The imminent departure of Angela Merkel from the Chancellery leads to promising prospects in Italy: Immediately after the federal election, former Prime Minister Matteo Renzi declared Mario Draghi to be the leader of Europe “because of this climate of German insecurity and instability”. For the time being together with French President Emmanuel Macron. However, if it is not re-elected in the coming year, everything in the EU should finally go as many Italians imagine: no return to the monetary union's stability pact, instead the budget deficit and national debt will continue, but even with guarantees from the central bank and partner countries. Other European spending programs, financed by all members, are also desired. The first development fund "Next Generation EU" arouses desires,after all, Italy has the lion's share.
The appreciation that the Prime Minister, who has been in office since February, is justified. Draghi was a PhD student with Nobel Prize winners, an economics professor, IMF board of directors, privatizer with record proceeds, national central bank governor and president of the European Central Bank. With his experience, he enjoys a great reputation in the EU. That this is why future decisions in Europe will go the way a majority of Italians would like them to be, could prove to be an illusion. After all, Draghi has little time to grow into the leadership role, as Angela Merkel has been able to do over the course of many years.
By 2023 at the latest, 25 months after taking office, the 69th post-war government will have expired.
So far there is nothing to prevent the representatives of the parties from continuing with their tactic of using the state treasury to finance short-term election gifts for their clientele.
So far, the Italians have been given the illusion that more economic growth can be achieved with a higher budget deficit.
Draghi will stay at the top for a maximum of 25 months
A fallacy, meanwhile, could be the idea that Mario Draghi will resolve all the imbalances and problems in the country within a few months without any real readiness for reform in Italy or among its politicians. Draghi has tackled the important problems, above all the slow judiciary, the Byzantine tax system with many advantages for individual groups and the overcomplicated administration with many intricate procedures. Even a Draghi, however, can only take the first steps towards a turnaround, because overall there is no willingness to change.
At the moment, however, many representatives of Draghi's coalition parties are behaving as if the prime minister's reform program was none of their business. They prefer to position themselves apart from the reforms propagated by Draghi with daily political banter and personal profiling.
Italy has huge potential for economic development: first and foremost, a luxury and premium image that is the envy of many other countries in the world.
Fashion, design, food and holidays have been marketed with it for decades.
However, it is pointless to believe that one can survive in the market with the past and the name of Italy alone.
This perhaps explains why the island of Sicily with its five million inhabitants and seven entries in the UNESCO World Heritage Site remains at the level of the small island state of Malta in terms of overnight stays.
A dynamic entrepreneurial culture
Compared to Germany, Italy has produced a far more dynamic entrepreneurial culture in the past few decades.
Without personalities who are still asserting themselves on the world market, the country would be far worse off.
But in your own country you don't listen to those who demand that Italy's competitiveness in the global market be made the most important benchmark.
The last heyday of the Italian economy was that before global competition, the era of the European single market in the 1990s.
Since then, productivity and wages have stagnated.
The unions, which have still not quite said goodbye to their class struggle past, prefer to fight for the preservation of obsolete factories from the 1970s and 1980s rather than for more attractiveness for new investors.
Italy would not only have the chance for more growth.
The country could also bring more dynamism to all of Europe.
Without the will and willingness to change and with continued strong forces of persistence against change, the most appropriate image for the description of the country remains the leopard skin with light and dark spots.
Unfortunately, even today many people believe that Germany is to blame for Italy's weak growth and that Europe must change so that as little change as possible is necessary in Italy.