An enemy of democracy Berlusconi has learned that it's more profitable to manipulate the parliamentary system than to overthrow it
Paul Foot Tuesday October 2, 2001 The Guardian What did the Italian prime minister, Silvio Berlusconi, mean when he said he was "confident of the superiority of our civilisation" over the Muslim world? A Guardian leader last week listed the three central features of Berlusconi's Italy that justify his confidence and his pride: fascists and racists in government, hideous corruption in business, monstrous media monopolies. To which I add: disgusting police brutality at Genoa, and crude official cover-up of that brutality. All these, it seems to me, can be grouped under a single heading - the determination of rich and powerful people to manipulate the democratic process. This was once the central aim of P2, perhaps the most influential secret society ever established in postwar Europe. P2 was ostensibly a harmless branch of the freemasons but there was nothing harmless about it. Its members included top bankers, business tycoons, media moguls, generals, judges and intelligence agents. They met in secret and plotted the gradual erosion of the hated system of democracy that from time to time threatened to exert some marginal control over Italian society. One of P2's most influential members was Roberto Calvi, boss of the doomed Ambrosiano bank. In June 1982, Calvi's corpse was found hanging from scaffolding under Blackfriars Bridge. The City of London police concluded that the banker had committed suicide, though others were struck by the coincidences between the scene of his lurid death and certain well-known masonic symbols - a bridge, a ladder, some stones in the dead man's pocket, not to mention the frati neri (black friars), an ancient secret society from which P2 allegedly originated. At any rate, despite occasional successes, P2 never came near to overthrowing democracy, and not long after the death of Calvi, dissolved and vanished. One of its most prominent members - no 1168 - was Silvio Berlusconi, who was so rich and owned so many television stations that he was able to form an entirely new legal political alliance, unattached to the parties of the old Italian democracy, and, with the help of former fascists and racists, to get the alliance elected to government. Ever since, the Italian parliament has been absorbed with complicated financial legislation, much of which will make it much more difficult, if not impossible, to convict Silvio Berlusconi of corruption charges launched against him. The new legislation sailed through parliament until recently when proposed changes in the laws about foreign bank accounts were deemed to conflict with other laws necessary to counter terrorism and were, narrowly, defeated. All this goes to show, however, that if you are very rich and want to change the law to your advantage it is really much easier to work within the parliamentary system than to subvert it from outside. In a half-hearted apology to the Italian senate, Mr Berlusconi called on Italian citizens to "hang me". Curiously, no one took him up on the offer. Full article at: http://www.guardian.co.uk/comment/story/0,3604,561651,00.html Michael Keaney Mercuria Business School Martinlaaksontie 36 01620 Vantaa Finland [EMAIL PROTECTED]
