"[...]They give me a couple of cards
and a beautiful,long, thin, brown pencil,
perfectly sharpened.
And I walk towards the booth,
deliberately casual
so as not to betray my emotions.
And I make a mark
on my mark
, as if elections are fair.
It's really true that
a little participation is good
. I carefully fold the two cards
and look at the pencil again,
so perfect and sharpened
, I almost take it away,
democracy"
(G. Gaber "Le elezioni", 1976/77)
THE BEGINNINGS
Instead, the intention was to wipe the slate clean of anything that might still remotely resemble any idea of social democracy.
Now, it's not as if this strategy had been invented by the press, but, as always, it implemented what the ruling classes demanded, or even merely imagined.
One of the newspapers most adept at implementing the "détournament" mechanism was undoubtedly "Repubblica." A system newspaper that managed to present itself as the exact opposite. A new layout, tabloid format, journalists captured from the movements of the 1960s and 1970s. A seemingly new and informal approach. Scalfari, the founder (a pompous, boastful, embarrassing, and overrated figure) with his animalistic instincts constructed a relentless mechanism, disguising a corporate newspaper (De Benedetti) as if it were an underground publication staffed by "free" journalists.
"Repubblica" seized the moment perfectly, wedging itself into Berlinguer's PCI (a leader more praised than loved by the rabid thirty- and forty-somethings eager to tear the whole thing down) and establishing itself as the platform for developing a program for a "modern" left (Blairian in its infancy) that would cast aside any socialist obsession.
Distinguished by its "firm" stance during the Moro kidnapping, Repubblica quickly became the newspaper of the right-thinking left, the wealthy upper class, happy to cast aside the "old" and drab communist milieu. The battles that the newspaper carried forward in a visceral way were all characterised by the idea of "a normal country", meritocratic[1], normalising the left, and using its own personal wars (against Craxi or Berlusconi for example) by passing them off as "in everyone's interest", but at the same time siding with all the wars unleashed by US imperialism (Libya, Iraq and so on).
THE NEW WORLD
The "Clean Hands" scandal saw the press unleash its entire force against the "caste" they were only just discovering.
That investigation unfolded in an international context in which the ruling classes saw a unique opportunity. With the fall of the Berlin Wall, it was necessary to begin undermining the structural foundations of a constitutional charter now considered a relic of the past, to be thrown in the garbage along with class struggle, public healthcare, pensions, and social rights.
At that juncture, the need for legislative changes arose. Short-lived governments, from the normal functioning of a bourgeois democracy (where crises served to redefine power within the ruling groups), became a national tragedy, a weakness unappreciated by the "markets," which from then on became the "caretakers" of Italian democracy. No longer was the so-called "people" invoked by Article 11 of the Constitution. 1.
And in a bourgeois democracy, born in the wake of the defeat of fascism and the presence of large popular masses, what better path to follow than to change the rules of the game and, above all, have the heirs of the Communist Party themselves change them?
ON THE MARCH
When it's time to march,
many don't know
that the enemy marches at their head. The voice that commands them
is the voice of their enemy. And whoever speaks of the enemy
is himself the enemy.
(Bertold Brecht 1936)
Thus began, with a totalitarian media hype, the race to change the electoral system, led by the son of the coup plotter, Mario Segni, and the "zombie with the moustache" at the head of what would become the strange PDS-DS_PD creature, Achille Occhetto.
A preliminary remark is necessary: the Italian Constitution was written assuming that proportional representation was the natural electoral law.
This was the case for several reasons, some easily understood, others now almost incomprehensible:
Italy was emerging from 22 years of fascist dictatorship during which the regime consolidated itself, institutionally (on the economic, political and social levels the means used were very different: murders, intimidation, attacks on the working class, etc.) precisely with electoral changes and then with the creation of bodies with legislative, jurisdictional and even constitutional character (the Grand Council) which operated alongside the Albertine Statute without modifying it and transformed the country according to the principle of the "leader";
what has just been said pushed the constituents to:
create a rigid system that is difficult and complex to modify;
establish a parliamentary system oriented towards representation;
to take for granted that the electoral system capable of being part of this qualitative leap could only be pure proportional.
Another fundamental consideration.
The nineteenth-century liberal struggles aimed to create parliamentary systems that would give voice to the concerns of society, in accordance with the liberal principle of equality of citizens before the law (obviously, we know that this representation said nothing about the social and economic inequality of citizens).
Certainly, the goal was democratic participation, not empowering governments, which, indeed, should have been the product of this representation. Otherwise, if the goal had been stable, long-lasting, and, in their own way, efficient governments , nothing could have overcome enlightened despotism.
THE ASSAULT CAPITAL
" The class struggle exists and we have won it "
(Warren Buffet, 2006)
But the liberal society of the 1990s was no longer that of the previous decades, timidly progressive, moderately secular. The world of capital, changed after the end of the communist threat, no longer needed the "red tape" of social democracy and its pseudo-democrats. And it didn't mince its words. After the coup in Chile and the recipes of the "Chicago School" it was understood that, even without bombing the "Moneda", the same path could be attempted in the white and "developed" West.
The 1980s and 1990s prepared the ground and then came the hysterical cries (without forgetting the separation between the Bank of Italy and the Treasury in 1981) against "short-lived governments", unreliable for "the markets", alongside this evident demolition of democracy with the undermining of state industry and the sell-off of national heritage.[2]
Moreover, in addition to Licio Gelli's "Democratic Rebirth Plan"[3], in 1975 a much more serious and dangerous document edited by the "Trilateral"[4]was released which frontally attacked the risk of "too much democratic participation". So, where to start (according to, I repeat, a totally institutional perspective, but one which in the end had a profound impact on actual reality) if not by destroying and defusing one of the pillars of democracy?
Namely representation and participation.
If we reread 99% of the press (with a few very rare exceptions) of the time it seemed that proportional representation and preferences had destroyed Italy. It was necessary to know "5 minutes after the elections" who would form the government. "Hurry up!". A collective hysteria to which the regime press has accustomed us, but to which we should never have become accustomed, given that the same method is now adopted for every event (bad weather, crime, Russophobia, epidemics) and is the most refined version of the "permanent excitement" that fascist regimes used to mobilize the people against some external enemy.
WE ARE A BIG FAMILY
" We are for class collaboration, especially in a period like the current one of acute economic crisis.
We want to strip the state of all its economic attributes. Enough of the railway state, the postal state, the insurance state. Enough of the state operating at the expense of all Italian taxpayers and burdening the exhausted state finances. " (Benito Mussolini, Udine, September 22, 1922)
Since then, electoral laws have changed with every rustling of leaves, but all the changes that have followed have never intended to give power back to the voter. Indeed, this "win-win" system has also been adopted in the municipalities, completely emptying the very meaning not only of participation, but also of doing politics tout-court.[5]
"Doing politics", that is, fighting and struggling to have one's vision democratically affirmed, became a "turnaround", mediating with the various political components a "deal".
And who better than the left could be called upon to convince the voters in what was a disturbing plebiscite[6], following in the footsteps of two subversives like Mario Segni and the worst figure in Italian politics, namely Marco Pannella?[7]
And who better than the left could convince millions of followers that "we are all in the same boat", also starting the viaticum that led to the most insane of trade union emasculations: "The concertation".[8]
DIDN'T THEY SEE THEM COMING?
" Smile.
The shots above
are for us. "
(Vasco Rossi, "The shots above", 1993)
Let's get to today. The combined effects of the demolition of participation, the (understandable) desertion of the polls, an ideology that unites 90% of the socio-economic positions of the "right" and the "left," the embrace of the European Union ideal as the replacement for "the mustachioed man" and the "external constraint" as Mao's Little Red Book, could only lead to an implosion of Italian democracy. Something, after all, that has always fascinated the subversive ruling class.
So we come to the final stages and where we find ourselves today. For the first time since the Second World War, the fascist right is directly in power. But this didn't happen because the fascist squads arrived one morning and, as in Bologna in 1921, ousted the ruling class. None of this. We got to this point by subtraction.
Don't be misunderstood: it wasn't the left's "mistakes" that made the right win. It was the conscious choices on fundamental issues (pensions, healthcare, war, liberalism, external constraints) that objectively worsened the conditions of the working class and that probably improved those of a minority (but noisy) section of society: the upper middle class, civil servants, pensioners on a salary, cosmopolitans with a "heart in the shape of a piggy bank".[9]
Those who, as Gaber said, were good at squash and "how is the snow in Cortina".[10]
I don't want to play the populist and launch the usual arrows against the "radical chic" left, also because, in reality, these people were only the secondary row of the show that was being prepared, with the seizure of power directly by capital (Monti) voted by majority and the white coup by the 2 re-elected presidents of the Republic ("hurry up" was the headline in La Stampa again).
With the municipal councils emptied, also because they are no longer useful, given the "podestrial" reform of the single head, with the provinces eliminated, where voters have been directly eliminated, with the regions the seat of the new decentralized centralism and the custodians of anti-democratic electoral laws (the worst is in Tuscany) and the almost total disaffection of a large segment of the electorate (regional presidents elected with a turnout of less than 50%), the viaticum seems to me to have already largely been achieved.
THE COUNTS DON'T ADD UP, BUT I AM A DUKE[11]
It was your choice, so what do you want now?
You've become just like one of us.
Before, you were a clown, a wooden puppet.
But now that you're normal,
how absurd is the game you play!
(E. Bennato, It was your fault, 1977)
True, reasoning would lead us to speak, think, and act, in a way that would ensure that the fascist scum (and now even super-fascists like Vannaccia) would return to the sewers from which they originated, but the anti-fascist cries of the last thirty years don't seem to me to have been very productive. And so today we find ourselves at a real leap in quality, yet proceeding amid near-general indifference: security decrees reminiscent of Pinochet's Chile, praise for vigilantes, a permanent attack on the Constitution.
And here we are with the proposed Melonian law. For a very detailed analysis, I refer you to https://www.libertaegiustizia.it/2026/04/23/la-legge-elettorale-meloniana-antidemocratica-e-incostituzionale/ .
As can be seen, the law takes on the characteristics of the previous ones, that is, aiming not to bring representation to Parliament, but to create "stable governments" with the addition of an abnormal majority bonus. These are the characteristics in summary[12]:
Voting system: Proportional representation with closed lists; candidates are selected by party secretariats.
Barring thresholds: 3% for individual parties and 10% for coalitions, with a second round mechanism for the best list among those below the threshold.
Governability bonus: Assigns additional seats only if the winning coalition surpasses 42% of the vote in both the Chamber of Deputies and the Senate simultaneously.
Prime Ministerial candidate: Mandatory inclusion of the candidate for Prime Minister in the candidate's platform, but the name does not appear on the ballot.
Voting outside the Chamber of Deputies: A permanent register has been introduced to allow voting in the municipality of temporary residence for study, work, or medical reasons (minimum stay of 9 months or 3 months for health reasons).
Italians abroad: The constituencies for the Chamber of Deputies are reduced to two (Europe and the Americas-Asia-Oceania-Antarctica), while the Senate becomes a single constituency.
As can be seen, this is a thoroughly subversive law. But if they've reached the point of voting on this law in Parliament, it's because the individual items on the short list above have already been standardized in Italian electoral systems since the end of the so-called "First Republic."
The electoral thresholds, the governability bonuses (in municipalities with fewer than 15,000 inhabitants, the list with the majority wins two-thirds of the seats), the farce of the candidate for Prime Minister (already introduced in a lowly fashion with the figure of the "leader"), the "Mayor of Italy" of Renzian memory.
It is precisely for this reason that this phase, just like the genocide in Gaza, is extremely dangerous: the habit of decay, the disinterest in political engagement, the racist impulses unleashed to obscure the true adversary.
"WHAT TO DO?"
"Mathematics can explore the fourth dimension and the
world of what is possible, but the tsar can be
overthrown only in the third dimension."
(Vladimir Ilyich Ulyanov, "Lenin")
And today, therefore, "What is to be done?" There are no miracle cures; it's no longer even the time to ask or apologize, an attitude that in recent decades has only served to clear our consciences, returning us to square one. I repeat, these are not mistakes. We must recognize that we are at an epochal transition internationally, where the radical right is hegemonic, within a global conflict between two faces of capital: the one, apparently questioned at this stage, of globalization, greenwashing, and "civil rights without social rights," and the fascist one, equally tied to global capital, but which requires the passive consent of the population through counting internal and external enemies (woke, LGBT, migration, etc.) and which conveys the idea that a good capitalism once existed in the old land of toys (or rather, better than the bauocchi). These are rehashes of fascism: appearing popular, being populist, but above all being anti-democratic. Let's not forget that capital is the same and, like parsley, it goes well with everything.
At this stage, even the "let's hold our noses" approach is outdated. We need to use another body and cover our asses.
It is absolutely essential to prevent this electoral law from becoming the law of the state. We have never been passionate about bourgeois electoral laws, but in the current desert, we cannot abandon this last loophole, not of salvation, but of survival. And if this means fighting battles with the left, largely responsible for this situation, they must be fought.
But we must forge a path that puts an end, once and for all, to the mania for destroying the constitutional charter.
A great battle for a pure proportional law without barriers.
It's not socialism, nor even remotely social democracy, but it's all we have now.
Andrea Bellucci
[1]On the real linguistic drift of the ordoliberal language ("resilience", "self-entrepreneur") the term "meritocracy" has certainly deserved the gold medal. In this regard, among the myriad of essays published on the subject, it is always
worth rereading Michael Young's dystopian novel, The Rise of Meritocracy , published in 1958 (republished in 2014 by Edizioni di Comunità).
[2]See M. Lorusso, Italy on sale . The privatization of state-owned companies: politics, business, ethics , Il Sole 24 ore, 2007 (it is noteworthy that Il Sole 24 ore has published a similar text).
[3]https://it.wikipedia.org/wiki/Piano_di_rinascita_democratica
[4]https://it.wikipedia.org/wiki/la_crisi_della_democrazia._Rapporto_sulla_governabilit
%C3%A0_delle_democrazie_alla_Commissione_trilaterale
[5]C. Crouch, Postdemocrazia , Laterza, 2004.
[6]https://it.wikipedia.org/wiki/Referendum_abrogativi_in_Italia_del_1993
[7]"Radical comrade
I don't know who gave you the word comrade but basically it suits you
It's disqualified anyway
Radical comrade
Rider of every tiger, crafty man
[...]You go ahead and deal with civil rights and the idiocy that creates democracy
And prepare another referendum for us this time to find out
Where dogs have to pee." (Giorgio Gaber, "Io se Fossi Dio", 1980)
[8]https://it.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patto_Ciampi
[9]F. De André, Recitativo , 1968.
[10]G. Gaber, Gli inutili , 1991: " What a change, eh! No, I remember that some time ago, we talked, we talked, we talked with our mates... with our friends, we talked in our homes, but also outside, in the squares, we discussed, we discussed everything, the world, politics, life, personal matters, in short, we talked. Even too much. Then suddenly, nothing, no, I mean, other things... tennis, wines from the Rhine, how the snow is in Cortina. For goodness sake, I have nothing against the mountains, and not even against tennis or cricket, or squash. There must be a strange enjoyment in feeling useless. Because, everyone is happier, more, more optimistic, and everyone goes away skiing, sailing, windsurfing, horse riding, golf. Great! In my opinion, to be good at those sports, you don't have to be a complete idiot, but it helps. Then a bit of good life, a bit of money doesn't disgust anyone, you become more beautiful, cleaner... an hour in the gym, a shower, love, the fullness of the senses... nature "
[11]Totò in Lascia o Raddoppia , 1956
[12]I confess that I used ChatGpt!
https://www.ucadi.org/2026/07/23/il-paese-dei-baiocchi/
_________________________________________
Source: A-infos-en@ainfos.ca
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