In the Middle Ages, when factional struggles became so intense as to jeopardize the state’s very survival, Italian cities resorted to an original form of government: a podesta. Uninvolved in the city’s quarrels and vested with full powers, this independent magistrate was appointed by consensus for a limited time (six months to a year). Once the necessary reforms had been decided, affairs put back in order and harmony more or less restored, the podesta was dismissed – often unceremoniously– and a regenerated society could return to its old quarrels until the next crisis.

The Italian state has relied on similar configurations on several occasions since the early 1990s when its stability and international image were at risk. It responded in much the same way, entrusting power to technocratic governments. Could this atypical model of crisis resolution be imported to France, at a time when many fear that the second round of the legislative elections will result in the absence of a clear majority, or even institutional deadlock? Nothing could be less certain.

The first time such a configuration arose, in April 1993, Italian president Oscar Luigi Scalfaro entrusted the reins of power to the governor of the Bank of Italy, Carlo Azeglio Ciampi (1920-2016). Faced with the endless turmoil of the “Tangentopoli” scandal (Operation “Clean Hands”), which had swept aside an entire ruling class stemming from Christian Democracy and the Socialist Party, Italy was rudderless: the country had to be guided to new elections, scheduled for March 1994. Less than a year later, in January 1995, the country was stuck after the first Berlusconi government self-destructed. This time, another Bank of Italy executive, director general Lamberto Dini, was called in. For 16 months, Dini, heading a government made up entirely of technicians, steered the country, preventing public finances from spiraling out of control until a new general election, during which the center-left came to power.

The broadest possible support

15 years later, in November 2011, it was under equally dramatic circumstances that President Giorgio Napolitano (1925-2023) called on economist and former European Commissioner Mario Monti to save the country from bankruptcy. Discredited in Brussels, Berlusconi’s government could no longer ensure the country’s financial stability as it faced the tremors of the eurozone crisis. The country’s “spread” with Germany was soaring, and Italian companies were no longer able to borrow on the markets… Restoring investor confidence and taking the necessary measures to do so had become an urgent matter. This is what Monti was able to achieve, with the help of a government of technicians, until the 2013 parliamentary elections. The storm calmed down after a difficult first few months but the austerity regime imposed on the country was drastic: Italy only emerged from recession in 2014.

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