Legal hyper-invasiveness and anti-legal practices in contemporary Italy

Abstract

This paper gives an illustration of legal hyper-invasiveness in Italy over the course of the last decades, with particular emphasis on the increase in laws and law-producing institutions: neoliberal governmentality is not characterized by a retreat of the State, rather by the extent of its reach and force. The success of legal imposition has always been partial; in recent years, however, anti-legal constituent praxes are becoming more evident both in public demonstration and in everyday conduct. Street mobilizations are fuelled increasingly by disillusion with institutional politics, pursuing explicit anti-legal aims and marked by an autonomy from political parties and trade unions. The paper also provides an ethnographical examination of the day-to-day avoidance of institutional control, revealing a growing and widespread sense of intolerance of several regulations promoted by the institutional powers. Finally, contemporary forms of repression of these constituent energies are examined; and the belief that an increase in legality will benefit citizens is questioned.

Keywords::

• Illegality
• neoliberal governmentality
• bureaucracy
• demonstrations
• constituent practices
• Italy

Notes

¹Brigantaggio largely supported the return of the monarchy under the House of Bourbon. Mafia has been intimately associated with the State's administrative apparatus. Terrorism was aimed at establishing the proletarian state. All have been, according to this definition, principally illegal rather than anti-legal activities, intended to re-frame a hierarchical political orders, which reproduces, albeit with different choreographic props, the one it replaces.

² For forthcoming legislation on seeds, see EC (2013).

³ Respectively 8 per cent and 34 per cent according to recent surveys; see http://www.clandestinoweb.com/ ISPO survey, March 2012; http://it.finance.yahoo.com/IPR marketing survey, May 2012. Only 5 per cent feels represented by unions and expresses appreciation; see http://www.unicobas.it/costcasta.htm.

⁴ See, for example, http://www.ilsole24ore.com/art/notizie/2013-12-09/no-tav-arresti-area-anarchica-sabotaggi-valsusa-estate-scorsa-095429.shtml?uuid = AB4Gari; http://www.radiondadurto.org/2013/09/12/val-di-susa-tra-sabotaggi-e-azione-diretta/.

⁵ See Boni (2006) for the bulk of the documentation here summarized and updated. No audio-recording devices were used during the research: quotes are faithful to the meaning rather than to the exact phrasing.

⁶ See Bruce Johnston's article at http://www.telegraph.co.uk (April 18, 2005); and ‘Mucca pazza: La UE blocca la fiorentina’ (http://www.adnkronos.com, September 27, 2001).

⁷ The measures were included in the law passed on 15 July 2009, nr. 94 (Ddl 733-b), known as ‘Pacchetto sicurezza’. For further details on registration of the homeless, see http://www.immigrazione.biz/approfondimenti/iscrizione_anagrafica_dei_senza_fissa_dimora.php.

⁸ The law was passed on 31 July 2005, n. 155, see http://www.camera.it/parlam/leggi/05155l.htm; for its application against No-TAV activists see ‘Caselli va in pensione con l'ultimo regalo: una norma anti Al Qaeda’ (http://www.infoaut.org).

⁹ On emerging techniques in the repression of social movements, see Repression and Social Movements (2011).

¹⁰http://www.esercito.difesa.it/Attivita/OperazioniinTerritorioNazionale/Pagine/Strade-Sicure.aspx?status = In%20atto.

¹¹ For instance, no-one was sentenced for the murder of Carlo Giuliani during the anti-G8 demonstrations. The policemen who killed Federico Aldrovandi, one of several victims in recent years of violent death while in police custody, were sentenced to 3 years 6 months – in 2014, after only 6 months in jail, they were released and working once again as policemen (see Il Fatto quotidiano, January 26, 2014).

¹² On the legislation concerning depenalization for false accounting see n. 366 of 3 October 2001 and n. 262 of 28 December 2005 and D. Lgs. n. 39 of 27 January 2010; on corruption, see http://www.ilfattoquotidiano.it/2012/04/20/si-combatte-cos-la-corruzione/205809/.

¹³ For example, the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) laments that: ‘under the current system, acts that generate serious damages to citizens’ health, devastation of the environment or threats for the survival of species and natural habits are sanctioned with fines just a little higher than a driving infraction' (my translation) (http://www.earthdayitalia.org/Politica-ed-Economia/Ambiente-Dei-delitti-e-delle-pene). In December 2013, the insertion in the penal code of environmental offences was still not approved (see http://www.repubblica.it/ambiente/2013/12/19/news/wwf_eco-reati_codice_penale-74020585/).