Abstract

For some time now in Italy there has been talk of an “institutional crisis.” It is one of those few things on which the powers that be and public opinion, left and right, agree. The term refers to a crisis of democratic institutions, in short, of democracy. When did it begin, what is its nature, when and if will it end?

1968 should be considered as the starting point of this so-called institutional crisis: it was the culminating point of challenges by the younger generation. One of the most characteristic aspects of these challenges, and likewise the most deleterious in terms of the political miseducation of youth, was a contempt for the democratic rules of the game.