I had a special bond with Sergio Pininfarina. Working alongside her during the years of presidency of Confindustria it was exciting, tiring, sometimes stressful, but full of lessons on what it means to assume the responsibilities of being a ruling class in a country perpetually poised between being in Europe and the temptation to get closer to the African shore.
Pininfarina was a Piedmontese with all the strengths and weaknesses of the old-style Piedmontese. He had a high sense of the state, he knew what the entrepreneur's obligations were towards his company and the community in which he lived. He loved a job well done, but he was also fussy and precise as true Piedmontese are. He was proud of having been able to continue the work of his father who had founded the Farina body shop by combining craftsmanship with the culture of design forms. Under his leadership, the factory had grown and established itself around the world. His name, changed to Pinin-Farina in honor of the founder, had become synonymous with Italian beauty and style. He was proud of the Ferraris to whose success his bodywork had made a significant contribution.
But it had always been too a public man, dedicating himself to representing the interests not only of entrepreneurs but also of the community to which he belonged. Repeatedly president of the Union of Industrialists of Turin and then European deputy, in 1988 he was called to preside over Confindustria after the four-year term of Luigi Lucchini who had marked the comeback of Italian industry after the critical period of the seventies characterized by high inflation and from loss of competitiveness on international markets. Pininfarina found itself facing serious problems due to the growing expansion of the state machine and the parallel loss of efficiency of the public sector which was reluctant to any reform capable of introducing market elements even in sectors protected from any competition. In the background we began to glimpse the spread of the phenomenon of corruption which in fact soon led to the explosion of Tangentopoli.
Many times Confindustria was forced to remind the political system of the time to take note of the need for profound reforms. But Andreotti, who was Prime Minister, proved to be blind and deaf in the face of the black clouds that were gathering on our horizon. The famous phrase "better to live than kick the bucket" and the clash in a conference of young industrialists in Capri when faced with criticism, Andreotti lost his patience and invited entrepreneurs to go and get their vows to be able to do everything they said was essential to save the country. The consequence of the accumulation of imbalances which they did not want to deal with was then the devaluation of the lira and the drastic austerity measures imposed by the Amato Government in 1993. On the political level, the DC lost the elections which saw for the first time the great affirmation of the Northern League phenomenon in Northern Italy.
On the union front, things were no easier. But Pininfarina, after a long tug of war managed at the end of 1991 to block the escalator thus paving the way for its definitive cancellation which took place with Ciampi almost two years later.
Confindustria was strong then. Private industrial enterprises, albeit a little sickly, accounted for a sizable chunk of our economy. The public ones were struggling in a deep crisis which led within a few years to their privatization and the disappearance of IRI. Above all, Confindustria could claim its diversity with respect to a political management that appeared to be seriously late in promoting the country's modernization process. Despite the many contradictions that also existed in the private sector, Confindustria was able to express a line of firm support for the opening of markets, for increased competition not only in manufacturing but also in the service sector. At the time work was underway in Europe for the single market and Pininfarina, who was well aware of the Brussels mechanisms, exerted all its influence to carry forward as far as possible the opening of borders and the abolition of the many tariff and regulatory obstacles to the free circulation of goods and people.
But the diversity wasn't just in words. It was also practiced. Confindustria fulfilled the commitment undertaken in 1975 by Agnelli as president of the Industrialists' Association, to make Il Sole 24 Ore not an organ of the association but a large free newspaper, which could represent the entire Italian economy and above all be the watchdog of the market against all those, including industrialists, who operated in an attempt to limit competition. The same philosophy inspired the support given to Luiss, a University made available to the country with the aim not of indoctrinating young people to the Confindustria verb, but with the aim of training the future public and private ruling class according to the dictates of the most modern trends cultural.
Twenty years later, it can be said that Pininfarina's dream of creating a more modern country, capable of exploiting great individual energies through meritocracy, with a leaner, but more efficient and also more severe state against those who violate rules, did not materialize. We still find ourselves battling our old vices of an expensive and inefficient public sector. But those battles testified that a different destiny for our country is possible and that it would certainly be better than the one that we have continued to build for ourselves out of foolishness and cynical cunning. And to finally change course, which is still possible, we must not forget the teaching that Sergio Pininfarina bequeathed us.
