I Know What Prejudice Feels Like. That's Why I Cannot Be Racist.

Whenever immigration is discussed, the debate almost always collapses into two opposing camps. On one side are those who treat every immigrant as a threat. On the other are those who label any call for controlled immigration or any criticism of migration policies as racism.

I belong to neither camp.

There is a simple reason why.

I come from Southern Italy. I was born and raised near Naples, in the shadow of Mount Vesuvius, in a region that has spent more than a century living under the weight of stereotypes, prejudice, and discrimination.

Anti-Southern prejudice is not a myth. It has deep historical roots. Following the unification of Italy in 1861, pseudo-scientific theories promoted by Cesare Lombroso portrayed Southern Italians as biologically predisposed to crime and social backwardness. Modern science has long since discredited those ideas, but many of the stereotypes survived.

Cesare Lombroso  (1835 - 1909)

For generations, Southern Italians encountered apartment advertisements stating "No Southerners," faced discrimination in the workplace, and were routinely portrayed as lazy, corrupt, dependent on welfare, or inherently linked to organized crime.

When people are judged not by their character but by where they come from, that is prejudice.

Having grown up with this history, I cannot accept racism directed at immigrants.

A person's skin color says nothing about their worth. Their ethnicity does not determine their character. Every individual deserves to be judged by their actions, not by the group to which they belong.

Rejecting racism, however, does not require abandoning common sense.

Immigration presents real challenges that every democratic society must confront honestly. Many people leave their countries in search of safety, opportunity, or simply a better future. That aspiration is entirely understandable.

But successful immigration policy cannot stop at admitting people across a border.

Integration matters.

Anyone who chooses to settle in another country should have the opportunity—and the responsibility—to learn the language, respect the law, understand the country's constitutional principles, and embrace the basic rules that make peaceful coexistence possible.

Integration is a two-way process. It requires commitment from newcomers, but it also requires governments willing to invest in language education, civic integration, and equal opportunities rather than leaving people isolated on the margins of society.

It is also important to recognize that migrants arrive from countries with very different institutional, political, and social realities. Some come from states weakened by corruption, fragile institutions, authoritarian rule, violent conflict, or deeply rooted patronage systems. These differences can make integration more complex, but they do not define the moral worth of individuals. Every person should be judged on their own conduct, not on the country listed in their passport.

There is another uncomfortable truth that deserves attention.

Too often immigration is reduced to a simplistic battle between compassion and hostility. Meanwhile, far less attention is paid to the criminal networks that profit from human trafficking, the exploitation of vulnerable migrants, or the economic interests that sometimes develop around poorly managed reception systems.

The greatest victims of these failures are often the migrants themselves.

For this reason, I reject both extremes.

I reject racism because I know what prejudice feels like.

I also reject the idea that responsible immigration policies are incompatible with respect for human dignity.

A democratic society has both the right and the responsibility to regulate migration, enforce its laws, and build effective pathways toward integration.

Human dignity and secure borders are not mutually exclusive.

Compassion and responsibility are not enemies.

A society that truly believes in equality must be capable of defending both.

Where Did Italy's Fascists Go After 1943?

One of the most uncomfortable questions in Italian history is also one of the least honestly addressed: what became of the millions of Italians who had joined, supported, or simply lived within the Fascist regime?

For decades, a reassuring narrative prevailed. On one side stood the Fascists; on the other, the anti-Fascists. Then Fascism collapsed, the Resistance prevailed, and Italy supposedly became, almost overnight, a democratic Republic.

Reality is far more complex.

Millions of Italians had built their lives during the twenty years of Fascist rule. They had worked within state institutions, advanced their careers, administered public bodies, and participated in the regime's organizations. When Mussolini fell, these people did not simply vanish.

Most adapted.

Some joined the Christian Democrats, others the Italian Communist Party, still others the Socialist Party or the liberal parties. Many remained in the public administration. Only those most deeply compromised by the regime were, in general, excluded from public life or prosecuted.

This phenomenon reveals a great deal about modern Italian history.

It does not prove that every anti-Fascist had once been a Fascist. That would be a historical absurdity. It does, however, demonstrate that part of Italy's political class was remarkably adept at changing its symbols, language and political allegiance almost overnight.

Historians refer to this phenomenon as trasformismo.

Italy’s eternal tradition of political transformation continued even after the fall of the Berlin Wall and the Tangentopoli corruption scandals.

The uniforms changed.

The methods often did not.

Clientelism, careers built through personal loyalties rather than merit, opaque party structures, the dominance of internal factions, political conformism and loyalty to powerful leaders continued to characterize broad sectors of Italian public life long after 1945.

The Fascist regime itself undoubtedly came to an end.

The Italian Constitution prohibited both the re-establishment of the Fascist Party and the public advocacy of Fascism. Given the legacy of dictatorship and a devastating war, this was an understandable choice.

Yet outlawing an organization does not automatically transform the mentality of millions of people.

Ideas can change.

Symbols can change.

Human behaviour, however, changes much more slowly.

For this reason, perhaps the more meaningful question is not where the Fascists went, but what became of certain ways of exercising power.

Intolerance toward dissent.

The belief that those outside one's own political camp are morally inferior.

The tendency to reward loyalty instead of merit.

The desire to silence those who express inconvenient opinions.

These dynamics do not belong exclusively to Fascism.

They can emerge within any political system.

The colours of the flags may change, yet the temptation of cultural authoritarianism remains.

Pier Paolo Pasolini sensed this danger when he warned against the cultural homogenization produced by consumer society and the emerging power of the mass media. His concern was that conformity could become even more effective than overt censorship, precisely because it was capable of manufacturing consent without openly resorting to force.

Today, this issue has returned to public debate.

Some speak of a "single accepted narrative"; others reject the very idea. Regardless of the terminology, one legitimate question remains: how much room do modern democracies truly leave for those who express views that fundamentally diverge from prevailing opinion?

Media campaigns, public delegitimization, and social or professional ostracism can all become instruments of pressure even without the use of physical violence.

They are different from the methods of the twentieth century.

Yet they deserve careful reflection nonetheless.

In this respect, the insight of psychiatrist Viktor Frankl, a survivor of the Nazi concentration camps, remains profoundly relevant.

Frankl argued that every human being always retains one essential freedom: the freedom to choose how to respond to circumstances.

People can become perpetrators of cruelty or examples of extraordinary humanity. Not because they are predestined to do so, but because they make choices.

Events shape our lives.

They do not determine who we are.

For this reason, it would be a mistake to regard Fascism merely as a historical phenomenon confined to the years between 1922 and 1945.

It would be equally mistaken to claim that it has survived unchanged.

The more interesting question is another.

Can democratic societies truly free themselves from authoritarian political cultures, or do such cultures inevitably re-emerge over time under different languages, symbols and political allegiances?

That is a question for Italy.

But it is equally a question for every contemporary democracy.

A Confession About Italy

I want to make a confession.

I have no intention of revisiting every chapter of Italy's post-war history, although I believe that from the Second World War onward, Italy has never truly come to terms with its past.

From the Armistice of Cassibile to the Cold War, from the "historic compromise" to the Moro kidnapping, the Italian Republic has often preferred comforting national narratives over an honest reckoning with its own contradictions.

For an international audience, I believe Italy deserves to be studied not simply as another Western democracy, but as a case study of what can happen when a country never fully resolves the political and cultural conflicts from which it was born.

In my view, Italy's greatest problem has never been the post-fascist right alone. That political tradition emerged after the collapse of Fascism as the heir to a defeated regime and was forced to rebuild itself within a democratic constitutional order.

What has been far more influential, I would argue, is a political and cultural establishment that defines itself through anti-fascism while often treating anti-fascism less as a historical responsibility than as a permanent source of moral legitimacy.

Pier Paolo Pasolini described this phenomenon as "anti-fascism without Fascism"—an anti-fascism that survives even after the historical object it opposed has disappeared, becoming a cultural framework through which political legitimacy is claimed and dissent is frequently judged.

Italy's Constitution was drafted under extraordinary circumstances. The country had emerged from military defeat and civil conflict, and the Constituent Assembly sought to prevent the return of authoritarian rule by creating a system of institutional checks and balances.

That constitutional framework has undoubtedly protected democratic freedoms. At the same time, it has often produced fragmented coalition governments, chronic political instability, and a culture of compromise that has sometimes made decisive long-term reform exceedingly difficult.

The political culture often described as Catho-Communism has, in my opinion, become one of the defining features of modern Italy. Over the decades, its influence has extended well beyond electoral politics into sections of the bureaucracy, academia, the media, and parts of the judiciary.

This is not to suggest the existence of a single hidden authority or a coordinated conspiracy. Rather, I believe Italy has developed a remarkably resilient network of institutional and cultural continuity that frequently outlasts elections and governments, shaping public debate regardless of which coalition formally holds power.

The controversy surrounding the Palamara affair, for example, intensified public debate over factional dynamics within the judiciary and reinforced the perception that informal power structures can endure independently of democratic alternation.

For these reasons, I believe Italy offers an important lesson to the wider world. It illustrates how a democratic state can become politically immobilized not because elections cease to exist, but because enduring cultural and institutional networks continue to exercise influence regardless of electoral outcomes.

Whether one agrees with this interpretation or not, Italy remains an exceptional laboratory for understanding the strengths, weaknesses, and contradictions of modern representative democracy.

Israel After Zionism? A Reflection on the Future of the Jewish State

Israel has the right to exist. This principle should not depend on the political orientation of the governments that happen to rule in Jerusalem, nor on one's approval or rejection of Zionism. Like every internationally recognized state, Israel's legitimacy rests on the principle of national self-determination and on the historical and legal reality that emerged after 1948. At the same time, the Palestinian people also have the right to live in security, dignity, and with their own political institutions. The failure to reconcile these two legitimate aspirations lies at the heart of one of the most enduring conflicts of the modern era.

Zionism has never been a monolithic movement. Its origins date back to nineteenth-century Europe, when nationalism was widely regarded as a force for the political emancipation of many peoples. Liberal Zionism coexisted with socialist, religious, and Revisionist currents. During the first decades of the State of Israel, the Labor movement dominated public life, promoting the kibbutzim and a socioeconomic model inspired by democratic socialism.

It is often forgotten that, in 1947 and 1948, the Soviet Union also supported the establishment of Israel at the United Nations, believing that the new state could weaken British influence in the Middle East. For several years, many on the European left viewed Israel sympathetically, largely because of the collective experience of the kibbutzim and the country's strong socialist tradition.

Over the following decades, however, the political landscape changed profoundly. The Arab-Israeli wars, terrorism, the occupation of territories captured in 1967, and broader social transformations contributed to the rise of nationalist conservatism. With Menachem Begin, Yitzhak Shamir, and later Benjamin Netanyahu, Israel entered a political phase markedly different from that of its founding generation. The growing influence of religious nationalist and ultra-Orthodox parties reshaped domestic politics, reinforcing a concept of national security centered primarily on military strength and deterrence.

In his book The End of Israel, Furio Colombo describes this transformation as a gradual departure from the democratic and pluralistic ideals that characterized Israel's early years. Whether one agrees with his conclusions or not, his analysis raises important questions about the relationship between security, democracy, and national identity.

The militarization of Israeli society did not emerge in a vacuum. It developed in response to repeated wars, terrorist attacks, intifadas, and persistent regional security threats. At the same time, Palestinians have lived for decades under conditions of occupation, territorial fragmentation, political instability, and recurring violence. The result has been a vicious cycle in which each side tends to view its own use of force as a response to that of the other.

Against this backdrop, the internationally endorsed "two peoples, two states" solution appears increasingly difficult to implement. The territorial continuity required for a viable Palestinian state has been severely undermined by the expansion of Israeli settlements in the West Bank. Jerusalem remains an unresolved issue, as do the future of Palestinian refugees and Israel's legitimate security concerns.

Is there an alternative?

Some scholars have proposed a single federal or confederal state in which Israelis and Palestinians would share common institutions while preserving broad territorial autonomy. Comparisons have been drawn—despite their obvious differences—with countries such as Switzerland, Belgium, Bosnia and Herzegovina, or Lebanon. None of these political systems is free from tensions, yet they demonstrate that communities with profoundly different identities can coexist within the same constitutional framework.

The greatest obstacle, however, is neither constitutional nor institutional. It is the legacy of more than a century of wars, terrorism, occupation, displacement, fear, and mutual distrust. No constitutional model can succeed without at least a minimum degree of reciprocal confidence, and today that confidence appears painfully absent.

There is also a broader geopolitical question. Israel's security has long relied on its strategic partnership with the United States and the wider Western world. If, in the distant future, the international balance of power were to change significantly and that support were to diminish, Israel would face the challenge of ensuring its long-term security through more stable relations with its regional neighbors. Comparisons with the medieval Crusader states occasionally appear in political commentary, but they should be understood as geopolitical metaphors rather than historical predictions.

How, then, can Israel secure its future?

Military superiority may guarantee survival in the short term, but it cannot by itself create lasting peace. Likewise, ignoring Israel's legitimate security needs would be no more realistic than denying the Palestinians their right to freedom, dignity, and political self-determination.

The fundamental challenge is to move beyond the illusion of total victory. As long as Israelis and Palestinians continue to view one another as enemies to be defeated or eliminated, no peace agreement will prove durable. A stable future will not emerge from the disappearance of either people, but from the recognition that both are now an irreversible part of the history of the same land.

Perhaps this is the hardest lesson of all. Yet it may also be the only one capable of preserving hope for the future.

America’s Two Souls and Europe at the Periphery of the West

The United States of America has always appeared to me as a two-headed nation, built upon the permanent tension between two founding souls that have never ceased to confront each other.

On one side stands the legacy of the Founding Fathers, shaped by Enlightenment culture and, in many cases, by the influence of Masonic thought. This is the America of the Second Industrial Revolution, of Wall Street finance, of great universities, multinational corporations, technological innovation, and the political vision that today is generally described as “liberal.” It is also the America of power projection: Washington, through the White House and Congress, often perceives itself as the centre of international decision-making, a kind of new Rome entrusted with the mission of preserving stability, security, and global leadership.

On the other side survives a very different America: the America of the Pilgrim Fathers, rural communities, evangelical churches, Mormons, small towns crossed by endless highways, and motels where a Bible can still be found on the bedside table. It is a deeply religious and conservative America, attached to family values, individual autonomy, and a certain distrust of a federal power perceived as too intrusive.

These two Americas are not separate worlds, but the two halves of the same brain. Like the right and left hemispheres, they cooperate and clash continuously, creating a dialectic that runs through the entire history of the United States. Presidential elections simply make this permanent tension more visible.

I observe all of this from the perspective of old Italy, a country that was once the heart of the Roman Empire and that today occupies a far more peripheral position in the balance of global power. Europe as a whole increasingly appears as a strategic periphery of a Western world whose main centre of decision-making now lies across the Atlantic. This is not a moral judgment, but a geopolitical observation: the United States remains the principal economic, military, and technological power within the Western alliance.

This central role may become even stronger with the expansion of artificial intelligence. AI systems require enormous digital infrastructures and ever-growing amounts of energy. The fundamental question of the twenty-first century may therefore not simply be which technology to develop, but how to produce increasing quantities of electricity at sustainable costs. Solar energy, geothermal power, next-generation nuclear technology, fusion, or other solutions still under development: the real challenge will be to guarantee abundant, stable, and competitive energy. Artificial intelligence will not be limited only by computing power, but also by access to energy.

I do not intend these reflections as a defence of the Italian government or of the current Prime Minister. Domestic politics follows different dynamics, and every political leader must be judged by their decisions and results. However, I observe with some concern the tendency, widespread in European debate, to measure the value of our choices almost exclusively through the perspective of other centres of power.

Forms of cultural and strategic dependence ultimately harm those who accept them first. Remembering that European civilisation, and Italian civilisation in particular, contributed decisively to the creation of ideas such as empire, law, politics, and institutions does not mean living in nostalgia. It means recovering awareness of one’s historical heritage.

No nation can live only on its past; yet without the memory of its own contribution to history, it becomes difficult to imagine an autonomous role in the future.

LGBTQ+ Rights, Civilizations, and a Multipolar World

I have devoted only limited attention on my blog to the subject of LGBTQ+ rights. This is neither an oversight nor an attempt to distance myself from the respect owed to every human being. It is a deliberate methodological choice. The articles addressing this topic are not among the 333 essays that will remain permanently available because I consider the issue to be closely linked to the historical evolution of a particular civilization and, above all, to the geopolitical transformations of the twenty-first century.

Contemporary debate often presents civil rights as the natural destination of history. Yet history teaches us that no political idea emerges in a vacuum. Every right, every institution, and every concept of freedom develops within a specific cultural, religious, and philosophical context.

The contemporary understanding of LGBTQ+ rights has largely developed within the Western world as part of a broader historical process that gradually placed the individual at the center of the legal and political order. Greek philosophy, Roman law, Christianity, Humanism, the Enlightenment, and modern constitutionalism all contributed—each in its own way—to the formation of a culture in which the individual came to be regarded as the holder of rights capable of limiting the power of the state.

Within this historical framework came the decriminalization of homosexuality, its removal from psychiatric classifications, and, more recently, the recognition of civil unions and, in several countries, same-sex marriage.

This does not mean, however, that the same historical development is interpreted in the same way by every civilization.

In many societies, the relationship between the individual and the community follows different principles. Family, religion, tradition, authority, or social cohesion may be regarded as values that take precedence over individual autonomy. This is not necessarily a question of being more or less advanced. Rather, it reflects different conceptions of the human person and of the individual's place within society.

For this reason, I believe the most important question is not whether LGBTQ+ rights are right or wrong. Such a question inevitably leads to ideological confrontation. A more meaningful question is whether these rights should be regarded as universal principles or whether they represent one possible expression of Western modernity.

This question becomes even more relevant in an era marked by the gradual redistribution of global power. For several centuries, the West exercised sufficient political, economic, and cultural influence to spread not only its technologies and institutions but also its understanding of liberty and individual rights.

Today, that predominance appears far less certain. The rise of new economic and political powers, the emergence of a more multipolar international system, and the growing autonomy of many regions suggest that the twenty-first century may be characterized by the coexistence of different cultural models, none of which is likely to establish unquestioned global dominance.

It is precisely in this context that the most significant question arises.

What would happen if the West were no longer the dominant civilization? What if its cultural narrative became merely one among many—or even a subordinate one within the international order? Would the civil rights developed throughout Western history continue to be regarded as universal, or would they gradually be reinterpreted through different conceptions of society?

This question also concerns the future of Western democracies themselves. Rights do not exist independently of history. They depend on institutions, public consensus, and political and cultural balances. If these balances change profoundly, it is reasonable to ask whether the hierarchy of values may also evolve.

This is neither a prediction nor a wish. It is simply a historical question. No civilization has remained dominant forever. No international order has proved permanent. Every major shift in the balance of power has also transformed the language of rights, freedoms, duties, and political legitimacy.

Perhaps the defining question of the twenty-first century will not be which values should prevail, but whether humanity will succeed in establishing a minimal set of shared principles or whether the future will be shaped by the coexistence of different civilizations, each preserving its own understanding of freedom, dignity, community, and justice.

Rather than offering definitive answers, this reflection invites us to acknowledge the complexity of the age in which we live. And complexity, more than certainty, is the proper starting point for any serious historical and philosophical inquiry.

Sleep and Have Luck

My father often used to say a phrase that, when I was young, sounded almost like a provocation: “Sleep and have luck.”

As the years passed, however, my experiences, the books I have read, and above all the many human stories I have encountered led me to recognize that behind that simple saying there was a profound truth.

Hard work, education, talent, and perseverance are certainly important elements, but they do not always fully explain the destiny of individuals. Life contains a silent and unpredictable factor, one that is often ignored in the stories of success: luck.

We only need to observe many unexpected careers, many social rises that began in poor neighborhoods, and many transformations of ordinary people into successful entrepreneurs, influential figures, or public personalities. Behind some of these stories there are certainly ability and sacrifice, but there is often something else as well: a chance encounter with the right person at the right moment; an opportunity that appears unexpectedly; someone else’s mistake that opens a door; a favorable circumstance that completely changes the course of a life.

Yet society often tends to describe success as if it were always the exclusive result of individual merit. It is a comforting narrative because it suggests that those who reach the top did so only because they worked harder than everyone else. Reality, however, is usually far more complex. Two people with similar abilities can experience completely different destinies simply because fortune placed them in different circumstances.

Even the biblical tradition does not seem to deny this mysterious dimension of human existence. In Psalm 127, we read:

"Unless the Lord builds the house,

the builders labor in vain.

Unless the Lord watches over the city,

the guards stand watch in vain.

In vain you rise early

and stay up late,

toiling for food to eat—

for He grants sleep to those He loves."

The meaning of the Psalm is not an invitation to laziness. It does not say that human beings should abandon effort or responsibility. Rather, it expresses something deeper: human effort alone cannot explain everything. There is a dimension beyond our control, called by faith grace, by philosophy chance, and by everyday language simply luck.

Perhaps my father, with a simple phrase, had understood a truth that economists, sociologists, and psychologists have later examined: human beings create their own opportunities, but they do not completely control the circumstances in which those opportunities become reality.

Therefore, “sleep and have luck” is not a celebration of passivity. It is a lesson in humility. It reminds those who reach great heights not to attribute everything to themselves, and it reminds those who remain behind that failure is not always the result of personal inadequacy.

Because in life we certainly need our hands to build, but sometimes we also need something that does not depend on our hands.

Perhaps this is why the wisdom of an old popular saying still survives: we must work, prepare ourselves, and strive — but we must also recognize that every human journey contains an unpredictable element.

The builders need their tools.

But sometimes, they also need a favorable wind.

Europe’s Limited Sovereignty After 1945

When, on a cold morning on 24 October 1945, Vidkun Quisling was executed at Oslo’s Akershus Fortress, many Europeans believed that the end of the Second World War had also marked the end of an era of collaborationist governments and regimes imposed by foreign powers. Liberation from Nazi-Fascist rule appeared to open the way towards a new political age based on representative democracy, popular sovereignty, and the self-determination of nations.

The reality of post-war Europe, however, was far more complex. The continent emerging from the conflict was not a Europe completely free to determine its own strategic choices: it was a divided continent, shaped by opposing spheres of influence, as became evident with the beginning of the Cold War.

In Eastern Europe, the presence of the Red Army led to the establishment of communist regimes closely linked to the Soviet Union. From Poland to Romania and Bulgaria, and in the newly created German Democratic Republic, governments existed that were formally national but politically integrated into Moscow’s sphere of influence. State sovereignty was therefore conditioned by the geopolitical balance created after the Allied victory.

Breznev and Honecker Kiss

Yet Western Europe was not entirely free from external constraints either. Countries that had emerged defeated from the war, especially Germany and Italy, found themselves in a unique position: on one side, they built democratic institutions based on free elections and constitutional systems; on the other, they operated within an international order in which the major strategic decisions were inevitably influenced by the victorious powers.

West Germany was created under the strong supervision and influence of the United States, Great Britain, and France, and its membership in NATO defined its strategic role until reunification in 1990. The Federal Republic of Germany was undoubtedly a democracy, but a democracy integrated into a specific international order, one largely shaped by Washington.

Italy’s post-war republic was born in a similar context. The Armistice of Cassibile in 1943 represented the decisive break with the Axis powers and the beginning of Italy’s alignment with the Allies, but it also left the country in a position of extreme political and military weakness. Post-war Italy had to rebuild its institutions while operating under the influence of the victorious powers.

The Atlantic choice, formalized by Italy’s accession to NATO in 1949, guaranteed security and stability during a period marked by the confrontation between the United States and the Soviet Union. At the same time, however, it inevitably limited Italy’s room for strategic autonomy. The presence of American military bases, even though integrated into the NATO framework, became one of the most visible aspects of this reality.

The  Three Masters

Nevertheless, the deepest issue does not concern only military matters, but also a political and cultural dimension: the gradual acceptance of a subordinate role within the international order. For decades, part of the Italian political class operated with the awareness that the major decisions regarding foreign policy, security, and economics were strongly influenced by forces beyond the national debate.

This does not mean denying the existence of Italian democracy, free elections, or political pluralism. It means recognizing that the democracies of post-war Europe developed within a precise geopolitical framework, in which national autonomy was inevitably connected to the requirements of international alliances.

The Italian political history of the second half of the twentieth century must therefore also be understood within this broader context. The confrontation between different political forces — from Christian Democracy to Socialists and Communists — took place within a world divided into opposing blocs. The events concerning relations with Tito’s Yugoslavia, the eastern border question, and the Treaty of Osimo demonstrate how national issues were often intertwined with much larger international dynamics.

The history of post-war Italy is therefore also the history of a constant search for balance between national sovereignty and membership in wider international systems. A challenge that does not concern Italy alone, but Europe as a whole.

The European turning point 

Today, Europe remains a major economic and political area, but it still does not represent an autonomous centre of power comparable to the United States or other global powers. The European Union possesses significant economic and regulatory influence, yet in many strategic fields — from security to energy, from technology to finance — it remains affected by external dynamics.

Within this framework, the United Kingdom, often considered less central after Brexit, continues to maintain a significant role thanks to the global importance of the City of London and its historical, diplomatic, and strategic connections with the Anglo-Saxon world.

The fundamental question of our time is therefore not only who formally governs states, but how much real freedom democracies still possess in determining their own destiny.

The history of Europe since 1945 can also be interpreted as the history of this permanent tension: between independence and interdependence, between declared sovereignty and exercised sovereignty.

The Brandenburg Gate and the Memory of Germany | Das Brandenburger Tor und die Erinnerung an Deutschland

The day after October 7, when I saw the Brandenburg Gate illuminated with the colors of the Israeli flag, I experienced a feeling that is difficult to explain rationally. It was as if that image had awakened another image, one that belonged to a Germany of more than eighty years ago, when the same monument stood beneath banners bearing the swastika.

I do not ask anyone to believe in reincarnation, metempsychosis, or the transmigration of souls. These belong to the realm of philosophy, religion, and personal experience, not historical proof. Yet I cannot deny that, whenever I write in German for a German-speaking audience, I often feel an inexplicable familiarity with that country and with that period of its history. It is as though fragments of a memory surfaced from somewhere beyond my own biography.

Perhaps they are nothing more than the product of imagination. Perhaps they are symbols created by the unconscious. Or perhaps they belong to what many Eastern traditions call the continuity of the soul through successive lives.

This idea is not foreign to German intellectual history. Hermann Hesse devoted much of his work to Indian philosophy, Buddhism, and the spiritual search that transcends a single earthly existence. The fascination with the East, with ancient traditions, and with questions about the destiny of the soul has always had a presence in European culture.

Even within National Socialist Germany there were figures, such as Heinrich Himmler, who cultivated highly unorthodox beliefs and developed ideas connected to ancient symbols and historical figures. These beliefs, which were often distorted and placed at the service of a destructive ideology, nevertheless demonstrate how powerful the human search for origins, identity, and transcendence can be.

Within my own reflections, two names often emerge: Ernst Kölle and Albert von Berrer. I cannot demonstrate that they have anything to do with me. They may simply represent symbols through which my mind tries to understand history. But if they continue to "speak" to me, their message is not about war, revenge, or nostalgia for the Third Reich.

Their message concerns Germany itself.

For decades, Germany has carried the enormous moral burden of the crimes committed under National Socialism. That responsibility cannot and should not be forgotten. Historical memory is an essential safeguard against repeating the darkest chapters of the past. Yet memory should not become a permanent sentence imposed on an entire nation, preventing it from moving forward.

Since 1945, humanity has witnessed many other wars, genocides, persecutions, and humanitarian tragedies. History did not end with the fall of Berlin. The challenge of our time is to preserve historical responsibility without reducing the identity of a people to the crimes of a single regime.

Sometimes contemporary Germany appears to search for its moral and political identity through very strong symbolic gestures. These gestures may be interpreted in different ways, but they reveal a country still seeking the right balance between remembrance, responsibility, and the confidence to look toward the future.

Aristotle taught that virtue lies in the mean, avoiding excess in either direction. This ancient lesson remains surprisingly relevant today.

If those impressions are more than imagination—if they truly represent echoes of lives lived before—then they cannot exist merely to awaken memories. Memory, by itself, serves no purpose unless it becomes wisdom.

Their meaning, as I understand it, is not to reopen the wounds of history or to seek revenge for the past, but to encourage Germany to rediscover the best of its own tradition: its culture, its philosophy, its scientific spirit, its sense of discipline and responsibility, and its capacity to contribute to European civilization.

A Germany that is strong without being aggressive, conscious of its history without being imprisoned by it, and capable of inspiring Europe not through domination but through example.

Europe does not need a Germany trapped by its past, nor a Germany that forgets it. It needs a Germany capable of leading with confidence, responsibility, and moderation together with the other European nations.

The European Union remains one of the greatest political experiments in history. It can become a true reality only if it becomes not merely a union of institutions and financial interests, but a genuine community of peoples.

An Europe capable of cooperating with all its allies while preserving its own political, cultural, and strategic autonomy. An Europe that is not built only by elites and economic mechanisms, but by citizens who recognize themselves in a common destiny.

If there is indeed a mission entrusted to each generation—or, for those who believe in reincarnation, to each soul returning to the world—it is not to revive the conflicts of the past, but to transform memory into wisdom and history into a foundation for a more balanced, peaceful, and human future.

Who Imports the Third World Eventually Becomes the Third World

The sentence is deliberately provocative:

"Who imports the Third World eventually becomes the Third World."

Taken literally, it is an oversimplification. Yet, beneath its rhetorical force lies a question that deserves serious consideration: to what extent can a civilization absorb large-scale migration without being transformed by it?

History suggests that every civilization is shaped not only by its territory or institutions but also by the values, customs, expectations and civic habits of those who compose it.

Migration, therefore, is never merely a movement of people. It is also the movement of cultures, legal traditions, social norms and religious identities.

This is neither inherently good nor inherently bad. It is simply a historical fact.

The Roman Empire offers one of the most frequently cited examples. Modern historians generally agree that Rome did not fall because of a single invasion or a single migration. Economic decline, political instability, military overextension, demographic changes and internal fragmentation all contributed to its collapse. Yet the gradual settlement of Germanic peoples within the Empire became one element of a much broader process in which Rome progressively lost its capacity to integrate newcomers into a common civic identity.

The lesson is not that migration inevitably destroys civilizations. Rather, civilizations decline when they lose the confidence, institutions and cultural cohesion necessary to integrate change on their own terms.

More recently, historians such as Arnold Toynbee argued that civilizations rarely disappear because of external enemies alone. They weaken first from within, when their ruling classes cease to respond creatively to new challenges. Samuel Huntington, although controversial, warned that cultural identities would become increasingly significant in the post-Cold War world. Economist Paul Collier has likewise argued that immigration can generate enormous benefits when it occurs at a pace compatible with successful integration, but it may also create social tensions if numbers exceed a society's capacity to absorb newcomers.

Europe now faces precisely this dilemma.

The continent needs workers because of demographic ageing and declining birth rates. At the same time, several European countries struggle to integrate large migrant communities. In some urban areas, educational disadvantage, unemployment, parallel social structures and residential segregation remain persistent challenges. Security authorities also continue to monitor the threat posed by violent Islamist radicalisation, while making clear that only a small minority of Muslims embraces extremist ideologies.

None of these observations justifies hostility toward immigrants as individuals. Millions contribute positively to European societies through work, entrepreneurship, scientific research and public service.

Nevertheless, neither compassion nor good intentions can substitute for effective public policy.

Successful immigration requires functioning borders, respect for the rule of law, shared civic values, language acquisition, access to employment and a reciprocal willingness to integrate. Without these conditions, immigration risks becoming not a source of renewal but a source of fragmentation.

This debate should therefore be separated from conspiracy theories such as the alleged "Kalergi Plan." Whether such theories are true or false changes little about the demographic, economic and cultural transformations that Europe is experiencing today. Those transformations are measurable and deserve to be discussed rationally rather than emotionally.

Richard von Coudenhove-Kalergi

The future remains open.

Europe may demonstrate that liberal democracies possess the strength to integrate newcomers while preserving their constitutional principles and cultural identity.

Or it may discover that societies unable to transmit their own civic culture gradually cease to remain the societies they once were.

History offers no guarantees.

It merely reminds us that every civilization is ultimately shaped less by the people who arrive than by the confidence—or the uncertainty—with which it responds to their arrival.

There Is Nobody at the Helm

I expected earth-shattering revelations.

Instead, the Truth turned out to be far more ordinary than I had imagined.

The shock was even greater than the one I experienced when I spoke with cemetery workers and learned that, after years on the job, they gradually stop reacting to the smell of death the way everyone else does. An almost unnatural sense of normality that quietly dismantled years of Gothic tales about ghosts, haunted places, and sinister presences. Just the occasional will-o'-the-wisp rising from the gases of decomposition beneath the graves. No vampires. No werewolves. No shadow silently watching from the darkness.

There remains, of course, that subtle feeling of being observed. But how much of it belongs to reality, and how much is simply the extraordinary power of our own imagination?

I explored the world of conspiracy theories searching for the King of the World—or at least for some hidden global directorate capable of explaining every major event with a single master plan.

What I found was something far less cinematic.

A ship without a captain.

The helm exists, but no one is holding it.

Instead, countless ropes and pulleys pull it from every direction. Some forces reinforce one another. Others cancel each other out. Still others prevail only for a stretch before new balances emerge and alter the course once again.

At one point, I even regretted not studying vectors more carefully in mathematics. They would probably help me understand the world's trajectory far better than many esoteric books ever could.

It is a less fascinating image than the myth of an all-powerful puppet master.

But it is also a far more convincing one.

It comforts me to know that not even history's first trillionaire will ever be able to purchase immortality. And that no structure of power, however sophisticated, can completely eliminate black swan events—the rare and unexpected moments that reshape history precisely because no one saw them coming.

Perhaps that is where freedom still survives.

In the cracks.

Between the ropes that tighten and loosen.

Among the pulleys that have learned to steer the ship toward preferred directions, yet remain incapable of controlling every variable.

In the end, the greatest discovery was not finding the helm.

It was realizing that there is nobody at the helm.

The Door I Never Knocked On

I was tempted to knock.

I'm not the kind of person who gets invited in. I don't have the right surname, nor have I ever excelled at anything that couldn't easily be dismissed as noise or vanity. The circumstances of my birth were such that very few would have bet on me ending up where I am today.

Everything seemed to conspire toward my failure: the family I was born into, the human outskirts in which I grew up, a personality that was reserved in some ways and excessive in others. The rest was my own doing. I was never truly a friend to anyone—not even to myself whenever I mistook wishful thinking for genuine goals.

Realistic goals become visible only when the center of the compass is steady. Only then do we know the widest arc we can draw with the pencil at its other end. Without that fixed center, every project risks becoming little more than fantasy.

Yet I kept moving forward without a square, without an apron, without a trowel, and without a plumb line. I moved instinctively, like a river finding its course wherever gravity allowed the water to flow, never really knowing where it would eventually lead.

That is why I thought about knocking on a certain door.

Only later did I understand that the most important work is always an individual one. In the corridors of life, we speak far more to ourselves than to anyone else. We ask questions of ourselves far more often than we ask them of others, trying to make the best use of the cards that fate has placed in our hands.

Shortcuts? Networks? Preferential treatment? Memberships? Recommendations?

Perhaps all of that would have made sense if I could go back twenty-five years. Even then, I suspect I would eventually have discovered that what we call synchronicity is often nothing more than chance, and that our fortunate moment may arrive regardless of the lodge, the association, or the committee we happen to belong to.

And besides, what does it really mean to reach the top?

Far better to pursue clear, attainable goals from the place where we actually stand, knowing that every destination reached simply becomes the starting point for the next journey.

Esotericism has never truly interested me. To my eyes, it is often just a more refined and elegant way of building symbolic systems that, all too easily, drift away from reality—much like ideologies and religions do whenever they stop inviting people to question themselves and begin asking only for belief.

There has always been only one smorfia—my own.

Everything else is just noise.

The Black Squares

The compass, the square, the trowel, and the plumb line are not relics from another age. They are timeless instruments for anyone who wishes to build a meaningful life.

The compass teaches that every expansion begins from a fixed center. Without a center, there is no geometry—only random movement. Every new circle we draw depends on the firmness of the point where the needle rests. The wider the circle becomes, the more important the stability of the center.

The square reminds us that every action eventually reveals its true shape. We may deceive appearances for a while, but we cannot indefinitely escape the geometry of consequences.

The trowel teaches that lasting achievements are built by joining what is divided. It is easy to destroy; it requires discipline to construct something that survives time.

The plumb line is perhaps the most unforgiving of all. It never argues, never accuses, never applauds. It simply reveals whether the structure remains upright. Gravity cannot be negotiated.

Then there is the checkered floor.

Many misunderstand its symbolism.

The white and black squares are not a simplistic opposition between good and evil. They are the landscape of reality itself. Life is made of light and shadow, certainty and ambiguity, success and failure, trust and suspicion. Anyone who pretends to walk only on white squares will eventually collide with reality.

The black squares exist because temptation exists.

They remind us that intelligence requires flexibility, that prudence sometimes demands silence, and that strategy is often wiser than confrontation. They teach us to observe before acting, to calculate before moving, and to distinguish between battles worth fighting and those better avoided.

Yet they also conceal the greatest illusion.

The illusion that intelligence is measured by our ability to escape consequences.

Many believe that true power consists in bypassing rules, manipulating institutions, deceiving others, or taking shortcuts whenever the opportunity appears. Some even dream of the perfect crime—a victory so complete that no one ever discovers it.

But this misunderstands where the deepest consequence takes place.

The greatest damage is rarely external.

It is internal.

Every dishonest victory silently shifts the center of the compass.

Every betrayal, even when applauded by success, slightly bends the plumb line.

Every shortcut that violates our own principles leaves an invisible crack in the foundation upon which future achievements must stand.

No judge may condemn us.

No newspaper may expose us.

History itself may never remember what happened.

Yet something essential has already changed.

The person who returns from that action is no longer identical to the one who entered it.

Character is not destroyed by public scandals.

It is transformed by private decisions.

The perfect crime, if it could ever exist, would still fail because it cannot erase its deepest witness: the one who committed it.

We become the first victim of our own deception.

The world may continue exactly as before.

Our reputation may remain untouched.

Our wealth may increase.

Our influence may expand.

Yet the center has moved.

And once the center moves, every future circle carries the distortion further outward.

The true strategist understands something deeper.

Power is not the freedom to do anything.

Power is the freedom to remain oneself while possessing the ability to do otherwise.

The strongest individual is not the one who has never encountered darkness, but the one who has crossed it without allowing darkness to redefine the center from which every future decision will emerge.

The black squares are therefore not permissions.

They are examinations.

They ask only one question:

"Can you remain the same person after obtaining what you desired?"

If the answer is yes, then the journey has strengthened you.

If the answer is no, then the greatest loss occurred long before anyone else could notice.

Even if the perfect crime existed, it would never be perfect.

Because every deception committed against the world ultimately becomes a deception committed against the architect within ourselves.

I Have Erased My Past | Ho cancellato il mio passato

I have erased my past. I have even erased the idea of being an underdog. Labels are for those who need to justify their story; I prefer to write my future.

People sometimes ask me why I never entered politics. My answer is simple: because I do not believe that the most important decisions are made there anymore. Too often, national politics seems to manage the details while the major choices are shaped elsewhere, by economic, financial, and geopolitical forces that lie beyond the control of individual governments.

Journalist Matteo Gracis summed up this feeling with a provocative metaphor: in Rome, they only decide "the shape of the dog's kennel." Whether one agrees or disagrees, the image captures the growing sense that political power has become increasingly limited.

That is why I have no desire to pursue a political career. I would rather devote my time to something I consider freer and more enduring: ideas.

A member of Parliament serves for a term. An idea can survive for generations.

I write in Italian, but I no longer write only for Italians. Artificial intelligence and machine translation have torn down one of humanity's last great barriers: language. Today, an article written at the foot of Mount Vesuvius can be read, discussed, and challenged in New York, Tokyo, Buenos Aires, or Johannesburg within minutes.

For decades, we were told that to be heard we had to belong to major newspapers, prestigious universities, or political parties. That is no longer true.

Today, what truly matters is having something worth reading.

Ideas do not ask for permission. They cross borders, ignore flags, and outlive governments.

That is why I chose to write instead of building a political career.

Governments have an expiration date. Ideas do not.

The Vesuvian Paradox

I have also chosen to stop writing about the thirteen municipalities that are part of the Vesuvius National Park. In many ways, I consider this debate even less meaningful than the discussion surrounding Italian politics.

Across many parts of the world—including other regions of Italy—a national park is regarded as an opportunity: a catalyst for sustainable development, environmental protection, cultural identity, and tourism. The Vesuvius area, however, often seems trapped in a different mindset. Public debate is still largely focused on the restrictions imposed by living in a volcanic protected area, with complaints about limits on new construction and the regulations required to renovate and modernize the existing building heritage.

Too often, the vision for the future appears to be linked to a return to an economy mainly driven by construction, as happened in previous decades, rather than to the search for new models of growth. In my view, this reflects an inability to fully recognize the extraordinary potential of a territory that has global historical, natural, and cultural value.

For this reason, the articles I published about the individual municipalities of the Vesuvian area have either been removed or will remain online only temporarily. They belong to a previous phase of this blog and no longer represent its future direction.

The only content I have decided to keep is a link discussing a possible alternative vision for the management and development of the Vesuvius National Park. I have kept it primarily as a matter of personal conscience, as a testimony to the fact that different approaches are possible. However, I do not believe that the current local political environment has the capacity to seriously embrace such a proposal, given the limitations that have characterized much of its public leadership.

Irrilevanza italiana | Italy's Irrelevance

Alla fine di giugno, il 24 giugno, ho deciso di eliminare dal blog tutti gli articoli dedicati ai partiti politici italiani. Alcuni ne conservano ancora traccia sulla pagina Facebook, ma sul blog non fanno più parte del progetto.

Non è stata una cancellazione impulsiva, bensì una scelta editoriale. Ho preferito concentrare il mio lavoro su temi che considero più duraturi e di respiro internazionale, anziché sull'attualità della politica italiana, destinata a cambiare rapidamente.

Il blog sta assumendo un'identità diversa: non vuole essere un commentario della cronaca politica nazionale, ma uno spazio capace di parlare a lettori di qualsiasi Paese. Per questo ho scelto di eliminare molti contenuti che appartenevano alla fase iniziale del progetto e di orientare definitivamente il blog verso argomenti di interesse più ampio e universale.