JOSEPH MONTAGANO
One of the criticisms of the proposal for a Macroregion of the South is that it is reminiscent of the Neo-Bourbon state and that it is an unrealistic, nostalgic and anti-historical idea. The response to the vulgar neo-Bourbon labeling is to clarify the function of the Macroregion as a European and therefore modern concept: from a 2017 editorial by Andrea Piraino “A macroregion of the Mediterranean for the rebirth of the South” would essentially be a tool for the best implementation of territorial cohesion which, in the most recent development processes, complements and complements economic-social cohesion, in reference to which the majority of European policies have so far been addressed. On the other hand, the territorial cooperation strategy aims to avoid the dispersion of resources. It concentrates them in an attempt to resolve some problems common to several state and sub-state authorities in certain macro-sectors (defined as “pillars” or “objectives”) whose size may vary depending on the participating subjects. Hence its functionalist nature from which the European Commission derives the famous “three no rule”: 1) No! to specific funding from the EU budget, but coordination of existing European and national funds; 2) No! the introduction of specific legislation as each macro-regional strategy must only be the result of new planning; 3) No! to the creation of a further institutional level by applying the principles of cooperation, coordination, integration and multilevel governance to the MacroRegions. Ultimately, an approach – this macro-regional – whose objective is the best coordination of the institutions and resources already available within the existing rules. Now, if we think about what has just been mentioned for a moment, we immediately realize that the effectiveness of this perspective ends up being defined by the circumstance that the best coordination that it ensures arises from the breaking down and overcoming of political boundaries. administrative procedures within which, to date, States, Regions and various territorial bodies remain constrained. Which means that the MacroRegion is a form of aggregation of territories no longer determined by historical legacies and constraints, but by the ability to overturn the concept of the border from a place of limit, of delimitation, of the prohibition of crossing in the meeting place, of collaboration, cooperation, integration. But if this is true – and the Macro Regions already established (the Baltic, the Danubian, the Adriatic-Jonica and the Alpine) confirm it – the consequences of the adoption of this strategy in the community system of the Union will not be limited to the specific objectives around which it was built but, although not representing a new institutional entity, they will affect the old territorial aggregations of the existing national states and will demonstrate how it is precisely the latter with their insurmountable delimitations that prevent the construction of the Community Europe of the Founding Fathers . Not only. But the MacroRegions will show this aptitude for coordination, cooperation and even integration even more, if possible, with reference to the regional systems which in Italy, as in other European countries, are subjected to a return of statist centralism which tends to disempower them, both from legislative and administrative power, mortifying them above all with linear cuts. Naturally, here we do not want to question the fact that the Regions today, at least in Italy, have largely become centers of power as an end in themselves, incapable of providing for the socio-economic development needs of the territories, far from the commitment to growth democracy of the populations, insensitive to the protection of citizenship rights. As public opinion underlines, in recent years the Regions have transformed themselves into subjects of pollution of administrative management, into centers of evasion from the State’s regulatory authority itself, renouncing their role of planning and regulation to dive into direct or through the promotion of controlled companies and entities subjected to rigid political subdivision. What must be underlined instead is that, if the regional system is to be virtuously inserted into a new organization of the Republic, there must be another path to follow. And, precisely, that of the territorial reorganization of the twenty Regions currently envisaged by the art. 131 of the Constitution, as now signaled by a vast movement of opinion which has led several parliamentarians to present proposals for constitutional laws to “redraw the map of Italy” (Roberto Morassut). After all, this prospect of modifying the current Regions to build a unprecedented system of MacroRegions represents nothing other than the re-emergence of an ancient idea whose birth, in the aftermath of the Second World War, was proposed by the leader of the Sicilian Independence Movement (MIS), Andrea Finocchiaro Aprile, and then resumed, in the first half of the seventies of the last century, on the one hand, by Guido Fanti, first president of the Emilia-Romagna Region, and, on the other, by Piersanti Mattarella, then a simple deputy of the Sicilian Regional Assembly. Since then, for about fifteen years, the macro-regional proposal seemed to disappear from the political-institutional agenda to re-emerge in 1992 with the famous research of the Agnelli Foundation which relaunched the idea of macro-geoeconomic areas with a pro-European vocation as an alternative to the bureaucratic-administrative regionalism of the experience implemented in Italy and also criticized by the federalist proposal of the Northern League and for it by Gianfranco Miglio who resumed an old belief of his and supported a renewed institutional architecture of the country in three MacroRegions (or “Italies”). Thus arriving at today, when the reform of the framework of the Republic in a macro-regional key would not only serve to redesign the territorial organization of our country, but also to help overcome the ‘walls’ constituted by the borders of individual European countries and thus recomposing new geo-political communities of continental dimension. But how? In what direction? Through an aggregation of regional areas homogeneous in terms of territory, history, culture, political sensitivity and socio-economic interests that overcome the differences of national belonging and are placed in the European perspective. Of that political Europe, however, which can only belong to Territories and Peoples. No more than the States. It may seem reckless to make this statement in the midst of the boom in intergovernmental logic which tends to sweep away all community demands. But that’s exactly how it is. In fact, if we do not set aside the centralist and technocratic thought that gave life to the current bureaucratic structure, devoid of soul, to return to the original idea of Europe, the current purely economistic imprint, assumed following the Maastricht Treaty, will not be never surpassed and the single currency will replace that cultural, political, social and economic unity which constitutes the sole reason for existence of the European Union. Confirming, as many popular movements already maintain, that this is a resounding failure that has produced a devastating economic crisis, not cyclical but structural. Not only. But, even more, it has led to a flattening of historical cultures which has reduced Europe to an entity without identity, poorly democratic and often incomprehensible for its own citizens, forced to witness the havoc of the rejections of migrants seeking asylum by Countries that owe their current existence precisely to the generous welcome of the (true) European Community. Now, if we want to avoid this disastrous prospect, there is no doubt that the only possibility is to build a new political unity of the old continent based on these macro-regions which we have seen to be, on the one hand, the only true content of a possible regulatory reform not only in ours, but also in other (France, Germany, Spain) European countries and, on the other hand, the path indicated by the EU to pursue development objectives that cannot be achieved individually by a Territory marked by belonging to a single state. But, since the macro-regional approach is an innovative initiative of concertation and collaboration which implies the full inclusion of the Regions involved, the construction of a Macro-Region of the Western Mediterranean could also constitute an opportunity to achieve the territorial cooperation indispensable for balanced development and sustainable development of Southern Italy. Clearly, at present, the Mediterranean MacroRegion does not have defined borders and, according to European guidelines, it would be nothing more than an “action plan” aimed at addressing the common problems and challenges of national, regional and local authorities facing in the area. In short, it could become a network where all the matters that constitute the key sectors of intelligent and sustainable economic growth can be brought together which, not only, would be in line with the EU strategy, but would also have the ability to make a significant contribution to development of the country. And above all to the renaissance of our South which could be one of the driving forces of this Mediterranean MacroRegion together with Regions such as Catalonia, the Côte d’Azur, Andalusia, Corsica, Malta. In conclusion, the Mediterranean constitutes a weakly structured space that calls for cooperation and interconnection interventions from every point of view (economic, social, political, ecological). But the development of these populations is a necessity for Europe itself – which would thus achieve greater security, more sustainable control of immigration flows and direct participation in a growing area – and for the same European Mediterranean states that they must know well that the future of their relations with a strategic area for the peace and well-being of their populations can derive from the latter. For the Regions of Southern Italy, however, such a cooperation process would constitute a unique opportunity to reverse what, vice versa, will be an inexorable decline and thus gain a space for action for their own rebirth, starting from the construction of a new government organization in which the principle of (federative) cooperation replaces a misunderstood autonomy claimed more and more often to defend small privileges, now obsolete. Knowing full well that a macro-regional strategy for the Mediterranean basin would contribute to determining benefits in terms of the fight against poverty, the protection and valorisation of the environmental heritage, territorial cohesion, security and, finally, also the drama of migrations which cannot be considered just an emergency phenomenon. In essence, beat them by speaking in the future and saying that their objections are made because they are facing backwards and because perhaps they have never come to terms with history. in short, reverse the reasoning and define them as conservative because we are innovators.
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