The legitimate competition for the government monopoly

The enchanted narration of representative regimes, despite their practice, today is so omnipotent that contradicting it is worthwhile. Deleting the rhetoric with which they legitimate themselves, the author shows the nature of government technique and dominion form that minimizes coercion. What comes to surface is a weave made of oscillations: between political synthesis of government action and recomposition of pluralism.A despecho de su práctica, el cuento maravilloso del régimen representativo hoy día es tan omnipotente como para que valga la pena contradecirlo. Despojándola de la retórica con la que se legitima, el autor analiza la naturaleza de la técnica de gobierno y de la forma de dominio que minimiza la coerción. De ahí que sobresalga una trama compuesta por oscilaciones entre la síntesis política de la acción de gobierno y la recomposición del pluralismo

La competencia legítima para el monopolio estatal.

The enchanted narration of representative regimes, despite their practice, today is so omnipotent that contradicting it is worthwhile. Deleting the rhetoric with which they legitimate themselves, the author shows the nature of government technique and dominion form that minimizes coercion. What comes to surface is a weave made of oscillations: between political synthesis of government action and recomposition of pluralism.A despecho de su práctica, el cuento maravilloso del régimen representativo hoy día es tan omnipotente como para que valga la pena contradecirlo. Despojándola de la retórica con la que se legitima, el autor analiza la naturaleza de la técnica de gobierno y de la forma de dominio que minimiza la coerción. De ahí que sobresalga una trama compuesta por oscilaciones entre la síntesis política de la acción de gobierno y la recomposición del pluralismo

Giovanni Sartori e la democrazia della Seconda Repubblica

Il saggio ripercorre e analizza criticamente tutti i passaggi istituzionali della cosiddetta Seconda Repubblica, ossia della peculiare democrazia maggioritaria che si imposta in Italia a partire dal 1994. Tali passaggi sono visti all'interno del pensiero di Giovanni Sartori e in particolare della sua teoria della democrazia. Tale pensiero si è manifestato sia attraverso opere scientifiche sia attraverso una continua attività pubblicistica, in particolare dalle colonne, come editorialista, del Corriere della Sera. Dall'esame di questo pensiero emerge una serrata e continua critica dei caratteri istituzionali della peculiare democrazia maggioritaria all'italiana.The essay traces and critically analyzes all the institutional steps of the so-called Italian Second Republic, that is the peculiar majoritarian democracy that is set in Italy since 1994. These steps are seen within the thoughts of Giovanni Sartori and in particular of his theory of democracy . Such thinking has manifested both through scientific works both through continuous publications, in particular from the columns, as a columnist, of the Corriere della Sera. From an examination of this thinking emerges a close and continuous criticism of the institutional character of the distinctive Italian style majoritarian democracy

Italie : quand la politique invente la société civile

Italy : when politics invents civil society At the end of the second millennium, between 1992 and 1994, Italy was hit by a crisis, not really a very dramatic one, but obviously an upheaval that radically transformed the physiognomy of its political system. The basic cause of this crisis is usually considered to lie in the corruption of public life in the previous decades and the financial collapse caused by omnipresent cliente-lism. This article asks if these two phenomena can sufficiently account for a crisis that seems unique in the history of democratic regimes. The author puts forward a different hypothesis : that one of the main causes of the crisis which Italian democracy had to confront is to be found in the discourses which the major political actors constructed about it and the flowering of other discourses presented by new, unconventional actors : « antipolitical » discourses, based on a ruthless, instrumental and unfair denunciation of the state of Italian democracy. By so doing these actors, whether official or unofficial, sought to relegitimize or to legitimize them­selves. By presenting Italian democracy under these colors, and by proposing as the only valid prescription a mythical change from the « First » to the « Second » Republic, they managed only to poison common sense and to push democracy into a legitimacy crisis which is not yetÀ la fin du deuxième millénaire, entre 1992 et 1994, l'Italie a été frappée par une crise, en vérité, peu dramatique, mais sans doute bouleversante et qui a radicalement transformé la phy­sionomie de son système politique. Normalement, on considère que la cause fondamentale de cette crise a été la corruption de la vie publique dans les décennies précédentes et la faillite des finances publiques provoquée par un clientélisme omniprésent. Cet article se demande si ces deux phénomènes constituaient des raisons suffisantes pour provoquer une crise assez unique dans l'histoire des régimes démocratiques. L'auteur avance une autre hypothèse : l'une des causes principales de la crise à laquelle la démocratie italienne a dû faire face provient des dis­cours que les principaux acteurs politiques officiels ont construit à son égard et de la floraison d'autres discours formulés par de nouveaux acteurs non conventionnels : des discours « antipolitiques », fondés sur une dénonciation impitoyable, instrumentale et injuste, de l'état de cette démocratie. Ce faisant, ces mêmes acteurs, officiels ou non, ont tenté de se relégitimer ou de se légitimer. En présentant sous ces couleurs la démocratie italienne, et en proposant comme unique recette valable un mythique passage de la « Première » à la « Deuxième » Répu­blique, on a obtenu uniquement l'effet d'intoxiquer le sens commun et de pousser la démocratie vers une crise — de légitimité — dont on ne voit pas encore la conclusion.Mastropaolo Alfio. Italie : quand la politique invente la société civile. In: Revue française de science politique, 51ᵉ année, n°4, 2001. pp. 621-636