in fact effective and conducive to growth...
...I remembered that time-worn bon mot while thinking about current conditions in Italy...
...This is not to imply that the government—a coalition dominated by the Christian Democratic Party (DC) and the Socialist Party (PSI) that for years has functioned with more perseverance than effectiveness—wants to withhold the gravity of the situation from the population at large...
...Silvio F. Senigallia reports regularly for ?he New Leader on Italian affairs...
...However, having interviewed a number of influential personalities, including Foreign Minister Gianni De Michelis, sociologist Franco Ferrarotti and prominent banker Mario Arcelli, Drozdiak apparently was smitten by the contagion of upbeat assessment...
...Understandably, the burgeoning class of nouveaux riches wants to preserve its affluent standard of living and shudders at theword "sacrifice...
...Italians, it said, not only disregard the signs of distress but take disorganization for a virtue and anarchy for evidence of resilience and improvisation...
...The country's staggering debt seems to work in Italy's favor, because 90 per cent of it is owed to its own citizens...
...A good-natured observer might merely tut-tut at the giddy hedonists...
...To be sure, Vienna in 1921 cannot be compared with Rome in 1991...
...The Italians' confidence in their lucky star, inordinate pride in their resourcefulness plus a touch of commedia dell' arte vanity create an aura of self-sufficiency that outsiders must approach with caution...
...If the bill ever does become law, many of its teeth will almost certainly have been extracted: Government spending cuts will be marginal and tax increases will be modest...
...Still, what baffles many economists, industrialists, labor leaders, and foreign observers is the widespread feeling of booming optimism at the very moment when Italy appears headed for bankruptcy...
...The difference between the two countries, it was joked, is that Germany's overall situation is serious but not critical, while Austria's is critical but not serious...
...Nevertheless, foreign furs, diamonds and whiskey continue to be imported in greater quantities than anywhere else, and the people keep buying them as fast as they arrive, apparently unaware that this Vesuvius may be about to blow...
...The judgment must be viewed as political, intended to guarantee Italy's place within the future European Economic and Monetary Union (EMU...
...3) Italy's inflation rate (7 per cent in June) is double that of France and Germany...
...The members of the European Community (EC) have repeatedly warned Italy about the plight of its economy, and if that were not enough the ballooning national debt is now over the $1 trillion mark...
...The problem is, rather, that coalitions naturally operate through compromise and procrastination...
...it was simply a dim catalog of Italy's ills and inadequacies, lacking so much as aglimmer of hope or aredeeming touch of humor...
...Italy will take care of itself was the proud slogan of the 1848 patriots, but unification in the 19th century could not have been achieved without the active support of France and Prussia or England's beneficent diplomacy...
Vol. 74 • November 1991 • No. 12
