Lessons of Berlusconi’s comeback
The mid-May election victory of Italian Berlusconi’s
right wing House of Liberty alliance grabbed the headlines. The Wall Street
Journal hoped that the defeat of the Olive Tree centre-left government, along
with having Bush II sitting in the White House, marked a further step towards
securing right-wing governments around the world. ROBERT BECHERT writes.
INTERNATIONALLY MANY workers and radicalised youth were
shocked by the victory of this bloc led by the megalomaniac and three times
convicted billionaire Berlusconi, the ‘post-fascist’ Fini and the racist
Bossi. Immediate comparisons were made with Austria, where last year’s entry
into the government of Haider’s FPÖ sparked off mass protests.
While the timing is not clear, however, Berlusconi has
already been warned that attacks on workers’ conditions and on pensions will
be fiercely resisted. Italian workers have not been cowed by the right’s
success. Five days after Berlusconi’s election victory tens of thousands of
metal workers in Milan, Rome and Turin staged four-hour strikes in support of
wage demands. Two weeks later, the mayoral run-off elections saw high profile
defeats for Berlusconi’s candidates in Rome, Naples and Turin.
Berlusconi’s national electoral victory only told part of
the story. Forza Italia, the party he founded in January 1994, did increase its
vote significantly from 7.71m in April 1996 to 10.92m in the chamber of deputies
election. But the total number of chamber votes won by his House of Liberty
alliance was 1.16m less than it received in the last election. In fact votes for
most parties, including centre and left parties, fell. A growing mood of
dissatisfaction with all parties was shown in the 3.19m spoilt or blank votes
cast in the chamber of deputies vote.
This right wing election victory has many lessons. Less than
seven years ago, two general strikes and a huge one and a half million strong
demonstration in Rome on November 12 1994 helped bring down Berlusconi’s first
attempt at government. Now he is on the verge of forming his second government.
How did this happen, what does it mean for Italy, and what can both the workers’
movement and the growing international anti-capitalist resistance learn from
this?
Roots of Berlusconi’s victory
THE REASONS FOR Berlusconi’s election victory, which
amounts to a big defeat for the working class, lies in what happened after 1994.
The defeated centre-left Olive Tree coalition had ruled
since the last elections in 1996, when they replaced the caretaker ‘technocratic’
government led by Dini. The main party in the Olive Tree government was the
Democratic Left (DS), representing the bulk of the former Communist Party, whose
leaders carried out a policy very similar to New Labour’s in Britain. In this
election the other forces running under the Olive Tree banner included
Margherita (Daisyflower, a group of centre-left former Christian Democrats), Il
Girasole (Sunflower, a grouping of Green and left socialists) and the Pdci
(Italian Communists, a right-wing split from Rifondazione Communista).
Rapidly after its formation in May 1996 disappointment grew
with the Olive Tree government as it failed to deliver. Taxes were increased and
public spending limited in a drive to meet the criteria to join the European
Monetary Union. Despite recent economic growth, unemployment only slowly
declined; it is still officially 9.9%, while real wages have been falling. As
part of its misnamed ‘reform’ programme the Olive Tree carried through a
very rapid casualisation of labour in 2000. Within one year, two million workers
became temporary workers, and a further two million were forced to become ‘self-employed’
- ie working for the same boss but without collective wage agreements. In this
election the Olive Tree’s main candidate, Rome’s Mayor Rutelli, promised to
continue with fundamentally the same policies.
Just before the election the London Financial Times
commented on the ‘rigorous programme’ of the ‘left’: "The Olive
Tree coalition has enjoyed some success since winning power in 1996. It kept a
lid on public spending, squeezing Italy into monetary union. But this historic
achievement has consumed three high-quality prime ministers in five years"
(30 April). The turnover in prime ministers reflected increasing disappointment,
disappointment that Berlusconi attempted to exploit, especially among the young.
Berlusconi, whose fortune is estimated by Forbes magazine at
$13bn, ran a very highly personalised and demagogic populist campaign, fully
utilising his personally owned, mass media empire to mobilise support. Questions
concerning his court convictions, and allegations of corruption and Mafia links,
were brushed aside. After The Economist said he was unfit to rule Italy,
Berlusconi, who proclaims himself ‘anointed by the Lord’, attacked its
editor who, he claimed, has ‘a vague resemblance to Lenin’.
The criticism of Berlusconi by other capitalists has two
sides. Firstly, his rivals fear that he will utilise office to the advantage of
his own, still privately owned, companies. It is commonly understood that one
reason Berlusconi originally launched Forza Italia was "as a way of
protecting himself from the mounting inquiries of Milan’s public
prosecutors" (Financial Times, 12th March 2001). Secondly there
is a fear that this right-wing government will, sooner or later, provoke an
angry response from the Italian working class.
The problem for the Italian ruling class is that, since the
Christian Democrats disintegrated in the early1990s, they have had no stable
political force through which to rule. The Democratic Left’s leaders are
reliably pro-capitalist, but they are steadily losing their popular base. Now
the election result has forced them to accept a Berlusconi-led government, but
it is clear that many elements in the ruling class are attempting to rein him
in. It is not accidental that Berlusconi rejected the demands of both his main
allies, the Alleanza Nazionale (AN) and Lega Nord, to be given the speakerships
of either the chamber of deputies or the senate.
This election result will not mean a long period of
stability in Italy. The coming economic slowdown will place great strains on
Berlusconi’s shaky election alliance with both the AN and Lega Nord.
Tensions in the House
THE ALLEANZA NAZIONALE was formed in 1995 by the neo-fascist
MSI renaming itself. While now officially ‘post-fascist’, it still has
strong fascist elements within in. At Berlusconi’s Naples election rally the
AN youth wing were selling CD-ROMs containing the writings of Almirante, one of
the MSI’s founders and a leader of Mussolini’s rump fascist ‘Salo Republic’
of 1943-45.
Furthermore the House of Liberty’s elastic boundaries were
shown by its election alliance in Sicily with Fiamma Tricolore, the hardcore
neo-fascists who split from the MSI when it converted itself into the AN. But
the far right are not in a position to try to repeat Mussolini’s dictatorial
rule. Today’s balance of forces means that any attempt by either the ‘post-fascists’
or neo-fascists to directly attack the workers’ movement will be met by a
vigorous counter-offensive. While in this election the AN’s own vote fell from
5.87m to 4.45m, however, the House of Liberty’s victory illustrates the
general danger that disappointment with the left can open the door to the right.
Berlusconi did not achieve a clear-cut parliamentary
victory. In the upper house, the senate, he will depend upon either the Lega
Nord or some of the nine, unelected life senators to have a majority. From its
launch there have been tensions within the House of Liberty. The Lega Nord’s
policies of regionalism are in direct conflict with the bigger AN’s centralist
principles, but these differences were papered over as the right bloc sought to
win a majority.
However the Lega Nord paid the price for its opportunist
zigzagging with a sharp drop in its vote - down from 3.77m to 1.46m. Its
campaign to ‘stop immigration’ and ‘defend Christian values’ did not
prevent its percentage falling from 10.1% to 3.9%. It is not yet clear what its
leader Bossi will do in order to try to restore his fortunes. To increase his
bargaining power Bossi has stated that the Lega Nord’s 16 senators will ‘determine’
whether Berlusconi has a majority in the senate. In 1994 the Lega Nord brought
down the previous Berlusconi government when the mass opposition became too
much. Bossi’s erstwhile allies fear he will do the same again.
The House of Liberty’s populist campaign offered change
and demagogically promised to create 1.5m new jobs within five years, cut taxes
(‘less taxes for all’), raise the minimum pension to £322 a month and start
more public infrastructure projects. Berlusconi presented himself as the
successful businessman who would run the country as ‘Italy Inc’. But the ‘House’
did not have a serious programme; it only published its manifesto six days
before the election.
Such was the disappointment with the Olive Tree, however,
Berlusconi was able to win a significant part of the youth vote. This was seen
in the different votes between the elections for the chamber of deputies, where
all those over 18 years old can vote, and the senate where only those aged 25
and over can participate. While winning 18.39m votes in the chamber’s election
Forza Italia won 14.39m in the senate vote, the difference giving an indication
of how many under-25s voted for Berlusconi’s party.
In contrast the Olive Tree’s senate vote, 13.01m, was
actually higher than its 12.95m chamber vote. A reason for this was the
polarisation caused by the fear, particularly among older people, of Berlusconi,
Fini and Bossi running a government and the widespread hope that they could be
prevented from winning a majority in the senate.
Within the Olive Tree there was the continuing decline of
the Democratic Left (DS), the renamed party launched by the leaders of the
Communist Party (PCI) in 1991. The electoral highpoint of the former PCI was in
1976 when it won 12.62m votes (34.4%). But this vote for change was frustrated.
The then PCI leader Berlinguer had pushed through a policy of a ‘historic
compromise’ when led the party into a de facto coalition with the totally
corrupt Christian Democrats.
The disappointment produced by its leaders’ increasingly
pro-capitalist policies has resulted, since then, in a virtually continuous
decline in support for the PCI and its successor parties.
Rifondazione Communista
THE PCI LEADERSHIP’S proposal in 1990 to move the party
further to the right and rename it the Democratic Left Party (PDS) led to the
left split which formed the Rifondazione Communista (PRC, Party of Refounded
Communism) ten years ago in early 1991. Almost immediately the PRC attracted new
activists, not simply disappointed members of the old PCI, and made its mark in
elections, winning 5.2% of the vote in the April 1992 general election.
By the time of the 1996 general election the PRC was able to
win 3.21m votes, 8.6% of the total. But then its leaders were confronted with
the question of what to do with this support in the situation where the Olive
Tree coalition had the opportunity to form a minority government. The PRC
decided correctly to allow the Olive Tree to form a government in May 1996. This
was the first time ever that the DS (then called the PDS) had effectively led an
administration and many workers had high hopes of it. But while it was right to
allow workers to have, and learn from, the experience of a PDS-led government,
the PRC was completely wrong to extend support to the Olive Tree’s capitalist
policies.
For the first 18 months the PRC leaders effectively allowed
the government to carry out attacks on the working class. On 25 September 1997
the PRC paper, Liberazione, commented, "we have voted for cuts amounting to
100,000 billion lira (about $60 billion)".
This policy produced growing tensions within the PRC. In
October 1997 the PRC withdrew its support from the Olive Tree government because
of $2.96 billion cuts proposed in the 1998 budget. However, within a week, the
PRC leaders made a 180-degree turn and agreed to support both the government and
reduced cuts of $2.66 billion in return for various limited concessions. This
meant that the PRC was seen as continuing to support the government’s policies
and was deemed to be at least partly responsible for its anti-working class
measures.
By the time of the following year’s budget discussions the
pressure had become such that the PRC leaders again withdrew support from the
Prodi-led Olive Tree government. This time they did not reverse their position.
The resulting government crisis led to the PRC right wing, led by party founder
Cossutta, splitting away, forming their own party (the Italian Communists, Pdci)
and joining the new Olive Tree government, whose new prime minister was PDS
leader D’Alema.
However even after 1998 the PRC still did not have a
consistent socialist policy. This, along with the election’s polarisation, was
the reason for the fall in its vote from 3.21m in 1996 to 1.86m - a fall which
could not be simply accounted for by the Pdci’s 619,912 tally. A worrying sign
regarding the PRC’s appeal to youth was that its vote among the over-25 year
olds in the senate election was only 162,380 lower than its total for the
chamber of deputies.
Clearly, by not sufficiently distinguishing its own
policies, the PRC was unable to gain from the Olive Tree’s growing
unpopularity. The total number of spoilt or blank votes indicated the numbers
looking for an alternative. Comparing the chamber with the senate vote, it seems
that about 914,000 of the 3.19m chamber voters who refused to support any party
were under 25 years old. This is a layer to whom an energetic, consistent
anti-capitalist and socialist PRC campaign could have appealed.
A new period of instability
THE HOUSE OF Liberty will not have a stable period in
government. The developing world economic slowdown will have a big impact on
Italy, one of the weaker links in the Euro.
Since joining the EMU Italian industry has not been able to
use regular currency devaluations - its traditional method of maintaining
competitiveness. One result already is that Italy’s trade surplus fell from
4.4% of GDP in 1996 to 0.2% in the year 2000. The squeeze has been particularly
hard on its many small companies. Notwithstanding the cuts the Olive Tree
government made, Italy’s government debt rose in 2000 by 1.3% of GDP (0.2%
over target), despite a 2.9% growth in the economy - the highest since 1995.
Now economic forecasts are being cut and a House of Liberty
government will be caught in a vice between its populist election promises, the
economic situation, and the limitations placed by the euro on the national room
to manoeuvre. This situation could very easily result in a major crisis for the
entire European Union. Faced with being unable to carry out its promises
Berlusconi may attempt a nationalist campaign against both the EU and immigrants
in order to divert attention and retain power.
Despite parliamentary defeat, the Italian working class has
not been defeated in every respect. This is why the House of Liberty leaders
have stated that they will try to avoid a direct confrontation with the trade
unions by not attacking the existing nationally agreed labour contract system.
However battles with the trade unions over questions like pay, job security and
pensions are still likely sooner or later. Already before the election warnings
of industrial action to prevent pension counter-reforms was threatened by
Sabattini, leader of the metalworkers’ section of the largest federation, the
CGIL. He went on to say that such action ‘could easily develop into a general
strike’.
Sections of the employers do want to take advantage of the
new right-wing government to launch further attacks on the working class in an
attempt to regain some competitiveness. D’Amato, leader of the Confindustria
(Italy’s main bosses organisation), opened its May conference by demanding
that the new government give employers the right to sack workers when they need
to, a generalised system of time limited labour contracts and that Berlusconi
must be prepared to make ‘difficult decisions, perhaps at first unpopular ones’.
These demands produced a warning from the leader of the GCIL
union federation leader Cerfeda saying that ‘if the Berlusconi government
follows this programme, we are heading for social breakdown’. However D’Amato
does not necessarily represent the major Italian bosses, who are more wary of
directly challenging the working class. A Naples packaging contractor, D’Amato
last year won the Confindustria leadership by defeating a rival candidate backed
by the giant Fiat auto company and is really more typical of the 96% of Italian
companies that have less than 100 employees.
It is not clear whether there will be an immediate movement
against Berlusconi as in 1994. The trade union leaders may be threatening action
in words, whether they actually mobilise their members in action is another
question. Furthermore, given the deep disappointment with the Olive Tree
government, many workers will be asking, what is the alternative to the House of
Liberty? Simply saying go back to the Olive Tree is not an answer, the election
result shows that.
This once again poses the question of what the PRC does.
Under the previous Berlusconi government in 1994 PRC enjoyed a swift rise in
support. In just over a year its national vote rose from 6% to 8.4%. But it has
been tarnished by its inconsistent policy towards the Olive Tree government.
After the mayoral election results, where the PRC did not run candidates, there
undoubtedly will be pressure on the PRC to link up with the Olive Tree
coalition. But this would be a serious mistake.
While not ruling out temporary, limited agreements against
Berlusconi’s alliance, it is essential for the PRC’s future that it
maintains, at all times, complete political independence from the Olive Tree’s
capitalist policies. After all it was the experience of the Olive Tree
governments that opened the door to Berlusconi’s victory. Only the adoption of
a fighting policy can enable the PRC to achieve its aim of refounding Marxism as
mass force in Italy.
If the PRC now takes a lead in fighting against new cuts and
counter-reforms; struggling to defend and increase living standards; resisting
job cuts and arguing for a socialist programme; then it will play a key role
both against the new right wing government and in building mass support for the
real socialist alternative of breaking with capitalism.
In this situation the planned protests against this July’s
G8 summit in Genoa could take on a wider significance, not only being a further
mobilisation against capitalist globalisation and the policies of the
imperialist powers, but also marking the first mass mobilisation against the
Berlusconi government.
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