Behind Berlusconi victory
Right-wing media mogul fed on center's concessions
By John
Catalinotto
Amidst election disorder that kept booths open until 2
a.m., Italian voters on May 13 elected a right-wing coalition
led by multi-billionaire media magnate Silvio Berlusconi to
clear majorities in both houses of Parliament.
The social-democratic-led coalition that has been in
office since 1996 paved the way for Berlusconi's victory.
Called the Olive Tree, this coalition not only presided over
social service cuts and privatization but pushed the Italians
into a major role in the U.S.-NATO aggression against
Yugoslavia.
Any class-conscious worker or progressive opposed
Berlusconi and his right-wing populist and free-market
policies. None, however, could get enthusiastic about the
incumbent government or the candidate leading the opposition,
Rome's Mayor Francesco Rutelli.
Berlusconi's right-wing coalition--named the "House of
Liberty"--will have 368 seats in the 630-seat Chamber of
Deputies and 177 in the 324-member Senate, according to
official election results. The Olive Tree will have 250 seats
in the Chamber and 128 in the Senate.
The Refoundation Communist Party, which has remained
outside the Olive Tree coalition since 1998, won 5 percent of
the vote and its own representatives in both houses.
It would be daunting to try to analyze each of the 40
parties in Parliament. However, a look at some of the major
parties in the two coalitions, their leaders and their
political roots can help provide an outline of the
events.
Berlusconi's "Forza Italia"
Berlusconi's own party is called Forza Italia or Let's Go
Italy--a soccer chant. Before 1993 it didn't exist. This time
it alone won over 29 percent of the vote.
With his billions, control of all three main private
television networks, film and advertising companies and 40
percent of the print media, investment and insurance
concerns, the Milan soccer team and other sports franchises,
Berlusconi has made his party the major vote-getter for the
Italian ruling class.
There are two other major players in the "House of
Liberty" coalition. One is the anti-immigrant and
anti-southern-Italian Northern League, led by Umberto Bossi,
which dropped to only 4 percent of the vote. The other is the
now more "respectable" successor party to Mussolini's
fascists, the National Alliance, led by Gianfranco Fini,
which wound up with about 12 percent, mostly in the
South.
While Berlusconi's two major allies are far right-wing
parties, no one at this point fears they will usher in a
period of extreme fascist-like repression. They have no mass
base of active storm troopers, nor do they hold street
demonstrations.
What is likely is a more right-wing orientation of the
police and courts, much like the Republican administration
carries out in the U.S. In addition the rightists will now
monopolize both the private and government media.
As with the Republicans here, a Berlusconi government
means one of the capitalists themselves, instead of one that
simply represents capitalist interests.
Berlusconi, whose first job was as a singer on a cruise
ship, is reputed to have built his fortune through the usual
capitalist methods--heavy corruption, bribes and mob
connections. He is reported to be the richest Italian, the
third wealthiest person in Europe and 14th richest in the
world, and he boasts of his success.
He also boasts of his friendship with George W. Bush and
his support for the U.S. in general. He backed Bush's
anti-missile program and his rejection of the Kyoto accords
on controlling global warming.
While Berlusconi is newly rich, he got the backing of the
Italian capitalist establishment this election when Gianni
Agnelli of the Fiat automobile company switched to support
him.
Olive Tree social democrats
The main party in the Olive Tree is Democrats of the Left,
the social-democratic successors to the old reformist Italian
Communist Party. This group dropped not only its name, but
also its connection to the Italian working class, and also
dropped its vote to 17 percent, a historic low.
The Olive Tree candidate, Rutelli, leads his own coalition
of small bourgeois parties that picked up 15 percent of the
vote.
Much as the Democratic Party under Clinton paved the way
for the Republicans by destroying the old welfare system and
leading the war against Yugoslavia, the Olive Tree cut social
benefits, allowed unemployment to grow and joined
wholeheartedly in that war. It oriented toward the European
Union and NATO.
Though the Democrats of the Left have turned themselves
into complete servants of international capital, this didn't
stop Berlusconi and his allies from attacking them for their
past adherence to the Italian Communist Party.
The election this time was more like a U.S.-type
popularity contest than the previous parliamentary elections
in Italy with a strong focus on program. Berlusconi's
flamboyance and control of the media overcame the charges
against him of corruption, bribery and monopoly of wealth and
power. He apparently convinced many voters it was better to
choose a crook who was a successful capitalist than some
merely corrupt or ineffectual career politicians.
The Olive Tree, on the other hand, failed to create a pole
of struggle against privatization and in defense of the
benefits workers had won in Italy in the period of class
struggle between 1960 and 1980.
Refoundation Communists
Outside the two big coalitions, the Refoundation
Communists succeeded in winning 5 percent, or over 2 million
votes, gaining representatives in both houses. This party is
the successor of the more left part of the old Italian
Communist Party (PCI) and has attracted some other Marxist
tendencies.
This does not mean that the Refoundation Communists, led
by Fausto Bertinotti, are a combat organization ready and
able to lead strikes and mass protests to confront the
government. But it has become a pole of attraction--at least
in the electoral arena--for almost all those in Italy who
identify with communism.
There was pressure to support the Olive Tree on the
Refoundation leadership, as its 2 million votes would put the
center-left coalition ahead of the right-wingers. Of course
that assumes the 2 million voters could stomach supporting a
grouping that backed the war and attacked the working
class.
The old PCI had a heroic period when it led the partisan
movement that drove out the Nazi occupiers and Mussolini's
fascists in 1945. Washington mobilized its wealth and its
secret agencies to build up the Christian Democratic
opposition to the PCI and assure its setback in the 1948
elections.
But by the early 1960s, the PCI leadership had gone the
furthest in raising reformist and opportunistic positions
within the old Soviet-centered world communist movement. It
also led moves toward a so-called historic compromise with
the capitalist class in the early 1970s, desperately seeking
acceptance not only from the Italian capitalists but from
Washington.
In those days the PCI got upwards of 30 percent of the
vote and had almost the complete backing of the Italian
workers. The U.S. government, rather than compromise with the
PCI, prepared for military coups with secret organizations in
Italy like the infamous P2--of which Berlusconi was
reportedly a member.
Both the PCI and the Christian Democrats collapsed in the
early 1990s. Despite the decline of the communist movement,
which accelerated after the counter-revolution in the Soviet
Union, there are still millions of workers in Italy who
identify with the struggle for socialism. There is a youthful
movement against imperialist globalization. There is an
anti-imperialist movement that fought the aggression against
Yugoslavia.
In the inevitable battle between the Berlusconi government
and the Italian working class, will an organization arise
that gives independent leadership not only in parliament but
in the factories and the streets?
This article is copyright under a Creative
Commons License.
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