Saying definitively no, for precautionary reasons, to the idea of granting Italian citizenship to immigrants’ children, born in Italy, is like trying to stop the inevitable. It is a difficult, and useless, "no", especially if it is pronounced by the most tenacious and obstinate defenders of the constitutional reform which, since a few years, has established that the children of Italian emigrants, who left our country a long time ago, may automatically become Italian citizens. And these people have never paid taxes, have been never called up for military service, when it was compulsory and, in most of the cases, they do not even speak our language. On the contrary, the children of immigrant families go to Italian schools, have Italian friends, support Italian football teams, speak, sometimes with many difficulties, Italian and, most importantly, will spend in Italy their future. Such a "no" is a refusal that clashes with history and, therefore, will be executed by time. However, because for a country the time necessary to implement a reform is important, in this case too, it is essential to understand the reasons lying behind a refusal that seems totally absurd. According to the illuminating words expressed by MP Federico [...]

The Dream Act signed last Saturday by Jerry Brown, the governor of California, allows irregular foreign but deserving students to benefit from public grants. Through this Act, California takes a stand in the power play concerning immigration, which has paralyzed and divided the US over the last years. As for other States, such as Arizona, Georgia, Utah, Indiana, South Carolina and Alabama, they decided to stand on the other side of the fence. Undoubtedly, the decision taken by the Orange County, the richest and most populous state in the US, represents a qualitative leap, an actual turning point. First of all, indeed, because it determines an acceleration of the political struggle on a key topic, such as immigration, for next year presidential election campaign. The Congress has certainly no intention to take now any decision on this matter. Thus, California overcame the long lasting stalemate that punished also the “hawk”, George Bush. Secondly, the Dream Act is particularly important because it underlines the contrasts existing not only "between" the two main competing political parties, but also within them. This is evident from the scathing criticisms against the republican governor of Texas, Rick Perry. He was considered guilty for agreeing with [...]

An extraordinary revolution is changing the face and nature of immigration in the US. The great wave of migration from Mexico that for decades has broken any sort of barrier and prohibition, increasing the percentage of workforce in the wealthy and ravenous North American economy, suddenly stopped. Between 2010 and the first months of 2011, indeed, for the first time in sixty years, the net of migration flows from Mexico to the US is equal to zero, or even negative. This is what the expert Douglas S. Massey, from Princeton University, says. Such a change is better testified by numbers. In 2010 the number of illegal Mexican board crossers and visa violators was 100000, whereas between 2000 and 2004 it was 600000. At the same time, the statistical agencies of Mexico City registered in the country  4,000,000 citizens more than those previously assumed on the basis of the historical trends of emigration to North. What happened? And why did the doors of the biggest world vector start to open in the opposite direction? First of all, this is due to the income improvement of Mexican households (+45% compared with [...]

The Prohibition as a strategy to fight drug addiction turns 40. The famous conference where President Richard Nixon declared war on drugs dates back, indeed, to June 17th, 1971. At that time Nixon announced to the world his decision to attack America's public enemy number one, drug abuse. It was an actual general crusade without prisoners, carried out by the Drug Enforcement Agency, in the name of the holy principle of prohibition. 40 years later, we can say with certainty that things did not go as the then tenant of the White House hoped. The prohibition, indeed, was not able to move with the times and it represents a complete failure. This is the reason why according to “The Atlantic” if every president has expanded it, Obama should end it. He should but, unfortunately, we are quite sure that he will not. The reasons why he should say stop to the Prohibition are simple. Almost everyone agrees that, instead of reducing drug abuse, the Prohibition has seriously complicated addicts’ life and it has significantly increased the profits of drug dealers. In this regard, it is very interesting what the Global Commission Report says. The most important passages of the document were [...]

Immigration cannot be considered as a solution to the current demographic crisis. This is what emerges from the data published yesterday by the Italian National Institute of Statistics (ISTAT). According to these data, indeed, in 2010, despite an increase of population, related mainly to the presence of immigrants, Italy reported another drop in the number of new-born children. Such a result shows clearly that it is wrong to think that the fast ageing of Italian population was in a first moment stopped and then overturned by the high fertility of immigrants. This trick, used by political and academic rhetoric, may confuse even more a public opinion that is already afraid and disoriented. Talking about a complicate and potentially explosive subject as immigration, the biggest mistake we can make is to consider it as a miraculous event. Such a situation, indeed, does not reflect the reality citizens are in contact with. As well as most of the biggest industrialised countries, Italy has a low birth rate. But it is interesting to notice that this value is the result of a double, extraordinary phenomenon. It is true, indeed, that the number of new-born children is low, but, at the same time, we [...]

While the Schengen Agreement is now gathering vetoes, disputes and discontent, the European institutions remain silent. Such a situation may cause a real paralysis. This hypothesis is reinforced by the inconclusive meeting held yesterday among the Ministers of Home Affairs and Justice of the 27 member states. The meeting was, indeed, opened and closed in a few hours without producing any result. Dum Romae consolitur, Saguntum expugnatur (While in Rome it is deliberated, Sagunto is assaulted). Here is a warning of the ancient history which today may become the outline of a concrete, threatening prophecy for the increasingly uncertain future of the EU. In such a context, we run the risk of facing a default of political leadership adding up to already uneasy economic situations (especially in Greece and Portugal). The recent tendency to criticise and try to change a system of rules created in the Eighties and entered into force more than fifteen years ago is in itself a crime of lese-majesty. First of all because the Schengen Agreement was legitimately recognised by each of the national administrations. And especially because a complex and tricky subject such as that of the rules regulating border controls and the free movement [...]

No migratory tsunami from Libya will hit the southern coast of Italy. At least in the times, ways and proportions forecast by the keyed-up predictions that have been concerning the Italian public opinion. An actual oversight maybe due to an excess of caution of the Ministry of the Interior, which in the past was unprepared to face unexpected emergencies. Such as the “human discharge” from Albania which in a night away back in the first 1990s overflowed the city of Bari and its surroundings. However, it is undoubted that much, or very much, of the excessive alarm over the migratory disaster was generated by a vague and rough analysis of the situation. Because of at least two reasons. The first one is that Libya is a huge but depopulated country. Around 6 million people, more or less the people living in Rome and the surroundings, live in a territorial extension which is equal to the sum of those of England, France, Spain, Italy, Germany, The Netherlands and Belgium together. Many of them are foreign immigrants looking for work. Not only from the neighbouring nations but even from China. And in these hours they are all trying to come back home storming [...]

The European Right, both moderate and extremist, has taken up the hatchet on multiculturalism. Merkel, Cameron, Le Penn(daughter), along with the Left, divided, that grinds its teeth or shrugs its shoulders. A scenario which does not look very promising, considering the actual complexity of the issue. But, especially, because a misunderstanding that has never been sorted out lies at the bottom of many of the current problems. What are we talking about? Multiculturalism means not one thing but two different things. The first one concerns existential, behavioural, lifestyle and creed diversities of the citizens of modern society, which has been made more open and vibrant by immigration. The second thing is of political nature, and here is where problems begin. It concerns the strategy of political administration which allowed, stimulated and institutionalized the transformation of diversities from an individual right into a tribal brand. Giving green light to the calamitous increase of many, distinct and separate communities, according to their creed, ethnic group and culture. In the first case we are talking about individual citizens and open society. In the second case we are talking about a patchwork of groups, which is homogeneous inside, on paper, but actually is armoured on [...]

Among the thousands revolutions produced by the Internet there is one that everybody continues to pretend not to see. The online upheaval of the border among love dreams, sexual fantasies and prostitution. Indeed, thanks to the Internet, even the world of passions has globalized and we can ask and obtain anything, remaining seated at our own PC desks in every corner of the world. Chance encounters, marriage proposals and sexual performances of any kind, above all. With men and women of every race, colour, nationality and creed. That is nothing new, but the phenomenon has been staggeringly accelerating its expansion over the last times. As it has been lately demonstrated by the resounding registration campaign on advance booking for the official opening of the website www.loueunepetiteamie.com on the next 31 January. This website offers and promises a companion to rent for those who long for her. With a simple online reservation of girls in the flesh through hour booking and with reasonable prices, for encounters of different types: a quick coffee chat, restaurant, cinema or an entire weekend. Leaving aside the criticism and, above all, the disguised, but not less obnoxious, inducement to prostitution, the novelty is evident. Because it allows, [...]

We should be grateful to the director of Caritas of Veneto region, don Dino Pistolato, for his courageous “no” to the government decree on the entry of 100 thousand new immigrants in Italy this year. Because he said out loud what many people think to themselves. With an economic crisis which shows no improvements, the worst unemployment levels in decades and the incomes which are left at the post, also for the luckiest, it is really difficult for our alarmed public opinion to convince itself that we need new foreign manpower. Only a totally self-referential bureaucracy, faraway from reality, can pretend not to see the problem, continuing, as it has been doing for twenty years, the annual raffle of the immigrants who are necessary for the market. The truth is that, as the endless and unique chain of regularizations promoted by the Italian government, thinking to rule immigration by means of annual quotas not only is politically risky, but also operatively ineffective. Because it increases the already critical level of social alarm and, at the same time, is not able to bridle the insatiable voracity of new workforce from companies and families. Like any other phenomenon regulated by the “invisible hand [...]