Hammer and Tongues

Just to refresh your memory about how censure works in Italy, take another look at the Corriere della Sera article of 19 February last entitled POLITICS and TV – a strange PAR CONDICIO by GIOVANNI SARTORI (pending permission to publish)

Sartori writes. “Basically, I have never been really persuaded that the par condicio a good thing for TV. Not because it is antidemocratic (this is the theory of His TVship (Sua Emittenza, a play on words of Sua Eminenza “HIs Eminince”, quite untranslatable n.d.t.), but because I don't really think that it really provides a balanced vision of politics. We have know since Aristotle that there are two types of equality (or parity): arithmetical equality (everyone gets the same amount, for example shoes of the same size,), or proportional equality (equal things to equals, unequal things to unequals); for example higher taxes for the rich, lower taxes for the less wealthy. I believe that the TV should apply the latter.
And this is why the principle «equal talk time for all» is counterproductive, encourages exhibitionism on TV and the proliferation of mini-parties. Which is the last thing we need.
So why have I defended par condicio in the past? Not because I like it but through force of circumstance. We are probably the only democracy in the world in which almost all private TV stations are monopolised by a sole owner. When the left wing was in power, they didn't have the will to break this monopoly (though they would have had the votes). All they managed to come up with,  to counteract the force of the monopoly before elections, was the par condicio. Then Berlusconi won the 2001 elections and so the situation became even more ghastly. The colonisation and control by Berlusconi of State TV was added to the monopolistic control of Mediaset . Which allowed “His TVship” not only to turn par condicio into a farce (too weak a barrier to hold out against his unscrupulousness), but to transform it, thanks to his praetorians in the Rai, into a generalised silencer, a gag on anyone at all who opposed him and was not at his behest.
I will quote, as an example, a case which concerns me directly and which I can chronicle without fear of contradiction. Last Sunday I took part in the Fabio Fazio's programme on Rai 3. I was told that the programme was watched by 5 million viewers, and perhaps this is what made the Palazzo (Chigi ndt) so nervous. As it was, a certain Prof. Petroni, who represents Forza Italia on the RAI Board of Directors, got upset with Fazio and with me too, judging my presence to be an extremely serious violation of par condicio. What would this violation consist of, pray? This: that I had been invited “without the opposite party” to talk about a “recent book of mine which notoriously deals with in a particularly critical and partial manner the reform of the Constitution ».
After which, the above-mentioned Prof. Petroni underlines, in a second letter on the 14 February to the Director General of the RAI, the «highly political-electoral content» of this book.
The incontrovertible fact remains that in the programme in question, the content of my book was not discussed, or at least, only very brief reference was made to it. So the accusation against Fazio had no foundation; the misdemeanour had not been committed. Now Prof. Petroni denies (so I read in the Corriere on Friday February 17th) having asked for an «action» to be taken against me. Clearly this would have been impossible for the dreadful misdeed of the 12 February: thank God I do not work for the RAI.
But it is equally clear that, in future, such action will be possible. The scandal of Petroni's argumentation is that the par condicio does not only apply to what one says on TV, but also to what a scholar writes in a book  (see the second letter cited above). I will not bother to repeat that my last essay in that book, in «Mala Costituzione», dates back to the 22 October 2005, or that my criticism of our various plans to reform the constitution also date back to 1995,  and therefore that no part of my text was written with the present elections in mind. The scandalous point is with the pretext of par condicio, censure, the silencer, is extended to books and therefore to intellectual activity as a whole.
Prof. Petroni should not take me for an idiot. I can read between the lines, and what I read is that by using my case, he is warning the Rai that I should no longer appear (I imagine for ever, should Berlusconi win again) on TV. If the intimidation and the ostracism were directed against me alone, it wouldn't be so bad. But it is obvious that the message is for all academics (as long as they are not on the «right side»).
To put it in a nutshell, don Rodrigo (the baddie in “Promessi Sposi n.d.t.) and his «bravoes» (henchmen n.d.t.) want an election without any possible ascertainment of the truth, without any scrutiny by experts. As a «bravo» Prof. Petroni is really «bravo»”

PS Professor Sartori is not a left-wing extremist but a member of the liberal establishment with an honoured academic career.
PPS Prof Petroni wears  many hats and one of them is his membership of the Scientific Committee of “Società Libera” whose board of directors also includes Giovanni Sartori himself (and Fabio Roversi Monaco). I bet they have some interesting meetings.

Monday 13 November 2006 from Punto Informatico (this article is published by kind permission of Punto Informatico)

Radio Radicale: Creative Commons must be respected

A long series of events has brought the webcasts of meetings of an Italian political party leaders, broadcast with CC, into the limelight. The media giants seem to ignore Creative Commons and certain bloggers make fun of it

Rome:Transparency doesn't pay. Or at least not all the time. This is what Italian Radical Party leaders must have thought when a political mountain was made out of a molehill, both on and off the Web,  concerning the delivery via Internet of audio and video broadcasts of meetings of the party leaders. At the heart of the case is the question of transparency, and the use of Creative Commons  licenses, blogs, loyalty and freedom of expression.

The facts: during the last meeting of party leaders at the end of October,  was “>broadcast, like all other Radio radicale events, well-known leaders of that party (Marco Pannella, Emma Bonino e Daniele Capezzone) blew theri gaskets, apparently uninterested in the fact that certain statements and wisecracks would be  seen by many, many people. And lo and behold, just a few hours after the publication online of the event, it was already being discussed on the RR site  FaiNotizia, after which the whole story ends up in Il Giornale.

Pannella doesn't think much of this article and makes a statement  by speedy return of post with some sarcastic comments on the so-called “scoop” of the  Giornale. He points out that transparency about political activity has always been a characteristic of the Radical party and that the presence online of party leaders is absolutely nothing new. But a few hours later, the Corriere.it takes up the story again on its own home page, linking directly to the “episode” of the political summit, as a result of which, as Radio Radicale has told Punto Informatico, the site is taken down for a few hours, as it can't deal with the huge number of visits.

But that's not the end of it. In the meantime, an Italian blogger, Daw, uses the same materials to produce a fairly amusing satirical video which he publishes on YouTube, a video which immediately hits the headlines in both the Repubblica and the  Giornale and even ends up on TV in Studio Aperto's news bulletin (Italia1).

At this point,  according to Daw, Diego Galli, a director at Radio Radicale, writes to Daw asking him to publish the source of the materials, together with his video, thus respecting the Creative Commons agreement. On the one hand the Radio wants CC license to be respected and on the other hand they fear that the lack of citation of the source means that whoever wants to know more will not be able to see the original video online. A day later Daw publishes the source of the content he uses,  but Radio Radicale is not happy with just a link to Radio Radicale's site and would like the link to the original video to be used. So they to send a letter to the blogger from its lawyer, cautioning him to publish a lengthier declaration on CC, including the direct link. Then  Daw, as you can read on his site decides to remove the video and accuses  Radio Radicale of censure

This is a pretty serious accusation, because it involves a political party traditionally associated with the fight against censure. This news begins to circulate, with frequently unpleasant comments  on the behaviour of RR and expressions of solidarity with Daw.

Will this commitment to take legal action against the blogger no further be enough to  calm everyone down? For now,  Daw's video  as we have mentioned, is no longer available. One can only hope that Daw will put it back for everyone to see. Or end the whole debate with a laugh.

Angelo Maria Petroni
Originally uploaded by mok.

Director of RAI who can't direct

The administrative board of the RAI still has a “right-wing majority” (as if it were indeed a mini-government!!). The man who makes the difference, Angelo Maria Petroni (nominated by the Treasury of the previous government) is still hanging in there, thus causing paralysis in decision-making because the Director General Claudio Cappon is getting outvoted by the board. Petroni is accused by Fabrizio Morri (RAI Watchdog committee) of pursuing Forza Italia party politics rather than responsably safeguarding  the interests of shareholders.

On the 25th October Cappon put his plans to reorganise the three main strategic sectors of the RAI (personnel, artistic resources, management of purchases and services) before the board, including the possibility for the directors to appoint their deputies without the approval of the Board). This plan was thrown out by Petroni and Giuliano Urbani, one of the founding fathers of Forza Italia.

Apparently, the two Forzitaliots slipped out for a quick confab and then came back into the meeting again to announce that they were against the proposal because it would put all the power in Personnel (“Human” resources) into one man's hands.  (never a good idea of course because one might give all the jobs going to one's friends and family).

According to board member Rizzo Nervo this “parallel meeting” outside in the corridors was absolutely unacceptable so he walked out and the meeting was adjourned.

Sandro Curzi, another member of the CdA, wrote in the Corriera della Sera on October 28th that Petroni “systematically prevents the new director general from fulfilling his proper and essential role” (CURZI: The case of Petroni and the party-cratic regression of the five RAI board members) (2)

It is hard to reconcile RAI's commitment to independence, as stated in its code of ethics, (1) with such a strong political influence in the governing body, whether left or right-wing. Appeals for a genuinely independent administration have so far fallen on stony ground.

See “Per un altro TV“

(1) “In its relations with national, local, or international public bodies, Raiworks to represent the interests and positions of the company in arigorous, coherent and transparent manner. In order to guarantee thegreatest possible clarity and transparency, institutional contacts are carried out exclusively by the functional areas and by assigned employees”

(2) According to Grillo Sparlante Petroni is supposedly under investigation for “abuse of office” by the GIP of Rome (procedure n 5424/2004 N). (see Mr Raffaele Pellegrino's letter to the Espresso (“In the tunnel of scandals”) Can this be true? Shuerly some mistake.