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PDF FormatIn the postwar period, the majority of the traditional Italian elites suffered a severe erosion of their status and power. The country was under Allied rule, and traditional sources of power such as the crown and its political supporters were accused of not having fought Fascism during the Mussolini years. Moreover, anyone identified with the political right anywhere in Europe in this period was delegitimized.15
These developments, together with the propagandistic Soviet claim that “Nazi-Fascism” was merely an advanced and natural phase in the development of capitalist regimes, be they conservative or even moderately liberal, succeeded in creating an absurd but widely believed identification of Nazism and Fascism with conservatism, Catholicism or anything else branded by Moscow as the “right.” This charge was made despite the fact that throughout Europe, conservatives were among the most consistent opponents of Nazism and Fascism. It was the conservatives who, unlike the USSR in the Ribbentrop-Molotov treaty, refused to accept Hitler and his actions once the war began: Leaders like the Polish Sikorski, the Yugoslav Mihailovic, the French de Gaulle, and of course Churchill, who led the only nation in Europe to stand against the Nazis from the beginning of the war to its conclusion. In Italy, conservative bastions such as the monarchy, the army and the Church never became “Fascist” but instead maintained their autonomy and eventually brought about Mussolini’s downfall.
However, leftist propaganda and the prestige of a victorious USSR succeeded in creating the impression of a vast shift to the left throughout Europe, including Britain and France. Italy was no exception. The left played a central role in the Provisional Government and the Constituent Assembly of postwar Italy, and in 1946 a referendum was held in which the Italians decided, by a small majority, to abolish the monarchy—a decision which was perceived as an expression of a new leftist spirit in the country. As the leftist parties won ever-increasing support from the masses of new “anti-Fascists,” it seemed that the Italian left was about to assume power.
The traditional conservative elements, veterans of the pre-Fascist classical liberal regime, seemed archaic to the public and enjoyed only minimal support. They also suffered from internal discord: The royalists, embittered and alienated by the abolition of the monarchy, loathed the republican conservatives; and the religious (Catholic) and secular (Liberal) conservatives were at odds with each other as well. It was not legitimate even to call oneself a “rightist” at that time: The anti-leftist forces were compelled to call themselves “centrists.” The only important non-leftist element remaining in Italian politics was the Catholic Christian Democratic Party, which included diverse factions and defined itself as “center.”
The elections set for 1948 therefore seemed certain to bring the left from partnership in the Provisional Government to full, exclusive power. The only question was which of the leftist parties—the Socialists or the Communists—would dominate a government of the unified leftist front.
At this juncture, however, the conservative tradition in Italy revealed its true strength once again: All the conservative elements in the country mobilized to support the one body which appeared capable of stopping the “Reds.” Even most anti-religious conservatives supported the Christian Democrats. The local institutions which had always constituted the basis of civil society, the intellectuals and the Catholic Church, with all its resources, joined together into a new conservative camp.
The election results spoke for themselves: The main winners were the Christian Democrats, who took more than half the seats in Parliament and, together with the small Liberal Party, formed a strong “center-right” government opposed by the defeated and stunned left. Against all expectations, more than sixty percent of Italians made it clear that they did not want the left to rule. Even some members and supporters of leftist parties at the local level voted for the Christian Democrats in the general elections, in the spirit of a popular slogan of the time: “In the secrecy of the polling booth, God sees you—Stalin doesn’t!”16
The 1948 elections proved to be a watershed that determined the fate of Italian politics for more than four decades. During the years that followed, in one election after the other, the situation remained virtually unchanged: The Christian Democrats continued to be the largest party, joined by several small parties in coalition governments; the left was incapable of gaining the reins of power.
Over the course of these decades, conservative governments led by the Christian Democrats instituted a stable democracy, an open and varied society that combined innovation with tradition, and above all a large degree of economic freedom. The result of these policies was the Italian version of the “economic miracle”: Vigorous and sustained economic growth that brought a continuing improvement in the standard of living. Italy soon joined the group of the seven leading industrialized nations (the G7), and by the early 1980s it had become the fifth-richest economy in the world, overtaking Great Britain, which was by then straining under the consequences of a generation of socialist economic policies.
The flip side of the coin, of course, was that uninterrupted rule naturally led to increasing corruption among the ruling Christian Democrats. Time and again affairs involving corrupt government officials came to light. Moreover, the party was at the mercy of infighting which caused a change in government on average every year. All this, however, did not change the terms of the political equation. Despite the dizzying pace at which governments came and went, stability was maintained, with the same party in power during this entire period. Every time the Italians had to choose between the “crooks” (the Christian Democrats) and the “murderers” (the left), people held their noses and voted for the Christian Democrats.
In the face of this reality, many within the Communist Party—the main force on the left—gradually concluded that they must change or cease to exist. In the late 1980s, the party changed its name to Partito Democratico della Sinistra (PDS—the Democratic Party of the Left), and its platform to that of a social-democratic party. These changes, however, failed to bring about a political upset, and the future seemed as secure as ever for Italian conservatives at the end of the 1980s.
IV
Clean Hands
And so these princes of ours, who had held their possessions for many years, have no cause to accuse fortune for having lost them; the fault lies rather in their own ineptitude ... when adverse times came, they only thought of fleeing, instead of defending themselves.The Prince, ch. 24
In 1989, however, the Berlin Wall fell, and in 1991 the USSR disintegrated. With surprising speed, the Communist threat to Europe simply vanished. And once the collapse of the Communist bloc removed the threat of the “murderers,” Italians in increasing numbers began to ask themselves whether the time had not come to deal with the “crooks.” The public at large, which had previously been reluctant to undermine the political system, began to demand the heads of corrupt officials; the latter began to fall like dominoes, each dragging down the next in line.
A routine police investigation of a marginal case of corruption in Milan, code-named “Clean Hands,” led to the uncovering of a well-oiled, all-encompassing web of corruption, bribes and other illegal benefits. The investigation was popularly nicknamed Tangentopoli (“Bribesville”) and officially revealed what everyone in Italy already knew—that suitcases stuffed with bills regularly made their way from various bodies to parties and government officials in return for kickbacks and other benefits.
