Is Elly Schlein really a leftist? Too much or too little? - Corriere.it

Is Elly Schlein really a leftist?  Too much or too little? - Corriere.it


Of Alexander Trocino

The debate in the Italian and foreign press. Program points

The Guardian uncertain: Elly Schlein Meloni's nemesis or the Italian Corbyn?. Refined uncertainty, while here the doubts are directly proportional to her surprise at her election as secretary of the Democratic Party, and more basic: leftist? And can an upper-class girl born in Switzerland be a leftist?

Isn't that too leftist? Or maybe not enough?

Angela Giuffrida's allusion in the British newspaper

to the leader of the Labor Party, elected in the primaries on 1 September 2015 on the wave of great enthusiasm especially from the young, who cheered: Finally a leftist. Finally we will invest in the environment and public health - it was said -, finally poverty and precariousness will be reduced. Two electoral blows followed, on time, in 2017 and 2019.

The last terrible one: the Labor Party brought home one of the worst results in its history and sent Boris Johnson into government, not exactly the best and most authoritative candidate.

Then there is the young American Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez
, the democratic pasionaria, elegant propagandist of Tax the rich, radical and glam champion of rights, strong environmentalist, instagrammer (8 million followers), Puerto Rican origins and native in the Bronx, equipped with an acronym that can also be perfectly titled in body 80 (Aoc). What does Ocasio-Cortez have to do with
Schlein
which bears a foreign name but without a diminutive received (only a horrid Giuselly runs, with reference to Conte), belonging to the Swiss upper-middle class, gaudy suits, jackets that are too loose and faded jeans, intellectual kinship (considered by most, alas, a fault), acquaintances (merit? no, who gave you the money, they say), sponsors among the great old men, votes among the many young people and not all of the Democratic Party?

It has little to do with it, or rather, we don't know, we can't know at the moment. A bit of patience. Political scientists and commentators have already launched into trenchant judgments. On the basis of the programmes, which we then know what happens to the electoral ones, they are often leaps of populism for the purpose of voting, buried ex post by the harsh reality of politics or, worse, of the government.

As for behaviour, how can one judge those who are appearing now and have not yet ventured into the political arena and the media mincer? Who would have bet on Conte when Alfonso Bonafede pulled his name out of the top hat? What would he bet then? On a Conte advocate of the people, on a sovereign Conte or on a left-populist Conte à la Mlenchon? As for Meloni, there were those who predicted upheaval, declining democracy, the end of Europe and instead there is an Atlanticist, moderate premier and, of course, some landslide to the right, from immigrants to silence on Florence, but in short, all in a frame of unpredictable pragmatism.

The debate in the newspapers these days gives an idea of ​​the fluidity of the placements. The right has already renamed it ComunistElly (time headline). To many centrist and Democratic Party moderates, it seems a lot leftist. Indeed, as Giovanna Casadio asks Graziano Delrio more diplomatically, are the Catholic Democrats uncomfortable with the radical nature of the new secretary? Not he, not the former minister, who is a man of the world and appreciates Schlein, as long as subsidiarity and family communities do not touch each other. On the other hand, the interview with Domenico De Masi, a Conte-prone sociologist (even if he says that he is neither from the Democratic Party nor from the M5S and voted for Schlein in the primaries), was particularly instructive.

De Masi laughs: Schlein on the left? Little little, so-so. You look Bolshevik, she says, due to your former stay-at-home and neoliberal. an optical effect, she claims, because she takes the reins of a left-wing party that seemed right-wing. Even if, it should be remembered, for four years the Democratic Party had been in the hands of the dem left (see Zingaretti), not the reformists). De Masi points the way for what he, with Conti's angle, defines as the left: He must free himself from liberalism, from Atlanticism, from dragonism. Specifically, it must marginalize neoliberals and governors, give centrality to policies aimed at welfare, free itself from the unfortunate gregariousness of Europe to America.

Huge program, huge. Because getting rid of liberalism yet again, but denying a Mario Draghi who has shored up a country (and parties) in disarray seems a bit too much for the Democratic Party, not to mention freeing oneself from Atlanticism, which sounds beyond Marco Rizzo's pro-Putinian left .

Schlein will hardly follow the De Masi programme. But how is his? With all the limitations we have anticipated (electoral programs are declarations of intent, sheets of paper, dream books), the Post has tried to draw a parallel with the parties of the European left, with the fateful question mentioned earlier : How much left Elly Schlein?.

The topics taken into consideration are these: work, rights, ecological transition, foreign policy (Ukraine, Europe) and immigration. The first is the most delicate. Schlein wants the Jobs Act to be overcome, he wants to make stable work more convenient by stopping precariousness and free internships. He wants to fight irregular work: It is unacceptable that riders are not entitled to insurance, holidays, sickness, anything. She asks for the minimum wage and not hostile to basic income (meanwhile modified and become Mia).

The post remember that these issues are very similar to the labor market reform made by the socialist prime minister Pedro Snchez. In 2020, the government introduced the minimum vital income, similar to our basic income. the minimum wage has been raised and protections have been given to riders. Mlenchon's program is not very different: he calls for a ceiling on precarious workers, higher wages, recognition of burnout (work-related stress syndrome) as an occupational disease and a higher minimum wage. Schlein wants working hours to be reduced: the British Labor Party is asking to reduce the week from 48 to 32 hours, France already has legislation, wanted by the Socialists, which provides for 35; in Portugal in 1996 it went from 44 to 40 hours.

the most critical part of the program, so far, as inevitable. Lorenzo Borga sul Foglio recalled that in Spain the reduction of fixed-term contracts was a real need, while in Italy only a minority did not have permanent contracts. Maurizio Ferrera, in the Corriere, noted a certain ambiguity on social rights, contesting the accusations against the Jos Act, considered by Schlein to be a grave neo-liberal sin. Luciano Capone, sul Sheet
, reasoned on Schleinomics: The clear vision, but the problem that the "how" is missing. It is not clear how (and by whom) his program will be financed.

On civil rights, Schlein refers to the Zan bill
sunken in the Senate, he supports same-sex marriage, going beyond the law on civil unions and de facto cohabitation desired by Monica Cirinn (already considered an extremist). The new secretary wants a law on the end of life, she supports positions that she defines as feminist, such as non-transferable equal leave between parents and full implementation of law 194 on abortion.

Spain goes even further, with the Ley Transhas approved the possibility for everyone, starting from the age of 16, to self-determine their gender identity: no medical certificate is needed, just a self-declaration. In Schlein's program, notes the Post, the self-determination of trans people is not mentioned. Spain has passed various provisions that eliminate obstacles to abortion and has a law on the end of life.

On environmentalism, Schlein says she is against nuclear power, in favor of suspending drilling in search of fossil fuels. And you would like to approve a tax plan that links indirect taxes to carbon dioxide emissions, with rewards for those who behave virtuously. Mlenchon has called for an end to nuclear power and subsidies for fossil fuels. Germany is faced with the contradictions of realism: it is stopping nuclear power and has announced a plan for renewables, but in the meantime it has had to reopen some coal plants.

Then there's the war. About this Schlein
he wants to correct Letta's ultra-Atlantist line. Not in the sense of disowning Ukraine, of stopping sending of arms or to give some reason to Putin (he just reiterated the s to send arms). But in the sense of emphasizing more the commitment to peace negotiations (see the interview with Che tempo che fa). Nothing too revolutionary, even if the concrete declination of the course correction will not be easy. Mlenchon has often been accused of complacency towards Putin. And Scholz, in Germany, has also been criticized for delaying the shipment of weapons to Kiev.

On Europe, Schlein proposes a more democratic, multilateral, social and ecological Union. Nothing reckless. As for immigration, he calls for a reform of the Dublin regulation. This is how the Post reconstructs it: The most concrete attempt to do so began in 2015 in the European Parliament: among other things, Schlein was among the rapporteurs of that reform. At the time it was approved by the European Parliament with the abstention of the League and the vote against the 5 Star Movement: it was also accepted by the European Commission, which had written the basic text, but was blocked in the Council of the European Union, the body where the national governments of the 27 countries are represented. Eastern countries, traditionally hostile to the reception of migrants from the Middle East and North Africa, had always opposed approval.

In short, a leftist program, even if it doesn't seem written by a dangerous subversive, at first glance. A program that in any case represents a turning point for the Italian Democratic Party, as the editor of Corriere Luciano Fontana said: For the first time there is a very young secretary and completely foreign to the reference world of the parties that ended up with the collapse of Berlin. Schlein interprets a very different political project from the initial one of the Democratic Party, which had a majority inspiration, looked to the productive and moderate classes and had important international references in democratic liberalism. Her themes have to do with inequality, ecological transition, precariousness, defense of schools and public health. The only reference to the original founding values ​​is what it brought to the streets, the danger to democratic freedoms, anti-fascism as a value to be practically pursued. So many elements that we don't know if they will be a revolution but they are a caesura on what the Democratic Party has been up to now.

Of course, now it will be necessary to verify its degree of flexibility, unavailability to yield on principles and the willingness to yield on tools, the ability to mediate with the left (Fratoianni and Conte) but also that of working with the center (yesterday he announced that there could be common battles with Calenda and Renzi). All very premature, of course. The first real test - after the crowds in Florence - will be the European elections of 2024, where you vote with proportional representation, so you go with your own ideas and identity. It will be necessary to see if he will be able to build a definite one and if he will not give in to that minority vocation that many fear.

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March 7, 2023 (change March 7, 2023 | 11:52 am)



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