Draghi’s decisionism and parties confusion

While the conflict goes on in Mariupol and Donbass, a breaking news is making its way into the local news: Italy begins to consider sending heavy weapons to Kiev to support the Ukrainian resistance. And Draghi, as soon as he recovered from Covid, will consider to visit Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky to discuss the upcoming peace talks. The direction of the Prime Minister’s line takes on an increasingly defined outline: working for a peace that does not prescind from that “ceasefire” to obtain which it is necessary not to weaken Ukraine militarily. A distancing from Moscow, which seems to have become definitive after the Bucha events, also confirmed by the determination and speed with which we are working on the diversification of gas supplies.

The diplomatic dialectic of Italy, at this stage, seems much more in line with the constructive one of Germany and France, at least Macron’s France. And, last but not least, Turkey. The choice of words, in delicate phases such as the current one, is of fundamental importance, and the defiant attitudes of American President Joe Biden, followed by British Prime Minister Boris Johnson, towards Putin gave the impression of “adding fuel to the fire”.

Draghi’s Eurocentric Atlanticism is the result of a political strategy which is obviously not conditioned by the logic of consensus, those which in other times disturbed, or at least distracted, the criteria of common sense and slowed down the mechanisms of decisionism.

The internal front management methodology is a demonstration of this. During the week, the Chamber of Deputies voted on both resolutions on the Economy and Finance Document and began discussing the reform of the justice system. On both fronts the knots were resolved with a substantial agreement of the majority forces, despite the initial hesitation.

On DEF, the opposition of the Lega was “neutralized”, averting the risk of a tax increase, and introducing measures to contain the increase in energy prices also through the use of budget flexibility. The 110% building bonus has been extended and the government has undertaken to continue the action to increase the resources available for strengthening the national health system.

On justice, the majority parties have signed an agreement that bodes well for final approval. No substantial amendment has been presented and trust will not even be required, despite strong opposition from the National Magistrates Association, which thundered against a reform that “looks a lot to the past and accentuates a hierarchical structuring also of the judges’ offices”.

Draghi’s “gentle” decisionism contrasts with the confusion that internally weakens the parties, with their eyes less focused on the sky, the more fixed on the ground, indeed on the territory, given the imminent administrative electoral round of 12 June. An appointment that preludes to the even more important one next year, with the political elections.

Less than two months before the election day of 12 June, the puzzle of the administrative candidates is filling up, although important boxes still remain empty, especially for the center-right. About 950 municipalities will go to vote for the town hall, but the focus will be on the 26 provincial capitals (of which 4 regional capitals: Genova, L’Aquila, Catanzaro and Palermo).

The center-right is at greater risk, whose coalition controls 18 out of 26 outgoing councils in the provincial capitals called to vote (3 outgoing mayors are from the Lega, 3 from Fratelli d’Italia, 6 from Forza Italia, 4 from independent center-right, one from Coraggio Italia and one from Cambiamo) while the center-left controls only 5 outgoing administrations (3 from the Partito democratico and 2 independent from the center-left, zero for the M5s). Instead, only three municipalities come from councils with civic lists.

As if that were not enough, the internal debate is “agitated” by two cases that have not failed to generate embarrassments: the Russiagate and the visit of the Hungarian President Viktor Orbán on a visit to Rome. The plot that would have been orchestrated by Moscow to condition the electoral campaign for the 2016 American presidential elections was back in vogue this week, having sparked a clash between Giuseppe Conte and Matteo Renzi. The dispute was triggered by the new developments reconstructed by the newspaper Repubblica on the mission of the US delegation to Italy during the Conte government when it investigated the possible responsibilities of Renzi’s executive in the “Russiagate”. It tells of a dinner between the then Secretary of Justice of Washington Bill Barr and the former head of Dis Gennaro Vecchione of which Conte had never reported anything to Copasir. The continuous skirmishes between Conte and Renzi on the relations entertained by one and the other with the American administrations when they were head of the executive were interrupted only by Copasir, which decided to freeze the investigation: even if the official version has judged «the new elements are not sufficient to reopen the case», one can imagine that the political costs of the operation would have been too high to face today, given the national but, above all, international tensions.

As for Orbán’s visit, the fact that the newly elected Hungarian sovereign President met Matteo Salvini but not the FdI leader Giorgia Meloni caused a sensation. If on the one hand, therefore, the harmony between Salvini and Orbán has been renewed on various issues, such as the fight against irregular immigration, the adhesion to the project of a “European center-right” and the defense of Western values, on the other it is it emerged that foreign policy continues to divide the Italian center-right, as it had recently also happened with the French elections.

The search for consensus, for the moment unrelated to Draghi’s political strategies, often turns out to be the main obstacle to decisionism, to the point of negatively affecting the achievement of results, and Draghi, with the mandatory objectives of the NRRP to be respected, cannot afford to fail, so it continues to leverage all its practical reasoning to remain immune to the Byzantines from the first and second republics.

However, on the day of Rome’s birth, April 21, the determination with which the mayor of the capital, Roberto Gualtieri, declared his intention to go ahead with the construction of the waste-to-energy plant, despite the inevitable criticism and opposition, took place in the national news. A courageous and responsible choice, although certainly unpopular, but which has fueled the confidence of those who, for years, have hoped for the breaking of the “chains of consent” by the mayor of Rome to overcome some structural problems of the city. The debate is only just beginning, but it is perhaps the sign of a new, more decisionism and pragmatic approach, in line with the Draghi model.