Silvio Berlusconi is at the center of two dramas in Italy today. The first centers on the prime minister's notorious personal and political scandals: A judge will soon decide whether Berlusconi should immediately face trial on charges of paying for sex with a 17-year-old and abusing his office to have her released after being accused of theft. With its Roman settings and operatic staging, the effort to put Berlusconi on trial has had the makings of a comic opera, as if Benny Hill were playing Scarpia in Tosca.
The other battle is less acute, but more critical for Italy's future. This past weekend, one million Italians and some foreign sympathizers marched -- not only in Italy, but everywhere from New York to London to Honolulu to Jakarta -- in order to air their grievances against "Berlusconi-ism," the distorted political and social system that the media magnate has imposed on the country since he came on the scene in 1994. Even if Berlusconi leaves the soon, Italians realize he will leave behind a toxic legacy, one in which the media cynically undermine democratic norms and women have largely been robbed of their dignity in public and private life.
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In the 1980s, Berlusconi succeeded in creating a near monopoly of national commercial television. The public broadcaster, RAI, has always been subservient to the government, so when Berlusconi became prime minister in practice he controlled five out of the seven national channels. He and his family also have extensive print and publishing interests which he has maintained even in office.
It is hardly news that a political leader has meetings with his staff to plan his media strategies, but what makes Berlusconi different is that the "staff" comprises editors of newspapers and TV channels that reach more than half the population. Given the concentration of media power in the hands of the prime minister, it is no surprise that for the past two years Freedom House has classified Italy's media status as only "partly free."
In the case of his current scandals, Berlusconi has unleashed his media companies to act as his public defenders. Over the last few days, they have started what looks like an organized campaign to defend the boss and attack his enemies. Last week, Giuliano Ferrara, the editor of a Berlusconi family paper -- the low circulation daily Il Foglio -- published a long interview with Berlusconi in which he accused the Milan prosecutors who are investigating him of carrying out a "moral coup" and acting illegally. He compared them to the Stasi and today's Italy to East Germany. Ferrara was also allowed a six-minute monologue on RAI's Channel 1 prime-time news program in which he attacked the main anti-Berlusconi media. Channel 1 is RAI's flagship channel; its news editor, Augusto Minzolini is famous for his direct-to-camera opinion pieces in which he either praises Berlusconi or attacks the opposition. Last week, Channel 1 aired an interview with the prime minister without a single question about his trials.
Italy has never had a puritanical culture, but under the influence of Berlusconi's media, the country has become positively shameless. That has been especially evident in his current scandal. Berlusconi makes no secret of giving parties for up to 30 young women, some under 18, and a few, usually elderly, male friends. Indeed, another of his family owned papers, Il Giornale, has just published photographs of one of the girls who calls him "Papi," Noemi Letizia. She spent New Year's Eve of 2008 in his Sardinian villa when she was only 17. Her friend who took photographs of her at that party admitted that they were given "money for little presents, 2,000 euros or sometimes presents like necklaces or bracelets, the usual sorts of presents that an uncle gives a niece." Berlusconi doesn't deny knowing the woman at the center of the current case, Karima el Mahroug (aka Ruby), nor having phoned the Milan police station where she was being held on charges of theft in order to get her released.
One needn't be a moralistic American to be troubled by the prime minister's casual openness about this kind of conduct. And the effects are being felt not only among a small group of young girls, but among Italy's women more broadly.
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