PERSPECTIVErnA League of Our Ownrnby Thomas FlemingrnNineteen ninety-two was an opportunity for Americansrnto reflect on botfi their past and their future. In lessrnthan a month, we celebrated the birthday of Columbus andrnthe transfer of power from the New Deal to the Big Chill,rnfrom the civics-class pieties of George Bush to the Penthousernimproprieties of Bill Clinton.rnI watched a good part of the campaign from an Italian vantage-rnpoint. I went to Italy primarily to speak about Columbusrnand the American tradition and to continue my very limitedrneducation in things Italian. At the end of the month, I wasrnmore confused than ever about Italian politics, but—as isrnalways the case—I had learned something about my ownrncountry.rnA year or so ago, a part-Italian friend took me to task for sayingrnthat Italy was in crisis. Without admitting I was rightrnthen, he now acknowledges the real sense of emergenc)’ thatrnexists everywhere in Italy. At the end of the summer, thernmiddle classes were practically up in arms against the government’srnhandling of economic questions. Faced with mountingrndebt, the government ordered property-owners to pay a secondrnround of real-estate taxes. All over Italv, people lined up to payrnthe impost and avoid the threatened penalties, only to discoverrnthat no one knew how much was owed, and, besides, therngovernment had not printed up the tax forms.rnThe government wanted the extra money, in part, to pursuernits futile plan to stabilize the lira on world markets. Afterrnhearing, day after day, that the lira would never be devalued,rnbusinessmen woke up one morning to read of the devaluation.rnEven opponents of the policy were outraged, and onernbusinessman told me that the regime had forfeited any claimrnto be taken seriously.rnThe Italian economy is in ruins; none of the major partiesrninspires confidence even in loyal members; the Mafia is murderingrnevery judge and prosecutor who stand in its way. In thernmidst of this crisis, the labor unions—pampered and coddledrnby the government—are once again threatening strikes thatrnwill shut down the entire country, just like in the good oldrndays of the 1970’s. I got up eariy one morning in Genoa torncatch the train to Milan, and when I asked the desk clerk torncall me a cab, she gave me a crude version of Hotspur’s responsernto Owen Glendower’s boast that he could summonrnspirits: “But will they come when you do call for them?”rnSomewhere in the monologue I picked out the most dreadedrnword in Italian vocabular’: sciopero (strike).rnThe unions have a right to be unhappy. After squanderingrnvast sums of money on monetary stabilization, the governmentrndecided to balance the budget by cutting health benefits.rnThe unions—part of the party-state that governs therncountry—went along, but when the most powerful unionrnleader in Italy attempted to hold a rally, he was attacked byrnunion members who have joined the Lega Nord, a coalition ofrnlocalist movements in Northern Italv that preaches a doctrinernof economic liberty and political decentralization.rnThe Lega has increased its share of the vote in every recentrnelection and is now the dominant party in the rich industrialrnNorth. In response to the double taxation, Lega’srnleaders called for a tax protest; their answer to governmentcontrolledrnunions is to form their own unions; and their solutionrn—onh’ half in jest—to the collapse of the lira is to coinrntheir own monc), the Lega.rnThe ruling coalition is terrified. Opinion polls in Monzarnand Varese, two wealthy cities in Lombardia, gave the Lega 55rnpercent or better in the next mayoral elections—high figuresrnin a country with dozens of parties. The government respondedrnto these polls by postponing the elections. UmbertornBossi’s threat, reported in the Corriera della sera last September,rncould not have been plainer: “If the government will notrnrexerse its decisions, a march on Rome could start from Milanrnto ask for the North’s secession.”rnBossi’s hand was strengthened by a recent victory in Mantova,rna city outside the center of the Lega’s strength. For thernfirst time in years the Socialists openly campaigned togetherrnwith the former Communist Party leader, Achillc Ochctto,rnin a popular front with the Greens for the sole purpose of defeatingrnthe Lega, but when the votes were counted the LegarnNord polled 34 percent, roughly double what the second-placern12/CHRONICLESrnrnrn