At the beginning of the last century, the backwardness of the South of Italy compared to the rest of the country had already become so striking that men of culture born and raised there thought of defining, even if only in detail, the characteristics of that situation. It was no coincidence that a prominent figure of the time, Giustino Fortunato, a lawyer and politician from Rionero in Vulture, in the province of Potenza, effectively defined it as a “pendulous rubbish”. The appropriateness of that definition, which still today characterizes the problem of the South of the Peninsula with sufficient precision, was taken up again in the early 1950s by Manlio Rossi Doria, a Roman but a southerner, economist at the Faculty of Agriculture of Portici. It is no coincidence that that expression finds perfect correspondence in the observations of those who study this “Question” after more than a century. This is how the Final Considerations of the Bank of Italy, read last week by Governor Panetta in front of an audience of experts on that issue, dedicated specific considerations to it. In fact, if we want to present it as a dialogue or chat between pensioners while they feed the birds, reality takes on the appearance of a reheated soup. At the beginning of the century, the differences between the South and the rest of the country had shown signs of reducing, at least according to some significant parameters: female work had tepidly made some progress, investments, almost all of which were directed towards the production of avant-garde, were advancing to some extent; finally, the scientific research carried out by institutions responsible for operating in those areas had moved towards new goals, increasingly immersed in that same reality. The Research Office of the Emission Institute has carried out a broader and comparative analysis of the pandemic effect and its aftermath. From that starting point the Question described above resumed its path, all uphill. With an aggravating factor: the context with which Southern Italy interacts has suffered damage for the same reason (Covid). So he is trying first to heal those same people. It has thus happened that the South, in all its social divisions, has currently slowed down the pursuit of the Central-North “group”, with easily imaginable consequences of the kind of employment and productivity problems. It is normal to think that in such situations the intervention of the State and the Regions becomes indispensable. Large works such as ports, airports and activities connected to them cannot be activities managed solely by private individuals. The opportunity is therefore propitious for the creation of public and private joint ventures. Having all reached this point with love and agreement, a fundamental premise demands the full attention of the political class: never again to think with a logic in which the welfarist connotation is strong. The Imperative, categorical in the case, must be – since yesterday if it were possible – to ensure that productivity increases and with it production With the conviction that the statement just written, although it seems easy to implement, is not even remotely easy .
