

Italy’s election

Long after the party


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BrightTony in reply to vitaliale

".... It defines "crazily complex" the electoral system with regional majority while it is very similar to that of the Usa with national victories producing the president elect...."

Do you think it's not any complex? Do you deem it be simple?
Any comparison with USA shall be better looked at, however that can have little do to with our society.
A lot of trouble has already been brought by such a system.


Thanks a lot to The Economist. On these pages I can freely express what any Italian newspaper not easily allows me to, even in a blog. Here I am really free to write what I think and see as true.

Thank you so much, again.


A lot of corrupted managers and politicians, who have been pursuing their intertwined and mutual politics-to-business corruption, shall now acknowledge the surfacing truth, the reality coming up. They shall 'honourably' thus keep and stay On Undisputed Truth (O.U.T).

Are you ready, Honourables, Madams and Sirs? Freeway is available for you. A good outcome is well expected, deservedly for honest citizens; a way out of such a mayhem is needed and well possible: that means all of you must go out, forever, soon!


What's most ridiculous, I dare say it ought to be funny if that did not bring trouble after trouble, entrepreneurs often complaining on labour costs and "rigid labour market". I can say for sure that, at any level, they had long been playing on our resource as a never running out good, they have been believing that they coud do whatever they wished. Such people have been issuing undisputed conditions, if customers did not like what they were offered, they could look for something else somewhere else. Prices and offer goods and service were just at the entrepreneurs' mercy, no real market competitor was really feared. A lot of firm owners would still complain on their employees' "too high wages" (euros 1,000 monthly, to say the best), saying that it's too costly for their business. No wonder if a great deal of them, after shutting the own office and firm doors, in late evening, leave then from Padua (northeastern Italy), for example, and they drive to Nova Gorica (Slovenia, about 200 km from Padua) to waste a lot of money in a gambling house. Similar examples are there throughout Italy, doesn't matter where the casinos (or anything else) may be there.
In the end, a lot of these people blame on workers their inability to deal with the own firm and to use the own money more profitably, such as investing into quality.
They must accept competitiveness, that means better quality manufacture and service, together with more convenience to customers.
That is hard to admit, they never feel comfortable thereupon.
A lot of them prefer to invest abroad, what about quality and therefore world market success, that will come to truth early, if not yet.

Come on! Time to speak the truth, never blame on others and especially never on less advantaged people.

Lucia Urbano


marie france dupont

@MARO FERRETTI.My italian friends affirm that it's better to be illitterate than to be able of reading and believe what IL FATTO QUOTIDIANO publishes

Come on, what do they mean? Don't they simply understand Italian, their own language? Do they find this newspaper indecent, on their viewpoint? If ever, they don't need to turn back illiterate, they just can refrain from reading it.

I think however that, if they don't lack education, they are completely out of culture. Such a behaviour of them clearly means being snobbish; indeed it's the real opposite of culture. No wonder if they feel uneasy with "Il Fatto Quotidiano", as well as with any newspaper aside from Il Giornale, Libero or similar..papers.


*Small print:
Will speed up the break up of the EZ and the EU.
And we will have a perfect scapegoat. Thanks in advance.

As always, SinnFrei,
your habit of malicious scapegoating gives you away.
I've seen enough.

There are no countries in the world which are more dysfunctional than those in the European South. Even Somalia is less corrupted and has a brighter future. The Italian election shows that a "born criminal" (I'm just quoting an Italian court), an ex-communist and a madman who wants "to kill all politicians" are the most popular politicians in the country.
I intended to comment on "dysfunctional history", too, but I don't know what that is - something from Star Trek?


Berlusconi is playing this card


Austerity is wrong as per IMF latest statement.

Puts Monti in a hole

Germany is Federated, if Italy wants to compete in Europe it must also become Federated.

GOTTMITUNS✠1870 in reply to zorzon

"Germany is Federated, if Italy wants to compete in Europe it must also become Federated."
Really shows how smart Silvio is, given the fact that many people in Germany oppose federalism and it was actually introduced to make sure that the German Federal Government is weak. How is having 16 different school systems good for a country?

marie france dupont

@BANANA REPUBLIC.I visited Italy many times,and i found no illiterates but gentle folks,good hotels,fantastic food,cheap prices.I traveled in less than 3 hours from MIlano to Rome spending half than in France,less than half than on the DB trains,on the same distance.I know,being a Physics professor,that a women named Fabiola Gianotti led the most important experiment in Physics history:she graduated in Milan University,not into one of the famous Ivy League or at Stanford.You lie knowing that you lie,your posts a kind of mediatic pollution.

You appear to be not terribly well informed about the educational problems affecting Italy. Apart from the results of PISA studies, you might be interested in what Professor Tullio De Mauro — a linguist — has to say at:
According to him, research shows that more than 50% of Italy's adult population suffers from difficulties in understanding written information. If I were you, I would carefully consider all that (and its possible causes) before using strong language against other posters here.

Banana Republic


zorzon in reply to Banana Republic

The Italians all go into the legal professions, latest count is

Italy - 220,000 ( barristers, lawyers, judges etc )
next in Europe
Germany - 155,000



Banana Republic


Banana Republic

50% of Italian adults are illiterate; they cannot comprehend basic information from a document. This mean that believe any rubbish that Berlusconi has proposed in his TV and newspaper. They firmly believe that all Italy problems are due to Germany and Merkel. So therefore what do you expect they will vote ?

Indeed. However, considering the latest OE report, it also means that:
(a) PD is unable to fill in properly a 20- question form on their proposed policies;
(b) when the report finally comes out (using surrogate information from their own previously published material), they don't seem to realise what it means;
(c) yet nobody cares anyway — even among their opponents.
Illiteracy seems to be widely interpreted as actually a virtue, particularly among Italian politicians and journalists. And all that must have something to do with an experiment carried out some months ago, when somebody administered a PISA test (meant for 14-year olds) to a sample of Italian school teachers. Their (dismal) results were not very different from those scored by their pupils. Education seems indeed to be at the root of most of Italy's current problems.

Mario Ferretti

During recent weeks Oxford Economics used its Global Economic Model to quantify the impact on the Italian economy of the different policies proposed during the electoral campaign by the main political parties. The results have been published (in English) by the Italian daily Corriere della Sera and can be found at
Of the six parties approached to that end with a 20-questions questionnaire, two (Mr Grillo's and Mr Ingroia's) did not provide any data. A third, PD, gave only incomplete ones, which were complemented by OE using published sources. So the final exercise regarded only four groups: “Fare per Fermare il Declino”, “Partito Democratico”, “Popolo della Libertà” and “Scelta Civica – Con Monti per l’Italia”. The study simulates the impact of their proposed policies on six variables (GDP growth, unemployment rate, household income growth, CPI inflation rate, public balance and government debt as percentages of GDP) up to 2018.
The results look striking. On the face of it, the least expansionary policies of all (with the lowest overall GDP and household income growth and the highest final unemployment) are those promoted by PD. At the same time, however, this same party would also lead to the highest final debt in 2018 (at 117.4% of GDP). However, it can be doubted that the PD leadership were aware of these implications of their policies on growth and employment, and it can be expected that if they won they would quickly change tack as they saw the results materialising in practice. How they would do that, however, is anybody's guess.
By contrast, the most Keynesian approach would appear to be the one proposed by Mr Berlusconi's PDL, with the highest growth and least unemployment, and also the highest final government deficit in 2018 (at 3% of GDP, compared with 1.1% on PD's proposals). However, one should keep in mind that these values (and also the simulated final debt of just 104% of GDP in 2018) are conditioned on two sets of actions which OE consider of very dubious feasibility: a Swiss deal to substantially increase revenue and a huge concentrated sale of public assets.
Taken together, the simulation results would thus seem to suggest that only “Fare per Fermare il Declino” and “Scelta Civica – Con Monti per l’Italia” have broadly believable policies, with a cumulated GDP growth of about 5% over the whole period and a final debt hovering around 112% of GDP.

stefano de santis

@MILOVAN DJILAS.As an actor of the movie "PLATOON" said,"excuses are like the a**hole:everyone has his own".You killed to give us a present called "stalinism",and like stalinist you behaved.
Not me,but a sure antifascista like GIAMPOLO PANSA accuses you in his book "TIPI SINISTRI"of blackmailing all the italian culture with printing houses and literary prizes.
Ronald Reagan knew about the close links of you with KGB and helped the DC to preserve democracy in this Country:he did his duty,not an "interference"
For the aspirin,i wait the results.I am afraid that you will get the pill that the happy war machine got in 1994.You hope that it will snow:you live of such hopes,to give us the perfect society of the mandatory happiness

luigi bianchi

@MILOVAN DJILAS.Always taken seriously democracy?Like when you used to kill the oppositors during the three years following the end of the WWII?While you still occupy press,media(included,shame on you,the FESTIVAL DI SANREMO tutned into a squalid show of propaganda),culture with your perverted regists and actors,magistrature(with magistrates trying to kill our strategic companies to help the francogerman dreams of domination),finance(ever heard about MPS?),the french marionets in the Vatican like the CEI folks clearly backing the enemies of Catholicism(Masonry proud about them),trade unions,women's lib,the antimafia associations,and the hands of idiots disguised as comedians on our Risorgimento?And,just to end,with your close links with the KGB in the years 40 to 90,and now with the french espionage?If this is democracy,call me Elvis Presley.You don't know the difference between Democracy and Nutella.Renzi is a democrat,and was politically killed by your nomenklatura.You PD are e danger.Hope to be terminated with the incoming elections.

MilovanDjilas in reply to luigi bianchi

Take an aspirin Luigi.
The years 1945-48 did not happen in a vacuum. Why are you so obsessed with those years? There were revenge killings all over Europe in those years. And by the way, I MYSELF did not kill any "oppositors".
Musicians and artists around the world take political stands. It's called democracy.
Close links in the years 1940-1990? And, your point is? Ronald Reagan was sending US and Saudi money to support the Christian Democrats still in the 1980's. That is illegal Luigi, and nobody has ever been prosecuted for those crimes.
Renzi was not "killed". He lost the primaries - and, just as frequently happens in the US, the winner Bersani is bending over backwards to accommodate the losers within his party.
BTW, I am with Vendola and the SEL, not the PD.
I this the above "sentence" is a textbook definition of "incoherent babbling".
Pier Luigi Bersani, a former successful Minister of Transport and then of the Economy, is going to win the elections.
Get over it.


This article is heavily biased and uses information in a selective and questionable way.

1) The Beppe Grillo article states that Demos found that compared to the average, M5S supporters were more likely to be male, unemployed and pessimistic. Is this compared to the average Italian or the average politically active Italian? It might be that the M5S attracts more women than other parties, although still fewer women than men. It also makes no mention of their age. If they are younger than the average Italian, and for that matter the average politically active Italian (which I suspect they are) they are more likely to be unemployed (as the article states youth unemployment is running at 36% against 11% for the population as a whole) and as a result more likely to be pessimistic.The conclusion that them being educated, unemployed, pessimistic and male makes them more likely to turn to political violence is inflamatory and unfounded.

2) The main articles opens with the statement that 'most Italians show little interest in the contest.' I would challenge this. Italians care desperately about their country and the political situation and seem to do little else than talk about politics. They certainly discuss it a lot more than British people. The Economist may be right that the turnout at these elections will be lower than normal, but that is not because Italians don't care; friends of mine are agonising about who to vote and many are coming to the conclusion that they cannot bear to vote of any of the candidates.

3) The Economist showers Monti with praise but does not go into the reasons for which he is deeply unpopular in Italy, non least of which is the unsavoury and opportunistic coalition he has formed with Casini of the UDC and Fini of FLI, but also because of the strong sense that he is pursuing a bankers/German agenda. This may be why The Economist is giving him their support but they should at least admit it. He may be important for the future of the Euro and for global economic stability but that does not mean he is the best thing for Italy. The article also fails to mention his strong links to the Catholic Church and the deeply conservative nature of his social policies.

4) Finally Italy may not have had a strong centre-left in the post way year,s but it did have a very strong Communist Party which was lead by one of Italy's most respected politicians, Enrico Berlinguer. Thanks to the work of this party, within the parliamentary system, the rights of workers and women were greatly improved. Comparing the Italian Communists to the various incarnations of Silvio Berlusconi's party on the centre-right is deeply insulting.


If The Economist thinks Italian don't care about the elections, this means it does not understand Italians. That's not a fault, I am Italian and often I don't understand my own people.

However, Italians really care about the elections. But Italians are cynic and used to deal with complex and risky elections.

stefano de santis


I will not cry victory yet.

But yes, Leftist voters in Italy always have taken Democracy more seriously than the Right in our country. So snow should be good news for us.

And we have organised primaries to choose many of the candidates, which should mean that we have more popular people in our electoral lists. Let's hope this counts for the extra 2 or 3 percentage points we need in Lombardy.

The Right in Italy has been thoroughly corrupted by Silvio Berlusconi - and needs to stay out of power for a very long, long time.

Finally, the vote abroad of those Italians who cannot be reached by Berlusconi's mediatic propaganda machine should favour the Left again - although Monti and Grillo are both popular abroad. On the other hand, nobody votes Berlusconi any more from abroad.

BrightTony in reply to stefano de santis

Come on! Now you see also "trinariciuti", 'three-nostriled fellows'! You ought just to read books about Greek mythology or anything similar, if you have such a fiction interest. You can find in these tales, for example, also Cyclopes, one-eyed giants. You can collect, if you wish, a few books about this kind of art and pictures, caricatures, strange faces, so on.
Do you think "trinariciuti" are fanatic? What should be said about people shouting your own way, strongly for Berlusconi, as if he was an undisputable leader? Do you think it has anything to do with democracy? Do you consider such a behaviour as yours any democratic?
Please, where are those dangerous guys? Do you think, if ever, that they are so dangerous? Why do you think that? Do you, just because Berlusconi stated that? Do anybody among you have any idea of their own, besides learning word-by-word- every Berlusconi's argument?

BrightTony in reply to stefano de santis


Come on, pal! I kindly ask you enough dignity, you refrain from blasphemous phrases as well as Nazi-propaganda ones.
Gott mut uns", however, is not in English, say it's in German.
Quoting this phrase, which is also off-topic, you belie yourself as democracy-saving aiming; I have just said which the reason is.


Just a little comment about voting participation: TE's journalist expects turnout in 2013 to be lower than in the previous election. Maybe as low as "only 70%"?
There are certain large countries that would be delighted to have a turnout of 70%; one might wish for a higher rate, but 70% doesn't seem catastrophically dismal to me.

MilovanDjilas in reply to Vive_chimie

Thank you for your kind words.

For most of the postwar period, our voter turnout was regularly around 90%. It has slowly drifted downwards to historic lows, but we are still among the highest (will that be true now?). And in many local areas (I live in Friuli) turnout is significantly higher.
Tellingly, in the US (for example) voter turnout is higher during NATIONAL elections and lower for local and off-year elections. In Italy it is generally the presence of contemporaneous LOCAL elections that drives voter turnout upward.
When coffee magnate Riccardo Illy was elected President of Friuli-Venezia Giulia ten years ago, we actually had a number of (Slovenian minority) small towns with 90% voter turnout that voted 90% for Illy. (We call those left-wing areas the "Bulgarian Zone").
Keep in mind that the electoral rolls in any typical Italian municipality include around 10% that are abroad even though they might still have their official residence in their hometown. There are close to 4 million Italians officially residing abroad who should vote through our consulates, but these voting procedures are difficult and turnout is very low.
In other words (if I understand the statistics correctly) between those citizens OFFICIALLY registered as residing abroad and those domiciled abroad but not officially registered there, we probably have 15-18% of our voting-age citizens outside Italy at the moment. In those cases, turnout is below 30%.

Today I was told by a university student that she will not be going home to vote (despite the 70% discount on the train ticket) because she has an examination the day after the elections. A Law examination. Shame on you, professor.

pietro dangeli

Matteo Renzi was the right man to lead Italy.
Mr. Bersani, a longtime party veteran, he only speaks to the old guard of the Italian left. Mr. Renzi would have spoken to all the Italian people. He would have won without problems and Mr. Berlusconi would be retired with his girls!
Well Mr. Bersani is like Berlusconi thinks at his businesses, instead of doing the best for Italy.
Now who can save Italy?
Mario Monti is the solution, He can not win but He needs votes for change the Bersani's programma.

longman333 in reply to pietro dangeli


MilovanDjilas in reply to Ras80


Please don't encourage him. Although I admit, he does offer insight into the mentality of Berlusconi supporters.

You have to ask yourself, what is it about Italians that they are so negatively obsessed with Communism in a country where the Communists never governed and never committed any crimes...

...with the one exception of the revenge crimes at the end of the war, 1945-47. Obviously, this is tied to denial in Italy of Fascist crimes. Berlusconi supporters are basically modern-day Fascists who refuse to admit Italian "Communists" in 1945 had some reason to erupt in violence after 20 years of a dictatorial regime and 5 years of a useless and criminal war.
Not that I am defending violence, but I think that period was inevitable on most of the continent. Or maybe large parts of the continent, such as German cities, were too devastated to engage in further violence.
But it is a fact that Italy itself was strangely "peaceful" from 1940-43, until the war arrived in the peninsula.

On the other hand, somebody should send Longman a calendar - this is 2013, not 1943.

longman333 in reply to pietro dangeli

How can you say that Berlusconi minds his own business. Thatßs wrong. He is a billionaire and caould live light-hearted and carefree in the most wonderful places of the world Instead of that he accepted the difficult job to save the country he loves so much, and now he is in a fix, he has a hard nut to crack. Italians do not deserve his superhuman commitment and in his place most people would have tell all to fuck off. But he is too a great man to surrender because he knows too well that people like Bersani, Monti, Grillo could only lead Italy to the ruin and he tries to precvent it. Of course ther's nothing to stop him from leaving if he see that his efforts are useless.

longman333 in reply to MehrAlsSinnLos



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