Élite Vs People?
In the short span of about a month were published two interesting books, which have led to at least a few questions and one doubt. The first (in chronological order) is "Governing the Italians, the history of the state" Sabino Cassese, Judge of the Constitutional Court, as well as academic. The second (in all senses) is "Europe or not" by Luigi Zingales, the Italian academic "emigrated" to the Booth School of Business at the University of Chicago. Because, not only the general thrust of their argument, but also some pages look the same even if the argument is addressed by two different points of view: one legal and the other economistic, it is tempting to think that: a) one of the two is the author of plagiarism (hypothesis to be excluded); b) have used the same "ghost writer"; c) attending the same golf club and have overheard the talk each other in the clubhouse; d) it is a coincidence, and their argument comes at a time of reflection, not surprisingly comparative between the formation of the unified Italian state and the European Union. We assume that the answer is d, and both emeritus professors promote it with flying colors. What is the focal point highlighted by the two? The path to the elite in the realization of the two constituent paths and distrust of both the Piedmont and Italian notables in general to the masses, both the elites who have given life to the EU, carefully avoiding subjecting the main steps establishing the ratification of the popular consensus. Both paths, Italian and European, have seen a remarkably limited number of politicians, economists, bankers and entrepreneurs. Not to exceed two percent, census in the first case, perhaps even more limited in the second, whereas Europeans are more than five hundred million. Since the beginning of the two stories, there was no confidence in the people by the rulers and distrust of the elite by the masses. Both paths have created a centralized and bureaucratic institutional design (think of the comparison with the Anglo-Saxon world that does not know the word State) and both have started to an original sin:take over existing debt (perhaps to ingratiate himself with the wealthy poorly digested this solution?), creating a continuity between old and new, and not a moment of departure. Both Risorgimental Italy and European Union have left in the background the political "dream" as a bit 'naive ideal (Mazzini, Cattaneo, Spinelli) and used the realism and cunning (Cavour, Schumann, Adenauer, Delors, Merkel). In the Italian case, faced with the pressure of the discontent caused by the forced annexation of the South, before were sent the "Bersaglieri" in a bloody war of repression then, once ratified an unwritten pact with the ruling classes of the South (which originated, among other things, the disastrous public administration of Borbonic type that the country has even now) was made use of the safety valve of mass emigration. In the European case, in front of Franco-German axis, to lay down the law is the currency that is nothing but a disguised euro mark. And the Government of the Euro, accepted and even desired by the political elites (coincidentally all from the world of academia of economics, central banks or Worlrd financial institutions) that force and "educate" the masses who - according to them - only with the stick of austerity and rigor would accept those reforms that by itself, or democratically, they would never work. Here, then, the rift between the countries of North, virtuous, Reformed, moderate in habits and countries of the South, corrupt, Catholics, lax morals. This in the iconography. While realistically, the comparison is between those who are in a position of competitive advantage and disadvantage of those. The Northern European countries enjoy the deflationary policy operated by the ECB for the benefit of their workers and retirees while the countries of the South, burdened by the weight of their debt and then by the weakness of their banking systems, trudging even in the absence of the ability to reform their public agencies and their backward trade unions mentality. Today, therefore, in Italy, we are located in front of the crux of hundred and fifty years ago. Have the elites reason to be suspicious of the masses who excel at continental level to low level of education (but not by Casati in then this is also a responsibility of the rulers?) or the masses have reason to be wary of the élite? Zingales responds that the exit from the euro, probably only benefit the elite Italian (then and now). Only a New Europe (most liberal, democratic, federal) is an opportunity to break this pattern of secular political hierarchy, crystallization and social immobility. Europe must be seen as a means and not an end. If the goal is economic prosperity and peaceful coexistence, the size of State can help because it reduces the power of local patronage. In Europe then a country (geographically and demographically) large becomes more convenient to use objective selection criteria that encourage meritocracy, reducing corporatism, baronies, familism, mafias . Besides the political corruption that finds fertile ground in the relationship between the state and nell’amoralità widespread citizen deformed by administrative law that puts them on two different floors. What new Europe, then? A new Europe that puts its democracy and human rights in the first place, the market economy and the free exchange of meci workers and the second, a defense and a common foreign policy, third, research, universities and communication common to the fourth. Answering then at the final question of the book “A New Europe”: how will the european citizens of the future be? A citizen who has finally seen asserted its sovereignty in the reconstruction of the rift between the elites and the people. A European who is not a “homogenized political” but a citizen free of choosing and thriving in diversity.