The stump showing the statue of Stradivari in Corso Garibaldi, with the violin removed, is more than a stupid disfigurement. I hope that the two minors identified by the police can and know how to redeem themselves from an unspeakable gesture. But the theft of the instrument, later found, and the severed hand of the statue are for me the metaphor of a dissociated community, part of which feels alien to the city and alien to the common goods that we should all share and protect.
Conviction is evidently not enough. The city, as a living community in continuous transformation in its deepest social and cultural processes, must be investigated, understood and represented. Not only youthful gestures, but the processes of progressive estrangement from political life should be better analysed.
It is not enough to refer to the work of the late Angelo Scivoletto “Cremona dissociated community” of 1970. Not even Robert Dahl’s works on democracy and power in an American city which converged in the seminal book “Who Governs?”. Head of the school, because since then there cannot be a local policy and an aware administration that does not know how to deal with the distribution of power in a city. For this reason in the Platform ” the Alternative of Ecological Democracy” put forward in view of the 2024 elections by the States General Climate Environment Health, which brings together the largest number of environmentalist associations and local fight committees, the 30 priority proposals are preceded by the analysis of the national context and the Cremonese context in which they must be implemented .
And here the most disappointing finding is that not only during the behaviors practiced in the last 5 years but also in this electoral campaign, both the forces that administered the city and the opposition forces are not giving any sign of profound change because they do not show any awareness of the city power system and not just the city in which they operate: local economic and financial system, intermediate entrepreneurial, professional and trade union actors, ownership and management of the media, spheres of influence, organization of welfare and healthcare, bodies and bodies in charge to safety, environmental and health controls.
In the absence of this awareness, the two center-right and center-left coalitions, the ones that will really contest the next government of the city, are neither able to express an adequate level of autonomy. Of course, fortunately, there are differences but they are due more to the national context and the European context than to substantial programmatic differences at city and territorial level.
However, we hope that in the next city council there will be stronger and more active minorities both inside and outside the major coalitions. But given the democratic regression underway at all levels, local, national, European, as States General Climate Environment Health we will be called to a profound critical analysis on the lack of effectiveness of our action and our proposals which have almost all remained unheeded. Certainly due to the closure of a self-centered political and administrative class subordinate to private logic in many sectors of civil life. Think of the subordination towards a great entrepreneur like Cavalier Arvedi who certainly cannot be blamed for his propensity for patronage which, perhaps, should have been better addressed by the elective institutions. Think of the progressive transfer of sovereignty over environmental and energy policies to A2A which, instead of being at the service of the territory, is putting the territory at its own service. See the mega biomethane plant project next to the San Rocco incinerator and the biomass plant, when for years the city and our territory would have rather needed a plan for renewable energy and, in particular, photovoltaics.
There are limits for us too, even for us environmental and voluntary associations when we allow ourselves to be divided and when we delude ourselves into thinking that we will be listened to because we are close or collateral to this or that political force. The experience of these years tells us that a leap in quality is also needed on our part, whoever is called to vote to govern this city. The novelty can and I think must be the creation of a real “Shadow Government” a point of reference for associations and citizens. Without delegitimizing those who will be elected but rather to call them to administer with their backs straight.
I hope we have the energy and determination to do it. We will have to do it not only for the love of the city, it sounds a bit rhetorical, but because we are challenged by a crisis of democracy that will worsen with the winds of war that are blowing ever stronger, with the national disunity created by the Differentiated Autonomy and with the an ongoing attempt by the Premiership to concentrate political power in ever smaller hands.
The Po is free flowing instead of basinised; the urban plan for renewable energy placed on roofs and warehouses instead of biomethane; an Antenna Plan to regularize the placement of 5G repeaters; gentle mobility and urban speed at 30km per hour; the early closure of the incinerator that emits dioxin compared to 2029 and the intensive reforestation of spaces within the city; investments for the recovery of raw-secondary materials up to over 90% of separate waste collection instead of hosting the next 300 MW mini nuclear power plants, which are still fission-based and therefore dangerous; the redevelopment of State Road 10 instead of wasting money on the Cremona-Mantua motorway; the rigorous defense of the soil and the protection of the fertility of agricultural land with a food policy that enhances the primary purposes of sustainable agriculture; the resumption of an epidemiological investigation into the causes of pollution and the origin of PM 2.5 killer dust; the redevelopment of the current hospital and a stronger investment in strengthening public healthcare; culture seen as production rather than consumption in relation to the needs of young people in schools and universities: these are some of the themes that we have developed in our current Platform with over 20 initiatives in the last 3 years, also making use of national experts and in complete Self-financing.
It’s not enough anymore. Because half the population feels like a stranger, while the circle of politics has narrowed down to clans and loyalty to the clan of reference prevails over everything else: there is no comparison that matters, there is no good strategic proposal or idea that can drag neither those loyal to the clans nor those who now feel estranged from everything, out of the games and also out of the clientele.
Neoliberal capitalism has favored the clanization of society. Fabio Armao called this phenomenon “Oikocracy”. Cremonese society is a fitting example of this: it is no longer just a dissociated community, it has become an “autoimmune” society in which the evils and defects have been incorporated and digested and the democratic antibodies no longer work. To heal, much more is needed than managing the small residual power left to Local Authorities and new forms of clientelism. This is why we must shake the consciences of citizens with real innovations that concern the reform and autonomy of politics, dialectics and political conflict, the regeneration of effective channels of popular participation so that we can truly count on choices.
