"The Italian economy hasn't grown for twenty years and in Europe only Greece and San Marino are growing less than Italy, but unfortunately this government, born out of a political emergency, doesn't have a medium-sized strategy and vision and long term". Carlo Cottarelli, an economist with proven experience and former Executive Director of the Monetary Fund which at the beginning of this legislature the President of the Republic Sergio Mattarella charged with forming the Government which, however, did not find the numbers to give life to a majority, is not tender and does not it has no illusions about the state of our economy. But he hasn't lost hope of contributing, with his own ideas and with the studies of the Observatory on Italian public accounts that he directs at the Catholic University, to bring the country out of the tunnel. That's why he joined Base Italia, the network that former trade unionist Marco Bentivogli has just launched. "Base Italia's commitment - explains Cottarelli in this interview with FIRSTonline - is to explore and disseminate ideas on the underlying issues, not only economic, of our country with a medium-long vision" which is practically absent from the public debate and that knows how to offer a growth perspective especially to the new generations. Let's hear it.
Professor Cottarelli, what prompted you to join Base Italia launched by Marco Bentivogli?
"The conviction that it is a good thing to help deepen and disseminate ideas and proposals on essential and not just economic issues for Italy, which help the country to grow and improve".
In presenting Base Italia, Bentivogli said it will not be a new party or one of the usual think tanks. But then, concretely, what will it be?
«It will be a Center that will develop ideas on aspects often overlooked in public debate - for example the problems of the new generations and their future - and which do not concern so much the short or very short term, but are projected into the medium and long term. Having an idea of what Italy will be like in 10 or 20 years and gearing up to face the country's problems in a broader horizon, I believe that, especially in a phase like the one we are going through, can be very useful».
Does Base Italia already have a programmatic platform on the priorities that the country should adopt if it wants to build a better future?
“We're working on it, but it takes some time. Personally I plan to give my contribution both in the Scientific Committee and in the Steering Committee of the association, but we have just been born and we are in the first steps».
Is that of Base Italia also a first step in doing politics in a new way, that is, attentive above all to the contents and in a medium-long term logic?
"Any civil commitment like ours is to do politics, but without distorting our function".
Could the programmatic contents that you will elaborate create a favorable terrain for the convergence of reformist and pro-European forces of the center and the center-left such as +Europe, Action and Italia Viva?
«This is not the role and purpose for which Base Italia was born and for which I joined».
Professor, let's get down to the current situation. How do you judge the way the Government is dealing with the new Dpcm the health emergency and the second wave of infections?
“Unfortunately not well. In Italy, as in other countries, the arrival of the second wave has been underestimated. It happened above all in the summer, when, thanks to the holidays, we thought we had come out of the tunnel. But we were wrong and did not prepare. Blame the Government? Certainly, but not only. Whoever leads the country always bears the main responsibility, but unfortunately public opinion has also played his part ».
In reality, at least in Europe, no one has yet found the key to taming Covid.
“In fact, only in Asia, and in particular in China and South Korea, have they managed to counter the pandemic. Does the fact that, especially in China, this happened in a non-democratic regime matter? It is difficult to say whether this is the case or whether the successes in the fight against Covid were also the result of chance, because the epidemic does not have a linear course and one mistake is enough to undo everything ».
The fight against the health emergency is linked to that against the appalling economic recession that followed: what rating would you give to the government's economic strategy?
"I don't want to give ratings, just judgements. In reality, the government is an emergency coalition sitting together without a clear long-term strategy. An absolutely legitimate government and with a parliamentary majority, but without a horizon that goes beyond the emergency, even if the arrival of the Recovery Fund should lead it to take a broader view. It would be time to come to terms with the fact that Italy hasn't grown for twenty years and that in the International Monetary Fund ranking it is in 170th place out of 180 countries: in Europe only Greece and San Marino are growing less than Italy, and that says it all. It's a bleak result."
Governor Visco says that our economy will need at least two years to return to pre-Covid levels: is he right?
«Yes, that is the time horizon necessary to recover pre-Covid levels, which were already very unsatisfactory and which would require a much more aggressive economic policy. We should start from the mother of all reforms, that of the Public Administration, which must put the State in a position to provide good services and not hinder private activities with its traditional slowness and quibbles. But this should only be the first step."
What else would be needed?
«A long-term strategy that reforms the entire public education system, from kindergartens to universities, that really invests in research and that seriously reforms justice, erasing the paralyzing slowness that distinguishes it. The objectives must be clear: more growth and real equality of opportunity for all".
However, don't you think that to bring about the modernization of the Italian system you are talking about, it would be necessary to clear customs two words – meritocracy and competitiveness – which a part of the country considers blasphemy?
«Yes, meritocracy and competitiveness must be the compass for development, provided that they are intertwined with equality of opportunity. From this point of view, Base Italia can lend a hand with a very useful work of information and civil and democratic preaching on the key points of our future and above all that of the new generations".
Assuming and not granting that the political conditions exist, which are currently not seen, the constitution of a government of national unity it could be a solution to get us out of the tunnel?
"No I do not think so. A government of national unity would risk sinking into the vetoes and counter-vetoes of the forces that support it and ending up mired in immobilism in a phase in which clear ideas and the ability to implement them are needed instead».
