Regionalism and the Southern Question

The study provides a full discussion, analysis, and conclusion on regionalism and the Italian southern question. The discussion includes a detailed literature review on how regionalism is always explained in the context of Italy, the Third Italy referred to as 'The Mezzogiorno,' what the southern question is, different scholars' perspectives on the major differences that exist between the South and the North, and whether such explanations and perspectives are viable and convincing.  While regionalism relates to a theory and or practice of regional administration rather than the central administrative system of governance that encompasses the political, social or political and economic affiliations, this study relates the theory of regionalism to a system in which governance and administration of a nation or city is divided into different regions each under independent control. However, the separate administrative entities in the various regions pay allegiance to the central system. There is a daunting issue of imperfect unification in the political and cultural affairs in Italy resulting into a state of imbalance between the South and the other parts of Italy especially the North. The economy of Italy has over the time faced divisions between the North and South, largely attributed to centralization of power. As mentioned earlier, regionalism involves splitting the administration of a nation and or city but, each of these regional sects are subject to the central division and power.

The element of imperfect unification has resulted into regional imbalances between the two regions, the South and the North with the North developing at a faster rate while the Southern region lags behind with poor infrastructure, poor markets and limited access to international markets. Of course, the limited access to better markets makes it a little difficult for the region to access better prices for their goods and as well cannot access any better products and resources to incorporate in the production of goods.

Shortly after the unification of Italy, the Northern regions begun to experience a rapid rate of industrialization coupled with economic growth and development. However, the Southern part was left hanging (Nowell 62). The higher levels of industrialization attracted more investors, both foreign and local, into the Northern part. The nationals, therefore, had access to employment opportunities, earned higher incomes and subsequently, their standards of living improved at the expense of those in the Southern part. Subsequently, the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) for the Northern and Central regions became increasingly higher as compared to the Southern part.

The recent data reveals that the GDP of the Southern region is just half of that of the Northern Region. The level of unemployment is as well more than double in the Southern region compared to the North and the other Central part of Italy. Eventually, the level of migration from the south to the North and Central regions have increased, and this deprives the South of the small available labor force therefore, the level of production has drastically become small (Scognamiglio).

The issue is not only economical. There exists serious cultural differences in the region (Newell 68). The imperfect unification is said to have brought in certain cultural divisions where the Northern region regards people of the South as background, and they often use the term ‘Torrene’. This is a term often used as an offense to describe the inhabitants of the South by those of the Northern part of Italy. It is always related to the negative personal traits of the Southern people who are referred to as ignorant, rude, lacking a desire to work, all of which aim at clearing discriminatory intent.

If they are isolated and degraded in society, what then do we expect from the Southern people? These have also retaliated by referring to the Northern people as Polentone that was extracted from polenta. Therefore, the South calls the Northern people ‘polenta eaters’, a food commonly used in the poor cuisine of North. The term intends to underline an element cultural inferiority. These differences have gone ahead to affect the way of relating to each other even at places of work. As a result, the southern people are humbled and quite submissive as compared to those of the North and Central regions. Inhabitants from the south are quite friendly and welcoming unlike those of the North who are only concerned about their business.

The two terms terrone and Polentone put distinct differences between the two regions. While the southern people are referred to as rude and lazy, the Northern people are selfish and do much of racism. The issue attracted stereotypes and various people have responded towards the saga. However, the perception has drastically changed over time, and the recent past has witnessed little of these issues in the Italian society. The economic gap still holds as the southern part is still under privileged. The unification therefore caused serious impact on the social, political and economic atmosphere of these different regions in Italy resulting into the Third Italy.



The Third Italy

The term Third Italy is used to relate to a specialized industrial system in which districts are located in small remote areas and in towns in the three major regions of Italy. The regions incorporated in the concept include Piedmont, Veneto, Lombard, Emilia-Romagna, Friuli-Venezia Giulia, Tuscany, Abruzzi and the Marches. The Third Italy emerged in the post war period. Various factors contributed to the emergence of the Third Italy and among others include culture, political and economic factors (Boschma 2). The differences in these factors came in after the aspect of regionalism. Regionalism gave rise to three giant regions; Northwest that is the most industrialized and manufacturing part, the Northeast and the Central that specialize in industrial and consumer goods. The developments in these three parts of Italy resulted into a lagging South that is looked as under privileged in the unification of Italy.

Since it was under-industrialized, the South region is related to as ‘Third Italy’ due to its isolation in the growth and development of the entire nation. The concept of Third Italy evolved in the early 1970s till date. While Italy is one giant economies in the World, the Southern region is such a creeping one. The region is characterized by small firms whose products are of low standards to compete on the international economic markets. The region’s products end up competing with the under privileged developing markets. As a result, the South region is isolated and therefore related to as Third Italy.

The rise in the disposable income in the North and Central regions in the 1950s accompanied by a high desire to customize goods in Italy gave rise to an exploitable niche. Subsequently, the Southern region instead faced declining levels of GDP and of course lower disposable incomes. The result was a big income gap between the South and the other parts of the country. While the other parts enjoyed the benefits of specialization in which case firms socialized in the production of distinct commodities, there was a variety and thus a higher standard of living enjoyed unlike in the South where firms were left with no choice. Firms in the North and the other parts enjoyed the advantages of economies of scale that could have been preserved for the larger forms. Besides, the Northern region, by virtue of its position in the economic development, it attracted the largest political will that eventually created a stronger political and social power in the region as compared to the South.

The evolvement of the Third Italy is partly attributed to the gap in the economic, political and cultural spheres in the country. To narrow the gap, there is a need to improve on the social capital level in the south, increase the level of industrialization, and boost the production industry by employing advanced techniques of production such as capital intensive methods to improve on the quality of their output that can adequately compete in the international economic markets. Once the level and quality of production increased and improved respectively, the region can then attract higher GDP and income per capita, and eventually the gap that exists between the two major regions can be narrowed.

The Mezzogiorno issue

The term Mezzogiorno often relates to southern Italy. It came in as a result of the North region advancing and modernizing much faster than the South. The part that dominated Italy’s wealth and economic power is Piedmont. This town is the major reason behind the regional imbalances between the South and the North. Piedmont supplied more goods and services to the international economic markets, and this eventually placed Italy on the map in the economic giants in Europe and World over. However, before the divisions, the entire nation benefited from the fruits of Piedmont. Upon dividing the two regions, it placed the North to an advantage of enjoying the rest and best from Piedmont. The division has remained critical in Italy up to date especially in the political discourse of the country. The term is much more related to this region due to the weak economic performance coupled with corruption and organized crime.

The issue of organized crime is very much more pervasive in the southern region than any other regions. If the country had not under gone a division, certain of these could easily be tackled. However, due to the weak economic foundation in the region coupled with higher levels of unemployment, it becomes a little difficult to fight such cases as the people became unruly simply because they have lost hope and partly due to the disrespect accorded to them by the other advantaged regions. In the addition to the above, the south has got a weaker institutional responsiveness. These, and some other factors that best describe the weakness of the South form a basis for the Southern Question.

The Southern Question

The southern question is entirely attributed to the weaknesses of the Southern region of Italy. Although all states have some poor and rich regions, the case of Italy is quite alarming. The world has experienced disparities between the rich and poor regions that are attributed to factors such as access to infrastructure, market and some other political reasons such as the rich regions harboring most of the political giants in such particular countries. However, the disparities experienced in Italy especially between the North and South regions are much worse. In fact, the imbalances in Italy, despite the changes in the institutions and politicians, are the most remarkable in the world’s history especially among the industrialized countries.

Scholars have attempted to tackle certain of these disparities in the country as they attribute them to economic and institutional roots. Scholars reveal that institutional responsiveness is solely dependent on economics, Culture as well as Institutions (Barca 3). Studies attribute the emergence of the Italian Mezzogiorno to the large population that occupied the area about one hundred thirty years ago soon after the birth of Italy. The population was such an illiterate characterized with high levels of unemployment, ignorance and laziness. However, the recent past portrays another story. Studies show that the Italian community has gone through rapid changes in the political realm, the economic, and more especially in the public institutional realms. Definitely, the concept is dying out and very soon, the Mezzogiorno concept will cease to exist and in fact, it has been eliminated from the ears of the people and communities at large (Fabrizio). In fact, the journey to its elimination started in the early 1990s strategized by the major changes in these institutions that were latter shaped to adopt better systems such as those in the North.

The changes in the institutions as well as the other policies in the production of goods has tried to narrow the wide gap that existed between the Mezzogiorno and the other privileged Centre-North. These policies bean to take shape in the sixties until in the recent data where the per capita income gap has reduced from 50 to 44 percent. This is a great achievement and a drive to get rid of the Mezzogiorno. Statistics shows that the largest European populations live in regions where the per capita income is below 75 percent. The Mezzogiorno does not apply to Italy alone and instead, a general representation of the European community.

The deductions by the various scholars on the image of the Mezzogiorno is but factual and a clear representation of those regions in the entire Europe that have experienced such challenges as the southern part of Italy. Devising policies such as improving the level of infrastructure in less advantaged and privileged regions not only in Italy but also in the entire Europe and World at large can help open up these regions to better markets and consequently create some bit of competition amongst them. The resulting effect that include increased output and improved quality of output is most likely to increase the GDP and per capita income of such regions that can assist in narrowing the gap that might exist between the rich and poor regions.



































References

Barca, Fabrisio. New trends and policy shift. New York: AMA, 2001.

Boschma, Ron. The industrial rise of the Third Italy: Open windows of locational opportunity? Abstract. New York: utwente, 2011.

Fabrizio. Italian Mezzogiorno; Achallange and an Opportunity for Italy and Europe. New York: Fabrizio, 2001.

Nowell. "The Impact of Sense of Community on Business Unit Work Performance." Thesis. 2010.

Scognamiglio, rco. Quora. 15 February 2017. Document. 12 June 2017.