Is Renzi heading for a lash-up with Berlusconi?

Submitted by Matthew on 15 November, 2017 - 10:04 Author: Hugh Edwards

Recent regional elections in Sicily, with less than 50% voting, saw a close-run victory for Berlusconi’s centre-right coalition, Forza Italia.

There was an unanticipated setback for the Five-Star Movement, although it remained the largest party with a 25% vote-share. The Democratic Party (PD), currently in government in Rome, suffered a heavy defeat, and the so-called radical left bloc, MDP-SI-PRC, saw a modest improvement. These results underline the decline of the once aggressive would-be Bonapartist project of PD leader Renzi split the social bloc of the centre-right, and steal the populist thunder of Grillo’s 5-Star outfit, with anti-Europe, anti-migrant rhetoric.

These failures do not herald Renzi’s immediate end — he still commands a majority in his party’s national directorate and the just-approved new electoral law gives him full control of the party’s electoral lists for next spring’s national elections — but may well signal his party being consigned to also-rans. Ferment and conflict within Renzi’s party has forced him to concede to his critics the need to forge a new competitive and “radical” profile. But in what direction?

The PD’s coalition partner, Alfino’s AP, was wiped out in Sicily, so that speaks volumes of the consequences of an reliance on that quarter. The left, if one can so designate those around the former mayor of Milan, Pisapia, has all but evaporated after a split led by former party leaders, and ex-Stalinists, Bersani and D’Alema. They may be hoping to return to the party, but know that only the head of Renzi will get their supporters to sign up for unity. So Renzi may go.

Other contestants for government now propose themselves as the only bulwarks against the putative disaster of the “corrupt, putrid mafia-ridden Berlusconi”, or “ the mad, fantasy-ridden ungovernability of Grillo-land”. But with the new electoral law, the conquest of 45% and 70% on the proportional and majority vote respectively seems beyond any of the contestants, even with a collapse of the PD vote in central Italy. More likely than an outright victory for any party is stalemate between PD and Forza Italia. But such a coalition would not only see the collapse of their respective coalitions, but in turn set off a process of dynamic destabilisation in all the formations in relationship to their diverse bases of electoral support.

This is already evident in the PD as it plummets everywhere, and inevitable in FI where a large slice of its elected members in the north, who owe their success to the voters of La Lega of Matteo Salvini, would have to rupture that historically crucial pact. More than likely, success for a PD/FI lash-up, even if numerically achievable, would signal but the latest chapter in the decomposition of the ideological, institutional and political order of the country’s rulers. And, ironically, at a moment when the hegemony of its bosses have never been stronger in the workplaces.

Such a paradox defines well why Italy remains the weak link in Europe’s chain of modern capitalism and why the irruption of Italy’s working masses onto the battlefield of class struggle can shatter to bits these historically congealed contradictions and the grotesque social order.

This website uses cookies, you can find out more and set your preferences here.
By continuing to use this website, you agree to our Privacy Policy and Terms & Conditions.