A step too far

It is as if,in the past 18 months,Italys public life had described a huge,futile circle. In May 2009 the country was agog at the revelation of a mysterious friendship between its septuagenarian prime minister,Silvio Berlusconi,and a blonde,18-year-old would-be actress. A year and a half later,attention centres on Mr Berlusconis links to another 18-year-old,a raven-haired daughter of Moroccan immigrants.Karima el-Mahroug,which seems to be her real name she prefers Ruby Rubacuori,or Ruby Heartstealer,first sashayed on to the political stage on October 26,when it was reported that she had been questioned by prosecutors in Milan investigating allegations of procuring girls for prostitution that were surrounding three people close to Mr Berlusconi. Ms el-Mahroug was said to have told the prosecutors about parties at the prime ministers villa,near Milan,involving numerous women. One allegedly ended in an erotic game known as Bunga,Bunga. Ms el-Mahroug,a runaway who worked as a belly dancer,has since said Italys billionaire leader gave her,unsolicited,7,000 euros 9,800 after she had told him her hard-luck story.The affair is about more than just innuendo and the damage Mr Berlusconi is doing to Italys image. Last May,police in Milan detained Ms el-Mahroug on suspicion of theft,but then let her go even though she was a minor who would normally have been put in care. The commander has said the station took a call from Mr Berlusconis office,and the prime minister has admitted sending an associate to take charge of Ms el-Mahroug. But on November 2 Milans chief prosecutor ruled that the police had followed the correct procedures.Mr Berlusconis response so far has added credence to the worst assumptions about him,saying that what happened at his home was his business,that he had no intention of changing his way of life and that,anyway,it was better to be passionate about pretty girls than to be gay a remark that appalled liberal critics,but probably went down well with core Berlusconi voters who might otherwise be tempted by the even more reactionary appeal of the Northern League,Mr Berlusconis coalition partner.Brazenness got the prime minister through the last bout of sex scandals in 2009. Will it work this time? Last years controversies battered an otherwise strong government. Mr Berlusconi had cleared Naples of the garbage mountains that helped topple the previous,centre-left government. He had successfully fused his own party with that of the formerly neo-fascist Gianfranco Fini to create a single movement of the right,the People of Freedom PdL. Italys banks had survived the credit crisis almost unscathed,and many voters still believed the governments claim that the economy as a whole had fared better than any in Europe. Its popularity ratings were high.Things look different today. One recent poll put the PdL just 2.5 percentage points ahead of the biggest opposition group,the Democratic Party. PdL supporters have been drifting away from the party since May when the government performed an abrupt U-turn,declaring that a package of painful adjustment measures was needed to prevent Italy going the way of Greece. Paralysis has spread through the administration as it has been repeatedly distracted by financial scandals involving Mr Berlusconis ministers and officials,and by his attempts to provide himself with immunity from justice. Last month Corriere della Sera,a newspaper,calculated that,excluding routine legislation,parliament had approved only 10 new measures this year. Consob,the body that regulates the stock exchange,has been waiting for the government to give it a new president for more than four months. Ominously,the Naples garbage is piling up again.Mr Berlusconis critics have reacted to the latest scandal with a fury that was not detectable last year. More importantly,his supporters are notably less keen to defend him. Mr Berlusconis equal-opportunities minister,Mara Carfagna,whose own relationship with Mr Berlusconi has long been the subject of gossip,dissociated herself from his remark about gays. The same day,two deputies renounced the PdL whip.There is a widespread view in Italy that the scandal marks the start of an endgame. But it could be a long and complex one,since the politician with the means to checkmate Mr Berlusconi is the very one with least to gain from doing so. Last July Mr Fini led a rebellion that saw his followers in parliament detach themselves from the PdL,robbing Mr Berlusconi of his majority in the lower house. They are setting up a new party. But it is not yet ready to fight an election,and Mr Fini knows that if he brings down the government he could be depicted by the prime minister as having betrayed the right and destabilised the country at a time when Italy,and the euro zone in general,needs a steady hand.If Mr Fini and his followers opt to back the government in parliament until they are ready to kill it off,will Mr Berlusconi let them have the best of both worlds? Instead he could resign,arguing that his former ally had made his position untenable. That would allow him to go to the country in the role he likes best that of victim. But there are risks to this course of action. Rather than dissolve parliament and call an election,President Giorgio Napolitano could decide to install a transitional,cross-party government. Even if the president did plump for an election,the polls suggest Mr Berlusconi would free himself of Mr Fini only to become a prisoner of the Northern Leagues leader,Umberto Bossi. Until the deadlock is resolved,Italy will remain a country adrift,its government unable to formulate the policies it needs most urgently,a strategy for boosting economic competitiveness. Last month Emma Marcegaglia,the head of the employers federation,Confindustria,argued that Italy could not allow itself a new election. But nor can it permit itself a government that no longer governs.

The EconomistNewspaper Limited 2010