The notabile as actor and model of Italian politics

This article examines the flexibility of the notabile model in different circumstances and time periods. The idea of a notabile cannot be restricted to only a few cases as there are many examples of notabili who, despite not having social and family origins of the classical notabile type, tend to assume the same behavioural and cultural patterns in managing power. The patterns usually considered typical of a notabile are often linked to landed property and the professions, but there are many other cases that suggest that the qualities of the notabili change in different historical and political moments, and are easily adapted to changing social and environmental circumstances. Even when they do not seem to fit directly into the classical model, over time those original features are still evident.     

The transformation of the Italian party system

Abstract

This article analyses the political and social changes that occurred in Italy in the 1980s and 1990s in ways that bring economic and sociological models together in a historical perspective. It argues that the rise of the new Right following the disintegration of the Christian Democrats and the Socialist Party was the result not only of the changed international situation (which was none the less important) but of the changes that had been taking place within the Italian political parties and the growing importance of neo‐patrimonial tendencies over the previous fifteen years. Increasingly open forms of corruption (on the part of the political classes rather than the industrial bourgeoisie, even though they too were to some extent accomplices) are interpreted as a sign of the crisis and disintegration of the political system that had taken shape in the postwar period. Hence the nexus of anguish and politics for both the upper classes and the rest of Italian society that has become one of the most important features of the situation in Italy today.     

意大利战争与欧洲国家体系的初步形成

1494—1559年的意大利战争是欧洲由中世纪向近代转型时期发生的最重大的历史事件,它直接导致意大利城邦国家体系的覆灭并融入正在形成中的欧洲国家体系。意大利战争的起源、过程和结果表明,战争为正在兴起的欧洲主要大国西班牙、法国、英国、奥地利等提供了竞技场,进而促成了欧洲国际关系中心由地中海向大西洋的转移,为1648年建立的欧洲国家体系——威斯特伐利亚体系——奠定了必要的基础。     

Renzi: the government,the party,the future of Italian politics

On 22 February 2014 President Napolitano appointed Matteo Renzi to the office of President of the Council of Ministers (the correct title according to the Italian constitution). Since then the 39-year-old secretary of the Democratic Party has launched a series of institutional, economic, and social reforms. Claiming that it was of the utmost importance to scrap the old political class and to put Italy back to work, Renzi has already produced significant but, to say the least, controversial changes, as well as many clashes within his party and in the relationship between Italy and the European Union. This article will explore where the changes in his style of governing and in his party will lead the politics of Italy.     

The dejuvenation of the Italian population

Abstract

In recent decades, a process of structural reduction of the weight of new generations in overall population (dejuvenation) has been observed. In Italy, this process started in the 1970s and accelerated in the 1990s. We present here its main consequences for Italian society and economy. The number of Italian young people (aged 0–29) was reduced from 24.5 million in 1951 (51.6% of the population) to 17.5 million in 2016 (28.8%). What is more, many young Italians are becoming a wasted resource and a social cost, facing high rates of unemployment, long economic dependence on the family of origin, renunciation of full achievement of their life plans, distrust of institutions, low social and political participation, and increasing emigration flow. We analyze, using multivariate models, the data of the Rapporto Giovani survey held by the Toniolo Institute in 2015. Our main finding is that generational disadvantages not only hamper economic growth but, in a familistic context, also exacerbate social inequalities.     

The institutional odyssey of the Italian Parliamentary Republic

This article examines the Italian foreign policy of the second Berlusconi government. The first section focuses on the episodes that critics have used to argue that, under the second Berlusconi government, there has occurred a process of ‘Americanization’ of Italian foreign policy, and provides an interpretation of their significance. The second section looks at these episodes against the historical background of Italian?–?American relations since the end of World War II and argues that, from this perspective, very little, if anything, has changed in Italian?–?American relations or Italian foreign policy in general.     

The crisis of the Italian state: then and now

Abstract

The article argues that Patrick McCarthy's Crisis of the Italian State was a book of great value by an author who was a partisan in the struggle to reform the Italian political system. The book's argument that lasting reform of Italian politics is only possible if middle class Italians begin to act as citizens, rather than as clients who regard the state as a source of potential largesse, has proved to be a far-sighted one, although at the time it seemed simplistic. Many of Italy's current troubles stem from the failure of Italy to go beyond the ‘overworked state’.     

The election of the tenth President of the Italian Republic

Abstract

The election on the first ballot of Carlo Azeglio Ciampi to the Presidency of the Republic came as a surprise. This article explores how it occurred by analysing the criteria usually employed to screen the candidates for President and the misplaced efforts by the secretary of the Partito popolare to win the office for a candidate of his party. An assessment of the powers of the President, in particular those concerning the appointment of the Prime Minister and the dissolution of parliament, is offered with reference to the experience of outgoing President Oscar Luigi Scalfaro. The success of Walter Veltroni, secretary of the Leftist Democrats, and of Gianfranco Fini, leader of the National Alliance, in persuading the opposition to vote for Ciampi is related to their interest in reigniting a process for the reform of the political system and the construction of a majoritarian and bipolar democracy. President Ciampi may prove to be very helpful in this difficult task, but most of the initiative and responsibility lie with party leaders and members of parliament.     

异质思维的历史误区——对延安时期政治与文艺冲突现象的几点看法

艺与政治二间思维的异质,是使延安时期“启蒙”与“救亡”相互误读,以至步入艺发展误区的主要历史动因。本通过政治家与艺家对“艺”、“政治”以及自身责任与使命的认识差异,来揭示这一时期艺与政治相冲突的表现特征,并对中国现当代学历史上的独特现象——由于艺主张的分歧而进行的政治批判运动。进行了一定程度的探讨。     

Power or policy: a comparative study of the cohesion of Italian coalition governments in the First and Second Republics

In the 1990s the Italian political system witnessed momentous changes that have severely impinged upon the country's political parties and party system. What has been the resulting effect on the cohesion of Italian governing coalitions? Has the effect on the nature and workings of governing coalitions been a product of the changing motivations of political parties? This article attempts to tackle the following questions by using the general framework of several formal coalition theories complemented with an analysis of the specific features of the Italian political context.     

论意大利自由派获得统一大权的历史必然性

本通过比较马志尼、加里波第与以加富尔为首的自由派在意大利统一过程中不同的政治、经济和外交措施,及其效果来论证意大利自由派获得统一大权的历史必然性。     

The Continuing Transformation of Italian Politics and the Contradictory Fortunes of the Lega Nord

There has been considerable academic debate about the transition in Italian politics, which began in the early 1990s and has continued ever since. The most significant recent milestone in this transition has been the May 2001 general election and this article focuses upon one important outcome of the election - the sharp electoral decline of the Northern League. The League has been one of the principal forces of change in Italian politics, so its decline needs to be fully understood. Even though its support has declined considerably, the League is part of Berlusconi's government and therefore, somewhat paradoxically, it remains a potentially important force, raising questions about the direction in which the Italian transition is heading.     

Silvio Berlusconi and the traditions of Italian foreign policy: a comment on Ambassador Romano's presentation

Abstract

While open to criticism on many levels, the foreign policy of Italy under Silvio Berlusconi does not deviate in many significant ways from traditional approaches, especially on its management of Italy's relations with the United States and the European Union. Italy's ‘exceptionalism’ is also similar to that of many other European states.     

Liberalism in the Cold War: Norberto Bobbio and the dialogue with the PCI

In this article I study the theoretical impact of Cold War ideology on Italian democracy through the dialogue between Norberto Bobbio and the leaders of the Italian Communist Party in the mid-1950s, in particular the philosopher Galvano della Volpe and the General Secretary Palmiro Togliatti. I claim that Bobbio's choice of dialogue with the 'enemies' of the western model of democracy was in itself a criticism of the Cold War logic and its Manichean theology of good and evil. What I call Bobbio's politics of dialogue has been roundly criticized in Italy, particularly since 1989, when revisionist scholars accused the non-Communist intellectuals of previous generations of not understanding Communist totalitarianism. I take the revisionists' challenges as my point of departure for an analysis of Bobbio's politics of dialogue and its underlying theoretical implications. Bobbio challenged the Communists on three related topics: the theory of the state, the philosophical character of Marxism, and the theory of liberty. Keeping the door open to illiberals did not imply relativism or passive acceptance of any opinion: failure to understand this basic fact led late revisionists to misinterpret Bobbio's dialogue with the PCI as a sign of weakness rather than strength. The dialogue strengthened Bobbio's conviction that it was crucial to link the defense of individual liberty to the defense of democracy, and thus avoid the dualism between negative and positive liberty, liberalism and democracy, a trait peculiar to Cold War liberalism as well as its leftist antagonists.     

The disappearance of a Rom community and the rejection of the politics of recognition

The politics toward Rom minorities in Italy is marked by a binary of recognition: on one hand, there exists the recognition of a nomad identity (present in various institutional practices), on the other a recognition of a cultural identity of Rom and Sinti (exemplified by many associations, either pro-Gypsy or Gypsy). But in the case of Melfi the predominant politics is a decisive refusal of recognition by Melfitani and Melfitani of Gypsy origins. The situation in Melfi should be read as the logical conclusion of a long process of assimilation which led to the dissolution of the historical Rom community.     

Berlusconi,strong government and the Italian state

Over the past decade, state capacity has increased at all levels, including that of central government, and the emergence of effective government in Italy has proved popular. A second trend has been the reassertion of party government since 1996. Given these two trends, the large parliamentary majority obtained by Silvio Berlusconi's alliance, the Casa delle LibertÀ, might be expected to result in strong party government. In fact, Berlusconi's triumph offers something more and something less than party government, challenging Italian democracy. Nevertheless, as a consolidated democracy, Italy should be able to withstand such a challenge. One stable, democratic outcome to Italy's political transformation would be the consolidation of a Schumpeterian model of democracy. This would require the anomalies of the right's accumulation of powers to be resolved, a process which the left could promote by accepting that strong democratic government is a public good, and by organizing itself to challenge Berlusconi by campaigning to provide Italy with such government through parliamentary competition.     

The 2013 elections and the Italian political system

The February 2013 Italian general elections were characterized by the highest volatility to date. Although, thanks to the majority bonus, the Partito Democratico (Democratic Party) obtained the absolute majority of seats in the House of Deputies, it could not be considered the winner of the elections. Lacking a majority in the Senate, it was obliged to form a government with Silvio Berlusconi's party and with the rather small number of parliamentarians elected in former Prime Minister Mario Monti's list. In spite of his last-minute surge, Berlusconi was a clear loser, having lost almost six million votes in respect of his 2008 victory. Comedian Beppe Grillo's Movimento Cinque Stelle (Five Stars Movement) received the highest-ever number of votes for a new entry into any post-war European general election. Unwilling to play the coalitional game and made up of inexperienced and incompetent parliamentarians, Grillo's party has remained isolated and ineffective. The present Italian party system consists of three poles, the Movimento Cinque Stelle playing the role of anti-system party. Institutional reforms and especially reform of the electoral system, which has been struck down by the Constitutional Court, are again the focus of debate. Restructuring of the Italian political system is yet to come.     

Resurrections and rebirths: how the Risorgimento shaped modern Italian politics

The Risorgimento was the process of independence and unification of the Italian nation between 1848 and 1860, and has remained a powerful symbol of Italian politics ever since. Elaborating on Jan Assmann’s concept of cultural memory, the article discusses the Risorgimento at crucial moments in twentieth-century Italian politics: the 1911 anniversary of unification, the elaboration of the Risorgimento during fascism, the re-appropriation of the Risorgimento by the left and by the Resistance during the 1930s and 1940s, the general semantic space carved by the post-war democratic forces on both right and left with reference to the Risorgimento, and the sudden return to the memory of the Risorgimento in the 1990s and afterwards. The aim of the article is to understand both continuities and changes in the reference to the Risorgimento in twentieth-century political discourse, and to put into perspective Italy’s ‘particular’ road to modernity within a comparative European frame.     

The Italian Left in search of ideas: the rediscovery of the political ideas of the Action Party

In the wake of the collapse of 'really-existing' socialism and against a background of the growing influence of neo-liberal political thought, European socialist parties - and especially the former communist parties - have found it crucially important to reassert their liberal credentials. This explains the interest displayed by the Italian Left in liberal socialism, Dahrendorf 's New Liberalism and American liberalism, and especially in what is now called the 'Third Way'. In Italy, these developments have resulted in a genuine example of 'history's revenge'. The political ideas associated with the Action Party (PdA), which long played a Cinderella role in Italian politics and culture, have moved back to centre stage. This article examines how Italian leftist parties like the Democrats of the Left (DS) have been realigned to take into account the ideas of liberal socialism proposed by thinkers like Carlo Rosselli. It also explores how,since 1989, parties of the Italian Left have tried to appropriate the Actionist past and its mission, and why,after a long period of deliberate neglect, the Actionist agenda has again become the subject of lively debate.     

清代贵州团练与地方政治

在清代全国团练兴起的大背景下,结合贵州具体史事,分析了贵州团练兴起的原因,介绍了贵州团练的名称,规模及其经费来源,并通过地方基层制度保甲制和基层社会重要构成部分宗族与士绅在基层社会中的地位与影响,着重分析在社会大动乱时期保甲制的困境造成团练兴起的必要性及宗族与士绅组织团练的原因。通过团练与官府的关系分析其在维护传统政治格局和社会秩序的同时侵害官府利益和权威、剥蚀离心中央政权的二重性,从而揭示清代贵州团练与地方政治关系的演变。