Berlusconism

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Silvio Berlusconi , namesake and protagonist of Berlusconism, 2010

Berlusconism (it. Berlusconismo ) is a neologism for a modern form of populism in the right to centrist political spectrum of Italy . The Italian politician and entrepreneur Silvio Berlusconi laid the foundation stone for this in 1993 when he founded the Forza Italia party . The political and sociological significance of the phenomenon is just as controversial as the question of “Berlusconism without Silvio Berlusconi”.

Use and discussion

In addition to its journalistic use, the term is mostly used critically in the social and political sciences. When describing the phenomenon, scientists include a. on the theses of the US media scientist Neil Postman . He saw the judgment of the citizens endangered by entertainment industries such as television and feared an infantilization of society. The Italian political scientist Giovanni Sartori portrayed Berlusconism as the court and the regime of a sultan .

The Italian political scientist Gian Enrico Rusconi opposed the simplification that Berlusconi had come to power as a “media mogul” and that his media power was just duping the Italians. Rather, he characterized Berlusconism as a policy that coincides with the ambitions of broad circles organized in the center-right alliance. These political circles did not want to get rid of what the 'Cavaliere' had created and were already preparing for the post-Berlusconi era. The voters of Berlusconi are little people, traders, housewives, even simple workers who feel economically and socially disadvantaged and who turn to Berlusconism because it promises a change in the status quo, new rules of the game, as the old ones would be seen as a brake on the economy , bureaucratic deregulation and greater local room for maneuver. In this sense, Berlusconism is an expression of the Italian 'civil society' and an expression of deep disappointment and perplexity of many citizens about the old politics or about the traditional party system, from which Berlusconism appears to them as a possible way out.

The Italian political scientist Giovanni Orsina defines Berlusconism as a mixture (“emulsion”) of (right-wing) liberalism and populism (with the populist and liberal elements being equally represented at first), but after the turn of the millennium the market economy elements of Berlusconism declined , while socio-politically conservative ones would have increased. He also compares Berlusconism with a three-armed octopus: the head of the octopus stands for the myth of the “good” civil society (as opposed to the state apparatus); the three tentacles represented a “friendly minimal state ”, “hypopolitics” (ie a containment of political conflicts in contrast to the traditional over-politicization of Italian society during the First Republic) and the identification of a “new, virtuous political elite”. The concepts of good civil society and hypopolitics are both populist and liberal; the friendly minimal state is predominantly liberalism, while the virtuous new elite can be assigned to populism. As is typical for populism in general, Berlusconism also “sanctifies” “the people”, who embodied all virtues, while the elite “betrayed” them. In contrast to authoritarian forms of populism, Berlusconi presented “the people” as a diverse and pluralistic collection of individuals and not as an ethnically, culturally and historically bound, undivided, homogeneous group.

The publicist Susanna Böhme-Kuby saw in Berlusconism a network of political and economic structures as well as a model of political action, which the Prodi II cabinet also used and thus achieved an “adapted Berlusconism from the center-left”. So Berlusconism prevails in Italy regardless of whether Berlusconi is in power.

The following section is not adequately provided with supporting documents ( e.g. individual evidence ). Information without sufficient evidence could be removed soon. Please help Wikipedia by researching the information and including good evidence.

Advocates of Berlusconi avoid the designation Berlusconism more and tend to one in a reversal Antiberlusconismus to identify that they as a - criticized form of anti-liberalism - from their perspective. Berlusconi's movement sees itself as an expression of liberalism , but criticism characterizes Berlusconism as an anti-liberal ideology. Criticism and polemics often culminated in a comparison of Berlusconism with Italian fascism under Mussolini . Experts refused to equate Berlusconism with fascism with reference to different historical-political contexts.

The discussion about Berlusconism touches on a number of topics that basically deal with different forms of rule , especially with the following phenomena:

Berlusconism is also discussed with regard to the political use of communication strategies and is related to the terms

Quotes

“ Berlusconismo , as it presents itself today, is made up of the elements arrogance, ignorance, cunning (furbizia) , arrogance, contradiction, aggressiveness, indifference, interest-based and unpredictable. (...) Silvio Berlusconi (...) installed a confrontational culture in Italian politics. "

- Jens Urbat, Political Science, 2007

"Like fascism, Berlusconism is a dangerous evil, difficult to eradicate."

- Dario Fo , March 14, 2006

“Berlusconism stands for the rediscovery of democratic populism and the re-creation of a media democracy that aims to replace traditional party democracy. (...) Mussolini's regime was institutionally anti-democratic, a dictatorship in which freedom of the press and freedom of expression were suppressed. Berlusconism, on the other hand, is downright obsessed with the approval of voters, which demoscopes measure every day and which should be maintained with the help of media hypercommunication.

- Gian Enrico Rusconi in: German Academy for Language and Poetry , Yearbook 2002

“Berlusconism was a parody of neoliberalism. He gave many the impression of a modernization and liberalization of economic and social life, but at the same time he also showed the most negative aspects of Italian political culture: negligence, circumvention of the law, complicity between private interests and public resources. The political opponents were portrayed as enemies of freedom, supporters of statism, 'communists'. Nevertheless, Berlusconism enjoyed wide acceptance under 'normal' conditions. In view of the unexpectedly severe financial and economic crisis, however, Berlusconi's political class proved to be powerless. "

- Gian Enrico Rusconi in: The European of December 7, 2011

Conceptual pair of Berlusconization and Deberlusconization

Using the example of the intensive media coverage in the “company car affair” by Federal Health Minister Ulla Schmidt in the summer of 2009, the journalist Gustav Seibt found under the heading “Deutsche Berlusconisierung” in an article for the Süddeutsche Zeitung 2010 that a “strange coalition of public opinion makers” was creating a mood, “ which ranges from the left-liberal leading article to the Bild newspaper to Frank Plasberg ”and“ constantly insinuating the most trivial motif ”engages in grotesque“ moral bullying ”. "The combination of unimportant power of opinion with contempt for politicians" is - according to Seibt - "the mix on which the Berlusconization of political operations [also in Germany] can be imagined". Seibt then remarked about Berlusconism: "Berlusconi offers the example of a depoliticized politics in which the personal political motive actually rules, that is, the state is degraded to the environment of an economic empire."

In an article for the Spanish daily El País , the Italian writer Antonio Tabucchi called for a “deberlusconization of Italy” in 2011. He accused Berlusconi of having led the Italians into the regime of a " Truman Show " through his television and media empire . With his contribution, Tabucchi contributed to the dissemination of a political term that was picked up in autumn 2013 in connection with the vote of confidence in the Letta government .

literature

  • Norberto Bobbio : Contro i nuovi dispotismi. Scritti sul berlusconismo (= Libelli vecchi e nuovi. Vol. 8). Delado, Bari 2008, ISBN 978-8-822-05508-8 .
  • Mauro Calise: Il partito personale (= Saggi tascabili Laterza. STL. Vol. 240). Laterza, Rome et al. 2000, ISBN 88-420-5971-4 (Nuova Edizione ampliata, as: Il partito personale. I due corpi del leader (= Saggi tascabili Laterza. STL. Vol. 346). Ibid 2010, ISBN 978-88 -420-9217-9 ).
  • Claudia Cippitelli, Axel Schwanebeck: The new seducers? Right-wing populism and right-wing extremism in the media. Fischer, Munich 2004, ISBN 3-88927-343-2 .
  • Irene Chytraeus-Auerbach, Georg Maag (ed.): The Italian media democracy. On the history of political staging and staged politics in the media age (= culture and technology. Vol. 6). Lit, Münster 2006, ISBN 3-8258-0110-1 .
  • Giovanni Orsina: Berlusconism and Italy. A historical interpretation. Palgrave Macmillan, Basingstoke (Hampshire) 2014, ISBN 978-1-1374-3867-6 .
  • Gian Enrico Rusconi: “Berlusconism” - a mutation of the democratic system in Italy? In: Leviathan. Berlin journal for social science. Vol. 37, No. 4, 2009, ISSN  0340-0425 , pp. 617-628, doi : 10.1007 / s11578-009-0057-y .
  • Gian Enrico Rusconi, Thomas Schlemmer , Hans Woller (eds.): Berlusconi in power. The politics of the Italian center-right governments in a comparative perspective (= contemporary history in conversation. Vol. 10). Oldenbourg Wissenschaftsverlag, Munich 2010, ISBN 978-3-486-59783-7 .
  • Enzo Santarelli: Profilo del berlusconismo. Datanews, Roma 2002, ISBN 88-7981-205-X .

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Giovanni Sartori : Homo videns. Televisione e post-pensiero (= Economica Laterza. Vol. 203). 13th edition. Laterza, Rome et al. 2011, ISBN 978-88-420-6156-4 .
  2. Jump up ↑ Neil Postman : We're having fun to death. Formation of judgment in the age of the entertainment industry. S. Fischer, Frankfurt am Main 1985, ISBN 3-10-062407-6 .
  3. ^ Giovanni Sartori: Il sultanato. Laterza, Rome et al. 2009, ISBN 978-8-842-08914-8 .
  4. ^ Gian Enrico Rusconi: The Italian civil society in the Berlusconi era. In: Aspects of the social center in Europe. Approaches and potentials (= Sinclair House Talks. Vol. 29). 29th Sinclair House Talk, Bad Homburg vd Höhe, 24. – 25. April 2009. Societäts-Verlag, Frankfurt am Main 2009, ISBN 978-3-7973-1171-9 , pp. 32–39, (PDF file; 54 kB), accessed from the kas.de portal on December 16, 2013.
  5. ^ Giovanni Orsina: Liberalism and Liberals. In Erik Jones, Gianfranco Pasquino: The Oxford Handbook of Italian Politics. Oxford University Press, Oxford 2015, pp. 240-252, at p. 249.
  6. ^ Giovanni Orsina: Berlusconism and Italy. 2014, p. 82.
  7. ^ Susanna Böhme-Kuby: Populism in Italian . In: Richard Faber , Frank Unger (ed.): Populism in past and present . Verlag Königshausen & Neumann, Würzburg 2008, ISBN 978-3-8260-3803-7 , pp. 149–174, here p. 164.
  8. ↑ Gian Enrico Rusconi: The legacy of Berlusconism . Article from December 7, 2011 in the theeuropean.de portal , accessed on October 2, 2013
  9. ^ Gustav Seibt: German Berlusconization . Article from May 17, 2010 in the portal sueddeutsche.de , accessed on October 2, 2013
  10. ↑ Antonio Tabucchi: 'Deberlusconizar' Italia , article from November 12, 2011 in the portal internacional.elpais.com (online portal of the Spanish daily El País ), accessed on October 2, 2013
  11. ↑ Tobias Bayer: Showdown in the Senate - "The risk for Italy is fatal" , article from October 2, 2013 in the welt.de portal , accessed on October 2, 2013
  12. ↑ Angela Mauro: Il piano di Giorgio Napolitano ed Enrico Letta: deberlusconizzare il governo e aprire la terza Repubblica . Article (in Italian) of October 1, 2013 on the huffingtonpost.it portal , accessed on October 2, 2013