Silvio's Second Round

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Nobody can say the voters weren't told all about Silvio Berlusconi. Major European newspapers and magazines detailed the corruption investigations that have stalked the billionaire-turned-politician for much of the past decade. Editorials highlighted the potential conflict of interest stemming from Berlusconi's control of much of Italy's TV programming. Prominent politicians across Europe wondered aloud how they could deal with a government that included the openly xenophobic and post-fascist parties allied to Berlusconi's center-right coalition. In the end, Italians went to the polls and elected him anyway.

What's more, they made Berlusconi's Forza Italia the nation's most powerful political party, with nearly 30% of the vote, and gave so-called Il Cavaliere a big enough majority to have a shot at staying in power for a full five-year term — something no Italian prime minister has accomplished since Mussolini. Turning out in large numbers, the voters themselves did what years of bickering about the election law had failed to do: weed out the small parties that have traditionally wielded undue power and concentrate support on the two main blocs.

In a solemn speech to the nation, Berlusconi promised to work for "all the Italians, even those who voted against me." Waving the one-page "contract with Italians" that he had histrionically signed before TV cameras days before the polling, he repeated his vow to withdraw from politics if he failed to accomplish at least four of its five promises — tax cuts, higher pensions, 1.5 million new jobs, major public works and a reduction in serious crimes. Despite Berlusconi's toothy assurances, big questions remained about his conflicts of interest, the composition of his future government and the policies he would pursue once he takes office next month.

None of those questions got clear answers last week. Through his $12 billion Fininvest holding company, Berlusconi currently owns Italy's three major private TV networks. As Prime Minister, he will also have indirect control over the three state-owned channels — putting 90% of the TV viewing public in his hands. He has promised to propose solutions to this conflict of interest during his first 100 days.

That's not good enough for Berlusconi's critics. In his new role as opposition leader, Francesco Rutelli, defeated center-left candidate, demanded that Berlusconi resolve the situation before hosting July's G8 summit of industrial nations in Genoa. Said Rutelli: "He cannot represent us in front of the most important international summit in the world with a problem this big — as big as a house — still unresolved."

The issue that most concerned Italy's E.U. partners, however, was the possibility that far-right elements might find their way into the new government. Gianfranco Fini, whose post-fascist National Alliance took 12% of the vote, was immediately promised a deputy prime minister's post. But Fini is now a moderate conservative who has severed ties with the party's pro-Mussolini roots. The neighbors' real worry during the campaign was Umberto Bossi, acid-tongued leader of the anti-immigrant Northern League, who has called the E.U. the "Soviet Union of the West" and once branded Brussels bureaucrats "Nazi pedophiles." Though Bossi had toppled Berlusconi's last government by withdrawing his support in 1994, he again joined Il Cavaliere's center-right electoral coalition and was said to be slated for a prominent cabinet post. That prospect prompted some European officials to consider hitting Italy with the same kind of E.U. sanctions that were clamped on Austria after Jörg Haider's far-right party joined the government in February 2000.

But Bossi's party got only 3.9% of the vote, meaning Berlusconi could govern without his parliamentary support this time. Denouncing the "atrocious price" his party paid for joining forces with Berlusconi, Bossi demanded that the League receive compensation in the form of a cabinet job or the presidency of the Chamber of Deputies. Berlusconi will probably placate the northern party with some secondary post, but he will no longer be forced to move quickly on Bossi's key demand for a devolution of administrative powers to the regions.

The humbling of Bossi prompted audible exhalations of relief across Europe, but the center-left parties and governments that currently dominate the E.U. remained on their guard. France's Socialist Foreign Minister Hubert Védrine warned that his government would be "attentive and, if necessary, vigilant" toward the new Italian administration, while Prime Minister Lionel Jospin pointedly refrained from making any declaration at all. German Chancellor Gerhard Schröder, a Social Democrat, issued a notably cool statement, saying his government "took note" of the Italian results and "respected the decision" of the voters. Britain's center-left Prime Minister Tony Blair was a better sport, phoning his congratulations to Berlusconi Monday night.

Predictably, Europe's conservative parties hailed Berlusconi's election as a victory for their camp and a boost to center-right governments, now outnumbered 12-3 in the E.U. French President Jacques Chirac treated Berlusconi to an effusive 20-minute phone call, while Chirac's Rally for the Republic Party cheered his "unequivocal victory" as "a powerful aspiration for change" and "an alternative to socialist immobility." Thomas Goppel, general secretary of Germany's opposition Christian Social Union, said the Italian vote was "ringing in the end of the governmental power of the left camp in Europe." Spanish Prime Minister José María Aznar, a longtime personal friend and political ally of Berlusconi, predicted that the "closeness" between them would make Spanish-Italian "bilateral relations grow even stronger." No European rightist took greater personal satisfaction than Haider, who remarked that "the E.U. burned its fingers with Austria and doesn't want that to happen again with Italy."

Indeed, no one wanted a rerun of the Austrian diplomatic sanctions, which divided the E.U. and were dropped after only eight months. "Everyone is reading into Berlusconi's election what they want to read into it," says Dominique Moïsi, deputy director of the French Institute of International Relations in Paris. "Conservatives are pleased to see the right back in power, the left is happy over Bossi's defeat and the avoidance of an Austria-style scenario. Yet everybody also realizes that Italy is a special case — that Berlusconi is unique, in a uniquely Italian situation."

Unique, but not isolated. Though domestic issues dominated the campaign, Berlusconi's victory has implications both for the E.U. and for NATO, where his strongly pro-U.S. position could weaken support for an autonomous European defense pillar. Within the E.U., Berlusconi could form a conservative bloc with Aznar, who shares his resistance to rapid enlargement of membership; he is already demanding a bigger Italian say on European farm policy. Berlusconi's promises to cut taxes, raise pensions and fund big public works projects seem at odds with the fiscal rigor required of euro-zone countries. Despite the potential for friction, the watchword within the E.U. is wait and see. "The trouble is we just don't know what Berlusconi thinks of Europe," says a French diplomat. "Europe has been a non-debate in Italy for the past 20 years."

The former cruise-ship crooner will soon have plenty of chances to perform on the international stage. After opening at next month's nato summit in Brussels, he will warm up at the E.U summit in Göteborg, then step into the spotlight as host of July's G8 meeting in Genoa. Whatever happens, Il Cavaliere is unlikely to make as big a spectacle as he did when Italy hosted a U.N. conference on organized crime in Naples in 1994: with the world's most powerful leaders looking on, Berlusconi was served with papers putting him under formal investigation for charges of bribing tax inspectors. (His conviction was overturned on appeal last year.) With that kind of debut, Berlusconi's act can only get better.