MARK LILLA
Letter from
Italy
The
seven hundred year-old Siennese Palio had to be canceled last July,
for only the second time in living memory. The well-known (and now
well-touristed) horse race, which features bareback riders from rival quar–
ters of the old town dashing around the Campo, ordinarily takes place
just before dusk. But this year several riders refused to bring their horses
up to the starting line in their assigned order. Since these particular riders
knew they had little chance of winning, their strategy was instead
to
prevent their traditional neighborhood rival from taking away the ban–
ner. The pushing and jockeying continued for over an hour until straws
were drawn again, but the new lineup was no more successful in con–
vincing the obstructionists to join in. Finally, with the sun setting at half–
past nine, the nationally televised race was called off, to the deep embar–
rassment of city officials and the outrage of German visitors.
It
was even–
tually run the next evening, though not without new litigious jostling.
Italian politics and its intellectual debates will always remain a mys–
tery to those who do not grasp the Palio Principle. Whereas in the rest
of Western Europe political energy is usually spent on advancing partic–
ular partisan positions, usually in coalition with like-minded partners, al–
most all the political energy in Italy is spent on blocking the advance of
one's nearest rival, disregarding common aims. Many explanations of this
perverse strategy have been put forward by students of Italian politics: late
national unification, the historical dominance of the Church and occu–
pying powers, the backwardness of the South, the present system of pro–
portional representation, Machiavelli, the Mafia, even a mannerist pre–
deliction for chaos over order.
Each of these historical explanations is plausible enough, but none
really tells us why this medieval mentality persists in the midst of an oth–
erwise modern country. Having returned to Italy last summer after living
here four years ago, I was disturbed to see how deeply rooted the Palio
Principle remains, even in the face of the recent dramatic transformation
of world politics.
In
these four years we have witnessed the liberation of
Eastern Europe, the slow crumbling of the Soviet Union, the disappear–
ance of communism as an ideological question in world politics, the
gradual integration of Europe, and a successful war in the Middle East.
