Over the last four years, decades of social
achievements have been lost due to structural reforms and privatisation,
benefiting a small proportion of the population. There is a clear decline in
the quality of life together with an increase in inequalities (through the
re-establishment of privileges for the few). Insecurity is growing, favoured by
a government that shows increasing disdain for democratic rules, institutional
and social dialogue, and the civil rights of those who are (politically,
socially or culturally) “different”.
Over the last four years Italy has been steadily
sliding down the ranking in the United Nations Development Programme’s Human
Development Index: in 2000 the country ranked 19th in the world, by 2002 it had
dropped to 20th and in 2003 it came 21st.
In the Human Poverty Index, Italy remains in 11th
place, with no progress since last year. The Istituto Nazionale di Statistica
(ISTAT, National Institute of Statistics) has revealed that “there were 2.46
million Italian households living in relative poverty in 2002, a figure
representing 11% of all households. Absolute poverty affects 926,000
households, that is 4.2% of the total”.[1]
Italy also went down a place, from 20th to 21st, in
the Gender-related Human Development Index, while - perhaps an even more
alarming trend - the country dropped from 31st to 32nd place in the Gender
Empowerment Measure. The latter takes into consideration women’s participation
in political and economic life, and the distribution of wealth by sex.
Insecurity is growing in the country, favoured by the
attitude of a government that shows increasing disdain for democratic rules,
institutional and social dialogue, and the civil rights of those who are
(politically, socially or culturally) “different”.
Institutional (in)security
The first element of insecurity derives from the
bizarre fact that the Head of Government, Silvio Berlusconi, is at the same
time the richest man in the country and controls around 75% of the media in
general and 90% of national broadcasting. Although media monopolies are common
in European countries, the Italian case is more worrying due to the direct and
indirect control Berlusconi and his company-party exert over the private and
state media sectors. The Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe’s
representative for media freedom, Freimut Duve, has declared that “this form of
media control is clearly unconstitutional”. In short, the current trend in
politics in Italy is characterised by strong media influence with a consequent
risk of populism.
It is worth remembering the alarmed tones of
international press reports when commenting the start of the Italian Presidency
of the European Union, in July 2003. The UK newspaper Financial Times referred
to an “untouchable President for Europe”, the German magazine Der Spiegel
invoked the EU Treaty which foresees a procedure to sanction a member State
which violates some of the EU basic principles, such as the freedom of the
press or the fundaments of the States regulated by “right-based” principles,
and the UK magazine The Economist said he was “not fit to lead the government
of any country”.[2]
In this context, some of the measures taken by the
Government in 2003 are a cause for further alarm, such as the so-called
Gasparri Law, that in practice grants the Prime Minister a yet greater
concentration of the media in his hands. The Gasparri Law (named after the
Minister of Communication) seeks to enlarge the advertising budget through the
Integrated System of Communications by making it impossible to fix a ceiling to
the amount of income a single telecommunications group can earn from
advertising.
Mediaset - Berlusconi’s company - is already in a
dominant position (controlling 63%), limiting access to the market and new
media groups’ opportunities for growth. The new law de facto eliminates the
conflict of interests by broadening the limits: for example, television
channels, newspapers and broadcasting are grouped together with
telecommunications, satellite systems, etc., so that Mediaset appears to have a
smaller share of the whole. On the other hand, the pay-TV market is monopolised
by another media giant - Rupert Murdoch’s News Corporation. As
Secretary-General of the International Federation of Journalists Aidan White
has recently declared, “Italy is about to become one of the most concentrated
media markets in the world.”[3]
Social (in)security
The Government’s plan of action is clear: to
progressively shift responsibility for public services to the market and
charities, thus reducing social spending and supporting the private sector.
Modest welfarist measures have been introduced while cutting funds for local
authorities to spend on social policies. This is a clear attack on the welfare
state: the gates are being opened to the market and private companies. In
return, Italians are promised a cut in taxes so that they will have more money
to spend on the private market. However, 64% of citizens would prefer to pay
more taxes for improved public services.
In the meantime, government policies on employment,
social security and immigration (like reducing the average length of contracts,
creating uncertainty regarding the age and quality of retirement, treatment of
immigrants) contribute to an increasing sense of insecurity in the country.
This is exacerbated by the fact that the mainstream media - especially the
national broadcasting networks - turns every news item into a criminal case
threatening “our lifestyle”. This is especially true in the case of
immigration. The year 2003 has been strongly marked by the enforcement of the
new Act 189/2002, known as the Bossi-Fini Law, which clamps down on “illegal immigration”.
In fact, the only option open to the majority of the 2.5 million immigrants was
to enter Italy illegally and take advantage of subsequent amnesties.
In response to pressure from entrepreneurs, who
benefit from larger migratory flows, the Government takes measures to hamper
people’s freedom of circulation, weakening their legal status, hindering the
process of social integration and effectively giving employers power over
immigrants’ right of residence; at the same time, the Government stirs up social
fears regarding foreign citizens by portraying them as criminals. The result -
actively sought by the Government - is the limitation of foreign workers’
rights. In fact, when combined with the measures introduced by the new Law No
30 (known as the Biagi Law), also passed in 2003, the rights of all workers are
undermined.
Alongside the progressive dismantling of the welfare
state, there has been an exponential growth in the number of people in prisons
in recent years. At 31 December 2002, the prison population numbered about
57,000 plus another 35,000 serving non-custodial sentences and on probation,
while 70,000 people were awaiting the Court’s decision on non-custodial
sentences. If we add to these figures people under house arrest, under
electronic bracelet surveillance or subject to restrictive orders, the result
is over 200,000 convicted criminals. The country therefore has a high detention
rate: 100 prisoners per 100,000 inhabitants. Italian jails hold about 16,000
more people than the available bed spaces.
A review of the legal and socio-economic
characteristics of the prison population shows that about one-third of them are
non-European citizens, half of whom come from Islamic countries; one-third are
people with drug and alcohol addiction problems; 16,000 people were unemployed
before their arrest, 22,000 have not completed compulsory education, and over
17,000 are under 30 years old. Thus it is also clear that in Italy penal
policies are tending to be used to deal with problems traditionally covered by
social policies.
Economic (in)security
In 2003 the launch of a book entitled “The
Disappearance of Industrial Italy”[4] coincided with the explosion of the Fiat
crisis which presaged the crash of two major Italian food corporations, Cirio
and Parmalat (the latter is perhaps the biggest in European history). These
cases illustrate several dimensions of the profound crisis affecting the
industrial sector and the economy as a whole. They relate to the production
system, but also to government corruption and fraud against small investors and
institutions. The Italian economy is going through a structural crisis
concerning competitiveness, management and - it is now clear - legality.
Nowadays, finance is no longer a tool at the service
of the real economy, but rather has an end in itself: in 2003, banks were
responsible for 50% of mergers and acquisitions in Italy; these banks also
support shady businesses since they are involved in their capital and
investments (as in the cases of Parmalat and Cirio).
At the same time, the advertising market is shrinking,
but the broadcasting sector’s share has increased, and now accounts for almost
60% of the total. This trend has taken place under the control and to the
benefit of Prime Minister Berlusconi. According to Forbes he is the 35th
wealthiest person in the world, with personal assets worth EUR 7.2 billion (USD
8.77 billion): he owns shares valued at EUR 7.3 billion (USD 8.89 billion) on
the Italian stock market and has declared an annual income of EUR 9 million
(USD 10.96 million).
The Prime Minister has reacted to the current economic
situation by proposing tax amnesties and remissions in favour of those who
infringe building regulations, attacking the state social security system,
creating a more precarious labour market, transferring the education system to
the private sector, reducing taxes on large private assets, selling off public
assets below cost and dismantling the state university and research sector. The
message to the citizenry is unequivocal: it pays to be sly. It is exactly the
opposite of what is needed in a country immersed in a productive and
entrepreneurial identity crisis.
Environmental (in)security
In Italy environmental policies have never been
brilliant, but they have rarely gone through such a dire phase: proper funds
for the enforcement of the Kyoto Protocol have yet to be allocated, while gas
and oil consumption as well as road haulage are still given preferential
treatment. At the same time, fewer funds are being allocated to protect the sea
and the environment (funds to manage waters in Venice, for instance, were cut
by 70%).
Furthermore, the Government has declared a new amnesty
in favour of those who infringe building regulations (the third in 19 years).
Thanks to this measure, the State has lost yet more credibility: ordinary
people will be tempted to break the rules and wait for the next amnesty. For
the first time it will be possible to regularise infringements committed on
property owned by the State: beaches or archaeological sites on which villas,
restaurants and cafés have been built will suddenly attain legal status.
Based on the fact that 362,000 illegal new buildings
were erected between 1994 and 2002 - with the total costs of attendant urban
development being covered by local authorities in the sum of EUR 8.7 billion
(USD 10.8 billion) - projections indicate that this amnesty will increase the
rate of future infringements up to 44%, which means that in 2004 alone 60,000
new illegal buildings will be built, which for the most part will spoil the
environment.
International (in)security
For 2004, the Government allocated EUR 1.2 billion
(USD 1.48 billion) to cover the costs of Italian participation in the
occupation of Iraq. This allocation represents more than a 5% increase in
military expenditure, which had already grown over 10% in the last four years.
The military budget (missions and the ministry budget) is the only one that will
increase in a year of cuts and constraints.
In the meantime, funding for international
co-operation faces a deep crisis. This is mainly due to the inadequacy of Law
49/87 that regulates Italy’s commitment with respect to international
co-operation, and to the progressive decline of the Directorate General for
Development Co-operation at the Ministry for Foreign Affairs (which today is
almost paralysed). This Board does not even guarantee basic administrative work
that would at least contribute to maintaining the projects already underway.
During 2003, the Executive Committee (the
Directorate’s operational and decision-making body) did not meet for months on
end, while hundreds of projects were waiting to be processed and selected.
Besides, Italian NGOs had spent as much as EUR 30 million (USD 36.5 million) on
projects that had already been accepted: some NGOs are still waiting for funds
granted in 1997.
There is an acute shortage of funding: only 0.2% of
gross national income (GNI) was allocated to international co-operation in
2002, making Italy the penultimate country in terms of resource destination on
the list of OECD countries. This situation belies the high-sounding
declarations made by Prime Minister Berlusconi on several occasions, promising
to raise this figure to 0.7% of GNI.
Signs of an awakening
In this context, we must acknowledge that there are
signs of an awakening among civil society, which on many occasions has
maintained a high level of mobilisation and awareness. Initiatives which deserve
a mention include those taken by the Girotondi movement in defence of media
pluralism and the independence of the judiciary, those taken by trade unions in
support of the state school system, state pension schemes and labour rights,
and last but not least, the campaigns in favour of setting new priorities in
public expenditure, and in defence of the common goods. These types of
initiatives are expected to grow, fomenting civic commitment and challenging
political powers and institutions.
Italy National Report
in Social Watch2004
Alessandro
Messina; Sabina Siniscalchi; Jason Nardi
ARCI; ACLI;
Fondazione Culturale Responsabilità Etica; Manitese; Movimondo; Sbilanciamoci;
Unimondo
Notes:
[1] Istat Report 2003. www.istat.it
[2] The Economist.
www.economist.com/displaystory.cfm?story_id=593654
[3] International Federation of Journalists.
www.ifj-europe.org
[4] Gallino,
Luciano. La scomparsa dell´Italia industriale. Einaudi, July 2003.