The eccentric vs the bureaucrat
Silvio Berlusconi is a self-made man, a successful businessman who served as prime minister of Italy – one of the rich G-8 countries – during a period focused on economic performance. He embodied the ideal of the age. His basic failing is his unconventionality – his failure to practice self-censorship, his refusal to enter the realm of the «politically correct.» Berlusconi’s rivals – a motley crew spanning from the far left to Britain’s Economist magazine – had hoped to see a crushing defeat but he lost the elections by just 25,000 votes. The left’s aversion to the defeated Italian prime minister is both understandable and politically legitimate. But what is interesting is the reaction of various European leaders, particularly those with «liberal» outlooks. In their eyes, Berlusconi’s mistake was that he had blackened the image of businessmen and politicians alike. These days, it is acceptable for a prime minister to develop economic policy as long as he is not involved in the business sector – and certainly not a premier-cum-businessman who, according to the Economist, approved pay raises that exceeded the productivity rate of the Italian economy and stalled on privatizations. Of course, Berlusconi is hardly a patron of the arts like the Medicis; he is not an intellectual and is not renowned for his self-control. He is a self-made man who attracted the votes of Italians with a sense of humor. Taking his place is Romano Prodi, who failed miserably as prime minister before leaping into the melting pot of bureaucrats that is the European Commission. Berlusconi was an eccentric figure from the Commedia dell’Arte. His successor will be a tightrope-walking bureaucrat and as such better suited to today’s political culture.
