Rome. Stepmother or Alma Mater?
A few observations on Rome by Italian sociologist Franco Ferrarotti regarding the period from the Italian unity - when Rome became the capital of our country in 1870 - until today. They appeared in two interviews published in Milan’s Corriere della Sera and Rome’s Messaggero between 2005 and 2006, in a period when the Paris banlieu exploded with riots.
Sociologist Ferrarotti (Corriere della Sera, April 2, 2006) observed that Rome always found some difficulty being loved by Italians since she has been a double capital, of Italy and of the Catholic Church. Italians - says Ferrarotti – felt that Rome was too universal. Rome, in short, gli starebbe larga, was too large for them. According to Ferrarotti, only provincial aesthetes like Fellini and Pasolini loved her. Ferrarotti published Roma da capitale a periferia 40 years ago (Bari, Laterza 1970), a book describing a suburban anti-Rome, so different from the celebrated historical centre. Today, thanks to years of good administration - says Ferrarotti – Roman suburbs have progressed. Rome, from suburbia, is becoming a real capital and a famous actor like “Michele Placido is today on stage in Tor Bella Monaca, a very peripheral borgata (= a working class suburb).”
According to Ferrarotti there are no explosive suburbs in Rome such as those in Paris because immigration is recent here. Maybe in 15 years Roman immigrants’ children and grand-children will protest for their rights.
Rome as a capital, believes Ferrarotti, is more Mediterranean than European, due to both her nature and mediation capabilities. However she is also a religious capital like Mecca or Jerusalem, which makes her something far beyond Europe (observation quoted in our first post, a sort of introduction to this web blog). The problem has always been urban planning management although today the old alliance among real estate business, finance and political power is broken thanks to increasing democracy. There is a tendency towards polycentrism, which is good, so the city can breathe.
Rome is not matrigna (stepmother) anymore, as Ferrarotti called her in 1991. Today, he argues, she has become alma mater (Latin for nourishing mother), even though at times she is also lupa (she-wolf) with her children. Zones once desolate like Quarticciolo and Alessandrino are now urban zones. “Instead of progressively rotting suburbs, in two generations we have had social auto-promotion: unlike other metropolises no favelas developed here ”.
On november 2005 an article appeared in Rome’s daily Il Messaggero.
Professor Ferrarotti, do you think Prodi is right? Will Italian suburbs be on fire as they are in France?
“No, Italian suburbs have nothing in common with Parisian banlieue.”
What’s the difference?
“A third generation of immigrants - children and grand-children of the old pieds-noirs - lives in the Parisian banlieue and feels they are rightful French citizens. In schools though being francocentrism dominant, Maghrebine culture and roots are ignored, which alienates these youngsters from society. First-generation immigrants showed gratitude for France hosting them; both the second and third generation, on the other hand, seeing their fathers threatened by ostracism, transform this old gratitude into hate. It is a tragedy and no parallel can be drawn between the French and the Italian situation”.
Italian suburbs are then the best of possible worlds?
“I have written a book in 1970, Roma da Capitale a periferia (”Rome from Capital to Suburbia”). Today we would rather speak of Rome’s transformation from suburbia into a real capital. Slums have disappeared. In Alessandrina borgata 50 percent of the students are non-EU. They don’t have problems. Their teachers have problems, instead.”
Why, Professor?
“Because these non-EU kids’ parents earn more than Italian teachers who, though badly paid, must increase their efforts talking to a multiethnic audience. Therefore they lose any motivation. In politicians’ place I would rather worry for possible protests by underpaid teachers and young unemployed graduates. These are the new poverty-stricken in Italy that could give life to an explosive situation, not the immigrants.”
No imminent immigrants danger, then.
“No. Problems could maybe arise from CPTs (Centres of temporary permanence) created by the Turco Napolitano law (num. 40, 1998). If the CPTs became like concentration camps, yes, there could be some danger. But for now the situation in Italy doesn’t seem so serious. Nothing comparable to suburbs in Paris, Frankfurt, London.”
An excessive alarm, that from Prodi …
“Yes, it seems apocalyptic to me. Nevertheless his statements imply useful ideas. Prodi invites to think about a process of citizenship and integration of non-EU people in our country. I find this correct, and necessary. If a true immigrants integration process is set out in Italy the mine is defused before it can explode.”
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