Cozy relationship
By Diana Saluri Russo Posted Dec 1 2008
CHAU NGUYEN/ Global Journalist
While the Italian press was talking about a subdued and humbled Silvio Berlusconi after he once again assumed power in May of this year, foreign journalists in Rome were not so sure things would be much different for the press under the media baron this time around.
In April, the Center-Left Berlusconi was elected Italy’s Prime Minister for the third time since 1994. He held that office for seven months in 1994 and from 2001-2006.
Berlusconi wields control over an estimated 90 percent of Italian television: direct control through his family’s ownership of three commercial channels (the Mediaset group) and indirect control of RAI, Italy’s public television.
The Berlusconi family also owns the advertising agency Publitalila, which controls 60 percent of the television ad market, Italy’s largest publishing house, Mondadori, the news weekly Panorama and two daily newspapers.
Megan K. Williams, who covers Italy for the Canadian Broadcast Company and the United States’ “Marketplace” on public radio, does not foresee a change in Berlusconi’s relations with the press during his third term in office. “His reason d’etre of being in politics is to expand his commercial empire and that hasn’t changed,” she said. “He’s a narcissistic personality.”
Irene Savio, of Spain’s La Economista and the Mexican Reformer, believes Berlusconi is at least trying to present a more moderate image. “If you analyze his language in his previous governments, it’s very hard: Anyone who wants to elevate [raise] taxes is automatically a Communist. I have the sensation he is measuring his words more carefully,” said Savio.
Although he says it is too early to judge, Israeli correspondent Yossi Bar also believes he is seeing a softer side to Berlusconi, a greater willingness to involve the opposition (and fewer jokes at the press’ expense). “You would hope that after 14 years in politics, after 14 years of hard opposition, he has learned to behave better.” Bar said.
This spring the Italian press was talking about a honeymoon period and the hope that Berlusconi’s clearer electoral majority this time around would make him more willing and able to work with the opposition to effect change in a country long plagued by minority political parties and governments.
The foreign journalists agree on one thing: Berlusconi, in his two past administrations, had little use for the foreign press. They have had little access to Berlusconi, his top advisors or even his press people. “He has his journalists whom he knows; if he doesn’t know you, it can be tough,” said Savio.
German journalist Martin Zoeller, who has been reporting for German newspapers in Rome for the past two years, said, “Berlusconi and his people have the mentality of being attacked. They are not very interested in us,” Zoeller said. “But then the press is not open-minded about him. I think the people who vote for him must be taken seriously.”
The elite nexus of power
Both Zoeller and Savio point out, however, that lack of access is embedded in Italy’s hierarchical culture of personal favoritism and goes far beyond Berlusconi.
“No one calls you back, no one gives you anything. Everything is based on whom you know,” Zoeller says. He notes that, with zero access at times, he relies on the Italian press for the basics and on professors at Italian universities to provide expertise.
Savio said that at a news conference last fall with Italy’s then-premier, the liberal Romani Prodi, and Spain’s President Zapatero, journalists were allowed only about five questions at the heavily staged event.
The journalists say that, even so, foreign journalists are largely freer than Italian journalists to do investigative reporting that goes against government or corporate interests.
“There are only two or three Italian journalists who can afford to do it, Savio says. “Most journalists work without a contract. Milena Gabanelli (producer of RAI 3’s investigative news show Report) is the best because she is not extreme, she doesn’t fall into the mindset of looking for the worst everywhere.”
Bar said it’s not a question of whether you are on the left or right: “It’s a mentality in Italy. They make you pay. If you want a job, be moderate. It’s okay to write about the Mafia but not the links to politicians or others. The Vatican is the worst — everybody knows if you write something bad about the Pope, you lose press credentials.”
Zoeller says he actually prefers covering the Vatican to writing about the fractious and volatile world of Italian politics.
“The issues are more fundamental — the dialogue with Islam, human rights. And I think [the Vatican] can be very much interested in having a sincere discussion because in the end they don’t care,” he said. “They’ve been there for 2,000 years and they do what they want anyway. They don’t need approval the way politicians do.”
The journalists say another manifestation of Italy’s insider mentality is that Italian journalists often write more for one another than for readers.
“There are some fabulous journalists, but many others write for other journalists and politicians — the more inside info you have, the more of a player you are,” said Williams. “The goal is not to act as a watchdog. It’s more about court intrigue — almost a social diary, a political social diary. ”
Newspapers receive state funding, and there are licensed state exams to become a journalist. “This means newspapers don’t have to take the interest of the reader to heart, making Italian newspapers some of the most boring in the world,” says Zoeller.
This is why, he points outs, you will see the first four pages of a newspaper devoted to the ins and outs of some minor point that is of interest mainly to politicians: “There is such a strong interlinking of the press and politics: The press doesn’t just observe politics, it makes politics. At a press conference you can’t tell the difference between the press and the politicians. They dress the same, they act the same.”
New media seek change
In the past year, however, there have been some remarkable signs that the Italian public’s tolerance for the old insider culture in both politics and the press is being tested by tough economic times. With inflation, the Naples garbage fiasco, and a failing national airline, pressure on Berlusconi is rising.
Williams points to last year’s nonfiction bestseller in Italy LaCasta (The Caste) by Gian Antonio Stella and Sergio Rizzo.
The authors reported that the annual budget of the Italian presidency is almost four times that of Buckingham Palace. Federal legislators are the best paid in Europe and nepotism is rampant in the legislature. Perks include ample pensions, which legislators can collect after only 30 months in office, a benefit the authors explore in a chapter titled “Baby Pensioners.”
On a more flamboyant note, there is the widely popular Beppe Grillo, the satirically clownish Italian comedian. His blog on corruption in Italian life and politics (beppegrillo.it) has been ranked among the 10 most visited blogs in the world according to Technorati and as the most read blog in Europe.
In September 2007, Grillo used his blog to organize a hugely successful national rally against corruption, which he called V-Day. This April 25, the anniversary of the liberation of Italy from the Nazis, he conducted a national V-Day2 rally aimed at lampooning the intermingling of the Italian press with corporate and political interests.
Writing on his blog, Grillo’s battle cry was “The control of information is the new fascism: Italy must be liberated once more. It is a former democracy. How else can you call a country in which information is in the hands of the power groups? In which Silvio Berlusconi is president thanks to the control of three TV channels and the Mondadori group … And the powers that be only survive thanks to their control over the media. The banks, Confindustria, Mediaset and the Parties make use of television and newspapers in order to spread propaganda, and they appoint newspaper editors as if they were part of the Public Relations Department.”
He also called for an end to the Board of Directors of RAI, Italy’s public television system, being political appointees.
Grillo is soliciting signatures for a referendum to abolish the Order of Journalists. Created by Mussolini in 1925, it requires journalists to be licensed, limiting access to the journalistic profession. In 1963 it became the Professional Order of Journalists with its own admissions requirements, guidelines for proper conduct and pensions.
A second referendum calls for an end to the one billion Euro per year of public funding for the press: “We have certain journalists amongst us who take their orders from the political parties, who don’t have much regard for the truth or, for that matter, for the reader,” Grillo said.
These subsidies result not only in repression but indifference about pleasing readers. “They don’t sell newspapers; they simply print them,” Grillo said. He cites the daily newspaper Europe, which sells fewer than 5,000 copies a day, yet prints 30,000 in order to receive a 3-million-Euro-per-year government subsidy.
Grillo is using new media to fight the old. He collects signatures for his referendums at 500 public squares in Italy and conducts virtual demonstrations where people send in electronic likenesses of themselves to add to a virtual march.
Whether the public outcry can break through the stranglehold of privilege and intermingled interests is unclear. In July, an Economist article titled “Berlusconi Fiddles, Italy Burns” summed up his first 10 weeks in office, noting that the man notorious in the past for tailoring judicial reform measures to shield himself from his own legal and business woes is up to his old tricks, quashing hopes that this time would be different.
The Economist notes that Berlusconi’s focus on his legal woes is taking badly needed attention away from a stagnating economy, rising inflation and low consumption.
In an Aug. 4 post on his blog, Grillo felt a need to stoke the morale of his followers. “Many people have written to me to say the signatures have been no use. That [the elites] will do what they want to anyway. The signatures are useful to count us. … They have not beaten us, and they never will.”