Rome is the capital city of the Republic of Italy.

One outcome, by no means to be ruled out, would neatly encapsulate the vapidity of Italian politics: if the centre-right wins the lower house but no one controls the senate, the most likely upshot would be … further elections. And so, by March 22, the country had nearly 60,000 COVID-19 cases.

Photograph: Marcello Paternostro/AFP/Getty Images, Centre-right deputy Claudio Barbaro (left) and Northern League deputy Fabio Rainieri (right) scuffle in the lower house of the Italian parliament in 2011.

Now it is less about the architecture, but it is still a trophy to be fought over to show ideological supremacy.".

Italy’s stunning musical memorials are in a league of their own. Giolitti had to bring the Popular Party into his government in 1920 and make many concessions to certain peasant interests, including giving guarantees to squatters and giving the Ministry of Agriculture to the Catholics. Italian superstar plays a Holocaust survivor who befriends an orphan in Netflix film The Life Ahead, directed by her son Edoardo Ponti Published: 7:29 AM Sophia Loren returns to movies aged 86 If anything, Italy’s performance during the pandemic should make the world rethink its condescension toward the country, which is often seen as both shambolic and overly bureaucratized at the same time. It was hailed as a modest step forward but, according to TI, which ranked Italy 72nd of 174 countries in its corruption perceptions index last year, more needs to be done. Italy seemed stuck in a destructive descent, albeit one with the occasional balcony romance. Paula Severino, the justice minister under Mario Monti, attempted to improve the situation by pushing through reforms and cuts she estimated would make savings of €80m and improve efficiency. In a shameful abdication of responsibility, fellow countries in the European Union have failed to give medical assistance and supplies to Italy during an outbreak. Stay up to date with the media, and follow the advice of your government. But the misery continued. Updated November 2012 The world watched the suffering country with a not inconsiderable amount of prejudice. It could have been worse. Unfortunately this kind of political message has more often been drowned out in recent years by others that seek to further entrench the differences rather than erase them. The question now is whether the public will act as stoically in trying to get the country’s shattered economy back on track—a herculean task even with the European Union’s 540 billion euro ($630 billion) aid package for the member states worst hit by COVID-19. Of course, other countries have remembered their victims and health care workers—mostly in the form of statues (as in Latvia’s capital, Riga) or online church services (as in Manchester, England). In this election, the number of different possible outcomes and permutations is daunting even for the most dedicated student of Italian politics. Italy’s culture of less-than-rigid organization may turn out to be an advantage not just during this pandemic but in future crises as well. Yet this mass movement never linked up with the Socialists, whose ideological anticlericalism alienated them from all wings of the Catholic movement. Our editors will review what you’ve submitted and determine whether to revise the article. "This is a first step. As Serrati put it, the maximalists based their strategy on the view that “We Marxists interpret history, we do not make it.” Very little attempt was made to link up the two great classes of Italian society, the workers and the peasants, and the middle classes were either ignored or reviled as “doomed to disappear.” “Who does not work shall not eat” was one popular maximalist anti-middle-class slogan. (There is a low base: at the moment, for instance, not one of the country's 50 biggest towns and cities has a female mayor.) Below an overview of the current COVID-19 situation, Overview of coronavirus disease (COVID-19) by date, United Against Rabies launches global plan to achieve zero rabies human deaths, Italy provides funding to support cystic echinococcosis projects in Morocco and Tunisia, World TB Day 2010: To Be Continued - 24 hour music event, Niger: Italy and WHO help strengthen health facilities for migrants and vulnerable populations, Italy: WHO helps reshape hospitals as COVID-19 eases its grip, How WHO is supporting ongoing vaccination efforts during the COVID-19 pandemic, WHO deploys rapid response teams to Italy, This map is an approximation of actual country borders, Coronavirus disease outbreak (COVID-2019), Coronavirus disease outbreak (COVID-19) ». Indeed, the rest of the world could learn a thing or two from its response. "One of the issues with Italy is we have a very complex legislation; we have huge numbers of laws but most of them are only on paper and there is no implementation. All rights reserved. Only once these have been properly tackled, they say, will Italy be in a position to capitalise on its strengths, which include a strong manufacturing base, successful exporters, relatively low budget deficit and relatively high domestic savings. In April 1920 the Piedmontese General Strike blocked work throughout Piedmont. On March 26, 712 Italians died of COVID-19; the following day the virus claimed another 919. Within the aid he’s already announced, Conte is trying to channel funds toward the South. By the end of 1920 the lira was worth only one-sixth of its 1913 value. These two parties dominated northern and central Italy. The 'Ndrangheta, for instance, has its roots in Calabria but dominates the European cocaine trade and the huge contracts being put out for tender at Milan's Expo 2015 are under particular scrutiny for signs of mafia involvement. The populist Five Star Movement has become China’s chief enabler as Beijing spreads disinformation about the origins of the coronavirus while sending aid shipments to EU countries where it seeks influence.

", A stagnating economy, corruption, organised crime, political apathy, misogyny, youth unemployment … The person elected to run Italy next weekend will have a formidable to-do list. Those informal initiatives included people shopping for elderly neighbors. Long gone too is the image of the gun-toting Godfather-esque gangster: the mafia, while remaining strong in areas such as drug trafficking and prostitution, have also moved into industries such as transport and public health. To be sure, much of that criticism has a basis in fact. Italy faced serious postwar economic problems. Meanwhile, others remain free pending appeals against lower court convictions. These reforms did not go far enough to satisfy the landless peasants but managed to terrify landowners. But perhaps even more important than any government courage was the resilience of ordinary Italians.

The global shock over Italy’s tragic fate betrayed a sense of superiority: The disorganized Italians were mishandling the crisis, sure, but the rest of us would know what to do. In a critical report last year, the Council of Europe's top official for human rights, Nils Muiznieks, said Italy could "ill-afford" such an inefficient system, which is estimated to waste the equivalent of 1% of GDP. “We would have needed a simultaneous lockdown of the whole country.”. The city's buses had to be called back to the depot after it was confirmed that the city government had apparently overlooked funding for all-weather tires. To what extent this task been accomplished remains, more than 150 years later, unclear. Savings became nearly worthless, and rents collected by landowners plummeted in value. Lowe says both the government and the population adapted with surprising speed. One step towards keeping the issue on the agenda would be, of course, a big increase in the number of women in positions of political power.

Other hazards in Italy It has implemented reforms – including of the pension system and labour market – that are viewed as a crucial part of long-term recovery and could, according to the IMF, lead to a 6% increase in GDP if properly implemented. More than 99% of Italy’s coronavirus fatalities were people who suffered from previous medical conditions, according to a study by the country’s national health authority. Of course, “embrace the chaos” would hardly be the label chosen by the Italian government for its coronavirus recovery strategy. According to an analysis of candidate lists published last week, the centre left has responded better to public demand for greater equality, with women making up 39% of the Democratic party's candidates for the lower house of parliament. “But as a result, we developed a network of informal initiatives that eventually was more successful than what was done in countries that are better organized,” he said. But economists say much more needs to be done to effect the kind of deep and lasting change needed to get Italy growing again. But when the criminal network was dismantled, the city fell apart. Why Are Armenia and Azerbaijan Heading to War. These governments were powerless to keep prices from rising or to satisfy the demands of the unions. A Catholic left even emerged in the north that preached revolution and led long strikes in Lombardy and the Veneto. They voted against, and Piedmont was isolated. He was eventually cleared.