Waiting for a Political Messiah

Waiting for a political Messiah…
By Alessandro Munzi

“I don’t care about politics!”, that’s what people always answer when I try to talk with them about politics. When I hear this, I smile to myself and just think “So you don’t care about your life”. I guess people don’t reflect upon the fact that politics is everywhere, including their own lives. When we complain about our job or the lack of one, the traffic jams in our city or our university fees, we are experiencing the outcome of politicians’ work.

It seems to me that Italy has been forever waiting for someone to save it. If we have a look at its history, we can find plenty of evidence of this. Every year on the 25th of April we celebrate the Festa della liberazione (Anniversary of the Liberation), an event in which we recall the moment when Italy, at the time under a Fascist dictatorship, was freed by the Allied Forces and the Italian Resistance movement.

What we cannot forget, however, is that only a small percentage of the population (10%) was effectively fighting against the dictatorship, while the rest were relying on someone to make decisions for them. They were waiting for someone else who could give Italy back its freedom (La Grande Italia. Il mito della nazione nel XX secolo, by Emilio Gentile).

This inactive and sheeplike attitude is not new in our country’s history; it seems like every time Italian people have to face problems concerning their country, they prefer to take care of their private garden or wait for some sort of Messiah to help them and find a solution to their difficulties.

Some examples of Italy’s political history may help you to understand.

In the 50s and 60s, Italy’s republican life was dominated by the Christian Democrat Party. Most Italians were deeply influenced by their religion when they had to vote. The Church itself often meddled by stating “Quando voti, Dio può vederti, Stalin no” – “When you vote, God can see you but Stalin can’t.” (my own translation). This last statement was one of the slogans created by Giovannino Guareschi, an Italian journalist and writer of propaganda for the Christian Democrat Party for Italy’s general election of 1948.

During the 80s, Italy’s political life started to decline even more with the birth of private TV, which destroyed culture and heavily influenced the political views of the Italian people. In that period, the people of Italy grew increasingly detached from politics, and this situation continues today.

During the 90s, Italy was in upheaval because of a series of scandals involving almost all the political parties. The investigation known as Mani Pulite (lit. Clean Hands) showed how businessmen were often obliged to pay bribes to politicians in order to win tenders (Mario Chiesa, a member of the Socialist Party, was the first to be arrested).

After this period, Silvio Berlusconi, founder of right-wing party Forza Italia, appeared on the political scene and he seemed to be the Messiah Italians were waiting for. He was a businessman and owner of three popular private TV channels an well as several newspapers and magazines. He was also a close friend of Bettino Craxi, leader of the Socialist Party that had dominated Italy’s political life during the 80s. All the reforms made by Berlusconi were praised in all the media he owned. This, together with a lack of investment in culture and public education left people totally unaware of what was going on, out of touch with reality and indifferent to their country’s political life. Even though the situation was falling apart, TV reiterated that everything was just fine. People began to quote TV as a source of unquestionable truth.

Over the last 20 years we have seen this situation: Italy’s worsening economic condition and widespread corruption, but most Italians are standing still. Many of their fundamental rights have been ripped apart and many others have been cancelled. Several laws have been promulgated in order to protect one slice of society, the upper echelon (the richest businessmen), making the rest of the population poorer (think, for example, of Article 18 concerning Italy’s labour laws and Law 40/2004 on assisted reproduction). Few Italians protested or fought hard, although it’s also true that they were also powerless because of a complete lack of support from people who were completely unaware of what was going on or simply didn’t care about problems they thought did not concern them.

I remember an unbelievable event that took place in 2003. That year there were demonstrations against the Berlusconi government’s attempt to modify Article 18 of the workers’ Statute. I was really curious to know first-hand the opinion of some workers and when I tried asking they answered that they had no time to think about those things because they had to go to work. In some ways it was really funny when you think that Article 18 is a guarantee against unfair dismissal.

Nowadays the economic crisis is affecting everybody. The middle class has completely disappeared and a new lower class has emerged. People have suddenly realized what happened and they are once again looking for someone to improve Italy’s economy. New political parties have emerged , purporting to truly represent the will of the people and trying to monopolize the widespread anger (such as Beppe Grillo’s Five Star Movement. )

History repeats itself…