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The second element is the provincial right wing, which is anti-globalisation and unenthusiastic about Europe. The third is the ‘reactionary moralism’ demanded by the Church hierarchy (Cousin and Vitale, 2007: 111–112). The title of Tremonti’s book already says a lot about it: La paura e la speranza (‘The fear and the hope’). In it, the author offers a rigorous, critical analysis of globalisation. Far from being the Promised Land, globalisation and the many crises it has triggered – from financial crises to the energy crisis – risk precipitating a terrible catastrophe.

Veltroni never once even named his adversary during the election campaign and, if anything, was concerned to shape the parliamentary representation of his party to his own advantage. Having saved a small group of prominent people, Veltroni exploited the electoral law, which forces voters to accept the candidates selected by their preferred party’s leaders, to swell the ranks of the PD’s parliamentarians with men and women faithful to him, who were also very young and without previous political experience.

One is very probably psychological. As heir to the moderate wing of the PCI, Veltroni saw in the electoral law an opportunity to settle old scores both with the wing that was determined to remain communist and with an old rival of the PCI, the Socialist Party. Unable to defeat his principal adversary, Veltroni thus preferred to use the elections to free himself from his secondary competitors, those who had the most power to block any compromise he might want to enter into with Berlusconi, with whom he shares some degree of community of outlook about the future of the Republic’s institutions.