Vote Antonio? No: vote Mario! Italian politics, with a few small and meritorious exceptions (Renzi, Bonino, Calenda), has chosen to ignore with a certain transversality the formidable speech on the competitiveness of Europe held last Tuesday in Brussels by Mario Draghi. The reason for the embarrassment is evident even if it may appear surprising at first glance. Draghi chastised Europe’s ruling classes for turning excessively inward, for making competition between European countries a more important issue than competition between Europe and the rest of the world. And in doing so, Draghi said, despite having a positive trade balance, no one has really paid enough attention to our competitiveness outside the borders of our continent.
“Our rivals – said Draghi – are ahead of us because they can act as a single country with a single strategy and align all the necessary tools and policies behind it”. Draghi’s speech embarrassed both pro-Europeans and anti-Europeans because he exposed some embarrassing truths. It is embarrassing for pro-Europeans on autopilot because it tells them that the real priorities for Europe do not concern the fights against fascism, the rhetorical battles against inequalities, the lazy campaigns in favor of European unity, but concern the economy , they concern growth, they concern competition, they concern the climate policies to be readapted, they concern the ability to know how to create new wealth, they concern the ability to govern globalization, not to fight it, they concern the necessary strategies to exit the season of national champions to enter in the season of the European champions.
There is a lazy way of being pro-European and there is an active way of being pro-European and focusing more on future challenges than on the ghosts of the past. But Draghi’s speech also embarrassed anti-Europeanists because it showed them an original, interesting and useful way of criticizing Europe without smoothing the hairs of the monster of Euroscepticism. Being dissatisfied with this Europe is right, perhaps it is even a duty, but to be dissatisfied in a constructive way it is necessary to criticize Europe for what it has not yet done and not for what it has done.
Example: “Our major competitors are taking advantage of being continent-sized economies to generate scale, increase investment and gain market share in the sectors where it matters most. In Europe we have the same advantage in terms of natural size, but fragmentation holds us back.” Being skeptical about the Europe of the present without being Eurosceptic is possible. To do this, as one of the few politicians of the Democratic Party to have valorised Draghi’s speech, Pierfrancesco Maran, well summarized, European protagonism is needed which allows a change of scale: from small national states to a continent that shares resources, technologies, industries for defend an internal market that can be increasingly put into crisis by the international context where the rules of engagement have changed.
Dedicating greater attention to Draghi’s words is not only an issue that concerns the desire to follow common sense but is also an issue that can concern the search for consensus. Yesterday, the Eurobarometer, the European Parliament survey conducted between 7 February and 3 March 2024 in each of the 27 EU member states, offered interesting food for thought, highlighting how the issues that are currently in top of the agenda of populist parties are very far from those that are at the top of the agenda of the majority of voters. At the top, there are economic issues: the fight against poverty and social exclusion (priority for 33 percent of the electorate), public health (32 percent), support for the economy and the creation of new jobs work (31 percent). Alongside economic issues, there are issues related to the defense and security of the EU (31 percent). Irregular immigration is no longer the top priority for European voters (24 percent). And even the issues on which populists invest the most (fueling doubts regarding support for Ukraine) appear to be less popular than ever. When asked what priorities the next European Parliament should give, the strongest support was for peace and democracy, followed by the protection of human rights, freedom of speech and thought and the rule of law. 83 percent of those questioned have a negative view of Russia.
The new Draghi agenda therefore does not just reflect considerable transversal common sense. But it also reflects an ongoing transformation among many voters in terms of priorities. Less populism, more pragmatism. Less nationalism, more Europeanism. And if across the board, after 9 June, Italy moved, with all its political forces, to give support to Draghi’s candidacy for the presidency of the Commission (difficult) or of the European Council (less difficult), some more hope of having an Italian in a place that matters could be there. Totò said: vote Antonio! Not this time. For this time, as suggested by the photomontage with the new slightly modified PD card that you find on the front page, better to say: vote Mario!
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