“The change of the guard”, “The delivery of the witness”, “the generational passage”, all expressions that, especially in politics, represent a very indigestible concept for those who command. In Italy, at least until the advent of renzism, the theme had never been placed with such clarity. The “scrapping”, the workhorse of the very first Matteo Renzi, represented, more than anything else, a real political manifesto for generation X (those born from 1965 to 1980). But on closer inspection, it was more an enunciation than a concrete fact. Renzism, in fact, introduced some new liturgies – first of all, the “leopolde” – which, however, at the eclissation of the Florentine leader, were put aside in a hurry. Renzism, as it came, left. Everyone had seen him arrive and everyone saw him set. The Renzian renewal was marginal and, in any case, today, after fifteen years, that of that Renzian ruling class has remained very little. The Renzian season has inherited the “reformist” component in the Democratic Party “liberal-democratic”, which limits itself to acting as a counterpoint to the most left wing of the party. The “scrapping” was a more announced revolution than practiced.

In politics – and especially in Italy – the best revolutions are never announced. They leave under the trace and then, when they succeed, it is good that they are never appealed as “revolutions”. It is not well. Someone could have badly. There is a certain etiquette of power that foresees that the new one that advances must be, in some way, accompanied by the old man who has advanced. There must be a scenic fiction, so that the passage of the witness for the benefit of the media and the public is represented.

Dario Franceschini magician of the new one who advances

In the Democratic Party specialist of these maneuvers is Dario Franceschini, long -term politician and leader of the area component. Already multi-minister, secretary of the Democratic Party and, above all, twilight writer. His skill is to know how to stage the new one. When the Democratic Party stagnates and nothing seems to be on the horizon, Franceschini knows how to create and narrate change. The first time was in 2009 when, which took over from Walter Veltroni to the secretary of the Democratic Party and having the need to revive the democratic community from the mourning for the abandonment of the secretary, he invented “the new one that advances” in Rome, during the National Assembly of the Circles of the Democratic Party, went up a young Friulian provincial councilor, such Debora Serracchiani. It was March 21, 2009. Spring. Shortly thereafter, Serracchiani, after several hosted around the national mainstream media, was candidate for the European Championships and began his high -profile political career. Of all his speech of over thirteen minutes, in which he asked for the renewal of the ruling class, very little remained, now co -opted by the party corpaccion.

Elly Schlein’s climb

On the occasion of the latest primaries of the Democratic Party Franceschini he redone the magic: he pulled out of the cylinder again “the new one that advances”. Elly Schlein who loves to say “You haven’t heard of us”. And here it is necessary to pay attention to a discrimination: unlike generation X, the generation Y of which you are part – or “millenials” that you want – does not announce the revolutions, but is limited to making them. More than anything else, it is striking, as an element of discontinuity, the coldness with which the secretary Schlein is recovering the ties with those who have allowed her to rise to the party command. An operation of extreme coldness and great effectiveness. In addition to a certain ability to create a ruling class held together by an almost generational pact around it. Let’s take them out waiting for them to eliminate themselves. We are stopped and these self -employ them for reaching age limits. Because now out of context and unable to be in step with the times.

The patriarchal paternism of Romano Prodi

And the operation, on closer inspection, is succeeding. See, for example Romano Prodi who, repeatedly spicy for the fact that the secretary Schlein has not consulted it enough, avoiding drinking in the cotanta source is wisdom and political wisdom, makes a great fool on a national scale. The video that sees Prodi pulling the hair to Mediaset’s journalist is embarrassing and hateful. And it is the plastic representation of an old paternalist and male chauvinist generation who shows no respect for a professional who, beyond the more or less correct question he asks, is carrying out his work. And you can’t touch it, let alone touch your hair with astioso. A man who touches a woman’s hair in that way is a tombstone on his public image. And it is only because it is the noble father of the olive tree that harsh criticisms do not come from the left. It was a center -right exponent, at this hour there would have been demonstrations in the square. In Italy, on the other hand, only the passage can decree the passage of the witness. Romano Prodi is, as we would say today, too “cringe” to be true. Spened up by time and a new culture that cannot bear that violently paternalistic gesture (as close as the concept of patriarchy, among other things) against a journalist who is legitimately asking a question. Would the professor ever allowed himself to pull the mustache or the tuft to a journalist? An even more embarrassing situation, just to remain within the center -left, of the theft of the perfume at the duty free of Fiumicino airport by Piero Fassino. The latter perhaps the victim of a cleptomaniac tendency, that, the professor, now outside the lumen of the self -control.

Much more poetic – on the other hand it is a writer of discreet talent – Dario Franceschini who, from his workshop in the Esquiline district – what a romantic image, almost Morettian – perhaps precisely to mark the distance from Prodi’s so inappropriate behavior towards a woman, leaves with the proposal to make a law to give children the surname of the mother. So as to compensate women for centuries of abuses. An hyperbole perhaps, but which has a certain momentum. Especially for a leader who perhaps, on the viale del sunset, wants to leave a trace of discontinuity with the past. From Patriarchate to matriarchy, passing through a strand of hair.