The weight of historical legacies can be heavy, indeed crushing, in the contemporary politics of advanced capitalist states. That weight, however, varies considerably from country to country. In Great Britain, for instance, the predominance of financial capital, represented by the City of London, is rooted in centuries of economic and political development which has given the City a privileged position within the state that has continued to bolster its economic role. In Japan, the national culture formed in the country’s feudal era is often cited as an explanation of the spirit of cooperation and dedication to work demonstrated by capitalists and workers alike.1 Italy’s history has been much less linear than Britain’s or even Japan’s, and its legacies are correspondingly less important in explaining the current power of capital within the political system: the Risorgimento, rapid industrial and political development, the two world wars, Fascism, and the tumultuous post-war boom broke down many entrenched positions and brought new actors, economic and political, to the fore

Nevertheless, history can still contribute a great deal, even in the Italian case, to our understanding of the current scene; certain seemingly intractable facts, such as the Southern Question, are deeply rooted in the past. Most importantly, throughout Italy’s historical development the bourgeoisie have been relatively weak in the political sphere, and bourgeois ideas and attitudes have similarly been weak in the field of ideology. As a ‘late-follower’ industrializer, like Russia and Japan, Italy fostered capitalist economic development before capitalist ideas or capitalist political representatives had become ascendant. The relative political and ideological weakness of the bourgeoisie persists to this day, in spite of the vicissitudes of twentieth-century history, the business renaissance of the 1980s, and the rise of global neo-liberalism. This has in turn given the state a particularly autonomous role vis-à-vis the capitalist class, and political factors a particularly significant role in shaping the development of Italian capitalism.