Opinion The last emperor

As we now know,thanks to his current trial on charges of paying for sex with a minor,he regularly assembles veritable harems of young women for bacchanals with a dress code that could be described as whimsical. He calls them “bunga bunga” parties,which has no particular translation and no need of one. The allegations grabbing headlines last week were that Berlusconi,in moments of pulchritudinous piety,was treated to lap dances from women attired as nuns. This followed claims that he received ministrations from women outfitted as nurses. And it’s said that Italy is a chauvinistic society! For Berlusconi,no profession is beyond a woman’s pantomime.

We find great entertainment in all of this because it’s lurid,yes,but also because it’s reassuring. Our own political madness pales in comparison. But we shouldn’t just gape and laugh. His country’s path from glorious to ridiculous,paved in part by his carnal and legal distractions,threatens the financial stability of Europe,and benefits no one. Beyond that,Italy presents a cautionary tale for many immodestly privileged Western democracies that have been lulled by comfort into complacency; have let too much silliness create too much damage; and haven’t held leaders to adequate account.

Money is Berlusconi’s lance,his armour,his steed,his everything. A billionaire many times over,he uses it to engender loyalty,and his business empire reaches deep into the image-burnishing and opinion-manipulating realms of television,journalism and publishing. At the end of a long interview years ago,he asked me if a recent book of mine had been distributed in Italy. It hadn’t.

“Would you like it to be?” he said. Italians have seen their country’s economy stagnate and debt rise over the last decade. And Berlusconi,in power for much of the last 17 years,has made minimal progress on necessary tax,regulatory and entitlement reforms. So how does he last? I was told that Italians have been too slow to take a hard enough look at his shenanigans,and allowed him to entrench himself. The opposition,meantime,hasn’t mustered the maturity to move past its fractiousness and make him go away.

In a country with such treasure and beauty,maybe hardship is dulled and the situation hasn’t become quite bad enough. I asked Mario Calabresi,a celebrated Italian journalist,why young Italians,whose unemployment rate is estimated to be about 27 per cent,weren’t protesting on the scale of the “indignados,” or indignant,who crowd public squares in Spain. He said it was partly because their parents remain affluent enough to supply them with money for clothes,clubs and beach vacations,at least for now. “You’re indignado,but not so indignado that you’d rather go to the square than to the restaurant,” he said as we sipped espresso on a cobbled piazza in Turin. Still,he hasn’t given up his belief that Italians will pull it together. Neither has the mayor of Florence,Matteo Renzi. “If Italians decide they really want to change 20 years of immobility,silence and political scandals,we have a future,” he said Monday in his Palazzo Vecchio office,walls and ceiling covered in magnificent frescoes. “It’s not easy to work here,” he added,“because you’re surrounded by the past. But I want to believe the most beautiful page in Florence’s history hasn’t been written.” I hope that’s true for all of Italy. Frank Bruni