The final judgment on decree for the relaunch of the economy will have to wait for the text to be approved by Parliament, provided that the Government does not issue it immediately the question of trust. However, the positive judgment remains for having prepared, with new public debt, the expansion of liquidity for the immediate needs of support for households and businesses.
What is certain is that the first glance at the encyclopaedic text of the provision brings to mind what Amilcare Puviani wrote in 1903 (professor of finance science in the Italian university) in the text neglected in Italy (but translated into German in 1960) of the financial illusion theory: “And so the budget says as much or as little as you like. It remains an impenetrable sphinx to the broad masses of the Chamber, to those masses who vote for laws, who vote for expenditure, who vote for revenue. The true situation of the accounts is hidden in a recondite ciborium, which is penetrated by the eye of a small number of very expert men: almost always the great priests…, who dribble power and who are therefore also held in their disputes, to the greatest reserve” (pp. 92-93, ed. Isedi).
The second look at the encyclopaedic provision, a veritable coat hanger each ministry hung what it liked best at the moment, it makes us doubt whether even the "high priests" are able to penetrate its most hidden meanings for the drafting of the implementing regulations.
To satisfy the right demand to eliminate the constraints imposed by the pervasive bureaucracy; to contain the power of the "high priests"; to avoid that this translates into an absence of any programmatic action for the future of the governance of the economy; to remedy the documented lack of coordination between the various ministers, each of which has contributed to the proliferation of the most diverse committees of experts, Parliament could intervene today.
This should be the case, during the forthcoming examination of the decree, of some measures adopted by post-war governments for the reconstruction of the Italian economy of the time, the spirit of which is often recalled by many also for the future reconstruction of the Italian economy placed in serious recessionary crisis from the pandemic. It was the Government of Ferruccio Parri (DC, PCI, Psiup, Pli , PdA, PdL coalition) which, with Legislative Decree no. 12 of 1945 July 432, established the CIR-Interministerial Committee for Reconstruction with the fundamental task (art.3) of coordinating the of the economic ministries and approve multi-year plans for the coordination of public interventions for the development of the economy and in particular that of the south.
The CIR was kept alive by successive DC-led governments, until 1967 when was absorbed by the Cipe – Interministerial committee for economic planning – which in turn was weakened in the DIPE in 2006.
In summary, to prevent uncertainty of the future from remaining coat hanger politics, and the consequent powers of the "high priests", it is necessary to rethink an active role of public intervention in the economy, with particular regard to industrial policy of which memory has been lost in deference to the presumed suitability of the market alone to guide entrepreneurial choices. To this end, the Interministerial Committee for the post-pandemic economic reconstruction can be the most appropriate institutional tool to replace the cacophony of the most disparate committees that still assist the fragmented government action of the economy.
