Democracy and the Constitution in Italy
| Published date | 01 August 1996 |
| Date | 01 August 1996 |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-9248.1996.tb00594.x |
| Subject Matter | Article |
Political
Studies
(1996),
XLIV,
451-412
Democracy
T
and the Constitution
in
Italy
LUIGI
FERRAJOLI
A
New
Italian
Case
The transition from the first to the second Republic is occurring in disquieting
and unexpected ways, once again raising the question of ‘an Italian case’.
For
better or worse, this century has seen many ‘Italian cases’. One such case was at
the forefront
of
political debate in the 1970s, centring around the prolonged
epoch of struggle for social reform that arose after 1968. However the Italian
flair for engendering a ‘case’ has more often manifested itself in the worst
possible ways: one need only think of Fascism
in
1922, the experience of
‘blocked’ democracy from 1945 to the present, or the bribery and corruption
scandals associated with
Tungentopoli
(Bribesville) in the 1980s and 1990s. The
novel elements in the current Italian case relate to three subtle shifts in the
‘material constitution’ of the state.’ These changes followed hard on the heels of
the advent of the Berlusconi government, set up in the wake of the electoral
success of the right on 27 March 1994.
The first element
-
by
far
the most obvious and striking
-
was the return,
fifty years on, of the Fascists to government. There has been a tendency in Italy
to underestimate and trivialize this event. Yet it is a fact of enormous symbolic
value, that strikes at the antifascist foundations of the Italian republic. Along
with the United Nations Charter, the 1948 Universal Declaration of Rights, the
documents that shaped the democratic identity of the West, effectively
redefining it through the negation of Nazism and Fascism. Consequently, the
fact that Italy, the very country that gave birth to Fascism seventy years ago,
brought the Fascists back to power in 1994 was greeted with consternation in
other countries. This general concern was by no means alleviated
-
quite the
contrary
-
by the lack of understanding and displeasure that marked the
The expression ‘material constitution’ was introduced into Italian legal discourse by
C.
Mortati,
La
costiiuzione
in
senso
materiale
(Milano, Giuffre, 1940).
In
contrast to the ‘formal
constitution’, it denotes both the ‘political values’ and ‘institutional aims’, which are at the basis of
a particular legal order, and the prevailing ‘political order’. Cf. also,
C.
Mortati,
Isrituzioni
di diritto
pubblico
(Padova, Cedam,
VI
ed., 1962); and ‘Costituzione (Dottrine generali)’ in
Enciclopediu del
diritto
(Milano, GiuffrC, 1962), vol.
XI,
pp. 169-78. This somewhat confused sociological notion
has now become part
of
ordinary political language and refers
to
the actual organization of public
powers, that is the way in which the ‘formal’ constitution
is
interpreted and applied (or not
applied). The opposition between the ‘formal’ and the ‘material’ constitution has therefore been
used to point out the gap between the two, either to highlight
the
violation and non-fulfilment of
the constitutional design, or to legitimate ‘realistic’ reform proposals intended to bring the
constitution into line with what actually happens.
OPolitical Studies Association
1996.
Published
by
Blackwell Publishers,
108
Cowley Road, Oxford OX4
IJF,
UK and
238
Main
Street. Cambridge, MA
02142,
USA.
458
Democracy and the
Constitution
in
Italy
Italian response, above all that of President Scalfaro, to the European Parlia-
ment’s exhortation to Italy to defend the Republic’s antifascist roots.
The other two elements of novelty in the current Italian case relate to changes
in the nature of political representation. The new ‘majoritarian’ electoral system
has not only distorted the representative relationship based on the classical
principle of one person/one vote, but has also favoured two converging
phenomena: the grouping together of the old electoral base of the former
governing parties with that of the Northern League and the Fascists, and the
success of an improvised political grouping in the form of ‘Forza Italia’ led by
Silvio Berlusconi.2 With the old governing class shattered by the
Tangentopoli
investigations, the entrenched strongholds of power, together with the vested
interest groups and the mighty patronage systems on which these rested, came
out into the open and opted for the post-fascist lists. They set up their own
organizational machine and ran for office in their own right rather than
employing a political intermediary.
As
a result, the rise of ‘Forza Italia’ has
transformed the forms and subjects of political communication, and therewith
of representation and democracy as well, enriching political science with two
new categories: that of the company-cum-party and the firm-cum-government.
These comprise respectively the second and third most significant changes in
Italy’s material constitution.
It is commonly said that elections, as Schumpeter pointed out, are
a
competition between parties for the popular vote, not altogether unlike the kind
of free competition that takes place between firms in the market. However, the
1994 elections saw a radical transformation of the electoral race. An
unprecedented concentration of broadcasting media was mobilized in the
electoral campaign behind not a party faction or a powerful lobby or pressure
group, but the media owner himself. Within the space of
a
few weeks
a
political
force was constructed in the company’s advertising department, which
proceeded to promote
it
using the same techniques as those adopted for
launching a commercial product, thereby endowing political communication
and consensus-making with the same characteristics as marketing and
advertising. What is more, this operation was carried out in a near-monopoly
regime. It marked the culmination of a process started in the 1980s which has
turned politics into glitzy show-business and commodified it. The judicial
hearings on graft and bribery laid bare the close link that had come
to
exist
between wealth and politics
-
money as a means
to
finance political power, and
political power as the key
to
amass wealth. This relationship, hitherto shrouded
in secrecy, was now made explicit: money had openly been transformed into
a
resource for acquiring political power, and politics into a tool to reinforce
economic power.
By December 1994 the improvised coalition between Forza Italia, the post-fascists of Aiiednza
Nazionale. and the Lega Nord had collapsed, due
10
the sudden withdrawal of the latter from the
government. This was hardly surprising, since
~
contrary to the general opinion that the right had
won the elections
of
March 1994
-
the coalition was the result of two separate electoral alliances,
one between Forza Italia and the Lega in Northern Italy, and the other between Forza Italia and
the Alleanza Nazionale in the rest of the country. The electoral pact had no common programme, it
was only conceived in order to
take
advantage of the majoritarian electoral system introduced the
previous year. The coalition scored
42%
of
the popular vote, gaining the majority of seats in only
one of the two chambers, but collapsed
as
soon as disagreements emerged over economic policy and
the regulation of the broadcasting system.
11
Political
Studies
Association.
1996
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