A Tale of Two Shutdowns.

One that almost happened, and one that almost didn't.

News this week has been inundated with reports on America’s government shutdown. Both in the days leading up to this possibility, and in the hours after virtually all news sources have been hypnotized by the first government shutdown since the Clinton administration. What managed to slip by us in this downpour of news was that another country was undergoing a similar threat to the stability of its government at the exact same time. Silvio Berlusconi nearly drove the Italian government straight off a cliff over their 2014 budget. Italy, however, prevailed where the United States government could not: right at the last moment they pulled together, forcing Berlusconi into a change of direction and averting disastrous effects to the government.

Italy, despite its recent economic and political troubles is still the Eurozone’s third largest economy. Part of Italy’s recent economic troubles are tied to the problems that the Eurozone in general is facing, thanks primarily to issues of the Greek and Spanish economies. Italy has maintained a solid exports and tourism trade despite its daunting unemployment figures.  It has also been a lead player in European politics in recent years.

Berlusconi, currently an Italian senator, held the office of Prime Minister in Italy for the longest concurrent run in recent history. Berlusconi started his political career after a lucrative career in media. In the early 90's used his media powerhouse to leverage his way into politics. He was adept in business and advertising from his previous career and took naturally to the political stage. In 1994 he won the general election with the highest popular vote. This run in office was marred by frequent controversies and internal strife however, and in 1996 he was replaced with Romano Prodi.

Berlusconi again took the general election by storm in 2001 and has remained a central figure in the Italian political field since then. He has been a successful, if controversial politician, most recently he was convicted guilty of tax fraud, which he has yet to serve any sentence for.

Source: xkcd.com

Late last week Berlusconi decided to make his power-play over the Italian 2014 budget.  He threatened to bring down the Italian government if his party were not going to get their way, which they didn't  The Italian government, threatened with something much worse than just a government shutdown, pulled itself together. Multiple supporters of Berlusconi, recognizing the danger of bringing down the Italian government in a move that was effectively political grandstanding to bring Berlusconi’s career back into the spotlight, jumped ship to the opposition. Without this support, Berlusconi was no longer able to field enough leverage to go through with his actions and was forced to make an abrupt turn in his stance. The Italian government made it through another day.

Now here we are, days into the American government shutdown, and days after the avoidance of an Italian shutdown. How is it that Italy avoided what America could not? Could we have done things differently, or perhaps learn from Italy’s near miss with disaster?

To begin with, the American government and the Italian government are two very different entities. Bipartisanship  the biggest roadblock in the American system, is much more common in the Italian government. Giorgio Napolitano, Italian President, has supporters crossing the left, right and center lines. Bipartisanship in the Italian government has actually caused almost as much trouble it how divided the American government has become. Cross line deals and party fracturing have consistently caused chaos in Italy (not to mention corruption, the only true bipartisan affair). For Berlusconi’s supporters to jump ship at the last moment and put their backing behind his opposition is much less out of the ordinary in Italy. Whereas American senators take it as a matter of party pride (or perhaps party votes) to hold out, even to the point of shutting down the government, against a rider which supports bill which holds the name of the opposition, Italian lines are nowhere near as clear cut. Also, whereas the American government is built to reject sudden dramatic changes, these kinds of changes are your average Wednesday in Italy.

If the roles were reversed, could we have overcome Berlusconi’s attempt, and could Italy have avoided America’s government shutdown? Perhaps, but both of these situations, despite occurring in tandem, are very unique to the political climates in which they were born. Perhaps there is something to be said for Italy’s bipartisanship, and perhaps there is something to be said for America’s strict party lines. 

For today let’s just give credit where credit is due: Italy’s national parks are still open.