The May 13 election of conservative businessman Silvio
Berlusconi as Prime Minister of Italy presents President George W. Bush
with a rare ideological ally in Europe. Many of Berlusconi's policy
positions echo those of the Bush Administration, and the outspoken Prime
Minister has made it clear that he intends to seek a new special
relationship with the United States. He already has supported President
Bush on some highly contentious issues. While he is visiting Europe,
President Bush should take advantage of this diplomatic opportunity to
cement better ties with Italy and enlist his new ally's support on an
array of issues, from missile defense to skepticism about
Euro-federalism and the Kyoto Protocol on climate change.
New Support for U.S. Policy
Positions. Investing diplomatic effort in cultivating deeper ties
with the Berlusconi government is likely to be a sound long-term
investment. The Berlusconi government is the 59th Italian administration
since World War II, but unlike most of the country's previous postwar
governments, it is likely to prove durable. Berlusconi's center-right
House of Freedom coalition won 177 of 315 seats in the Italian Senate
and just over half the 630 seats in the lower Chamber of Deputies.
Rarely has there been such a clear victory in an Italian political
system made chronically shaky by proportional representation.
Berlusconi was elected because
he promised change, especially on the core issues facing Italy. Unlike
its predecessor, the center-left Olive Tree coalition, the Berlusconi
government has a practical, unromantic view of the European Union (EU)
and espouses a more nationalist point of view. For example, the Prime
Minister has personally said that he favors tax competition within the
EU, and he sees German proposals for a federal European superstate as
unrealistic and politically impractical. Berlusconi believes the
strength of the EU lies in its diversity, not in further homogeneity.
His inclination to safeguard national interests at the expense of
European solidarity and to disagree with the homogenized cookie-cutter
approach so favored by Euro-federalists represents a new wrinkle on the
Italian political scene.
Nor does the new Italian
government accept the standard European line on the Kyoto Protocol on
global warming. Agreeing with President Bush that the Kyoto accord will
be bad for business, Prime Minister Berlusconi is urging his EU partners
to be flexible in considering the Bush Administration's deep disapproval
of the treaty and its counterproposals for addressing global warming.
Although the EU ministers for the environment unanimously signed an
understanding to push ahead with the Protocol (when Italy was
represented by the Olive Tree government), Berlusconi has pulled back.
Berlusconi's initiative represents the first crack in the EU double
standard about this issue. Despite the fact that no European state has
ratified the Kyoto Protocol, and that former President Clinton's
economic advisers now accept that observing the Protocol could prove
economically daunting, the Europeans have continued to sharply criticize
the American President for his sensible stand. Berlusconi's statements
could not have been better timed diplomatically to illustrate that the
controversy over the Kyoto Protocol is less about making honest efforts
to reduce greenhouse gas than it is about opposing the U.S.
position.
The Berlusconi government is
also aligning itself with the Bush Administration on the critical issue
of missile defense. Antonio Martino, the new Minister for Defense, has
emphasized that the new government favors missile defense because it
believes that Italy and Europe are at least as likely a target for rogue
state missile attacks as is the United States. The Prime Minister is one
of the first European leaders to express enthusiastic support for this
central Bush policy.
Clearly, these positions are
part of a broader pro-American strategy that the Berlusconi government
has adopted. The new Italian government is looking to America for
economic inspiration as well as an ideological counterweight to the
preponderant center-left tenor of the EU and most European
governments.
The U.S. Response. The
Bush Administration has an opportunity on this current visit to Europe
to capitalize on the favorable change in leadership in Italy. President
Bush, when he meets Prime Minister Berlusconi in Europe, should invite
him to the White House in the near future to discuss U.S.-Italian
relations more specifically. This would encourage Berlusconi in his
efforts to develop closer ties with the Bush Administration and also
would provide the Italian people with practical evidence that their new
Prime Minister's pro-American strategy is working.
At this meeting, the two leaders
should be prepared to engage in an exhaustive inventory of their
diplomatic stances on every major issue and establish common policies
that would enhance their diplomatic impact both at home and in
international settings. In addition, President Bush should encourage
Prime Minister Berlusconi to promote structural economic reform,
including regulatory reform to reduce bureaucratic red tape. Italy
currently overregulates its economy, a factor that prevents it from
achieving the ranking of "free" on The Heritage Foundation/Wall Street
Journal Index of Economic Freedom and from
qualifying to participate in the global free trade association (GFTA)
that Heritage is proposing. The Bush Administration should point out
that if such structural reforms are undertaken, Italy can expect closer
trading relations with America.
Conclusion. By responding
positively in these ways to Prime Minister Berlusconi's pro-American
statements and initiatives, President Bush and his Administration will
be able to foster closer ties with a valuable European ally.
--John C. Hulsman,
Ph.D., is a Research Fellow in European Affairs in the Kathryn and
Shelby Cullom Davis Institute for International Studies at The
Heritage Foundation.
