From Financial Times - May 26 2009
Fascism is not a likely future for Italy. That is worth saying, because it is being forecast. Many assume that the financial crisis plus Silvio Berlusconi equals a return to fascism. It did, after all, start there (...).
But the danger of Berlusconi is of a different order to that of Mussolini. It is that of media sapping the serious content of politics, and replacing it with entertainment. It is of a ruthless demonisation of enemies and refusal to grant an independent basis to competing powers. It is to place a fortune at the service of the creation of a massive image, composed of assertions of endless success and popular support.
That he is so dominant is partly the fault of a faltering left; of weak and sometimes politicised institutions; of journalism which has too often accepted a subaltern status. Most of all it is the fault of a very wealthy, very powerful and increasingly ruthless man. No fascist, but a danger, in the first place to Italy, and a malign example to all.
Nessun commento:
Posta un commento