I took a look at the systems of government in other countries, including a few infographics on the U.S. system, for which I’ve included the references below.
Meanwhile, as far as Italy is concerned, in order to put into practice all my good intentions, and hopefully those of as many 'awakened' people as possible, priority must be given to reforms that
protect legitimate governments from possible interference by other institutions that are alien to a modern concept of politics, where instead I find that in our and many other countries the normal 'weights' of politics are decisively counterbalanced by those of certain military elites. To explore this topic further, it would be useful to conduct separate comparative analyses with the organization of government systems in other countries that are more capable of maintaining more effective rule of law, such as the more strictly parliamentary republics than Italy, a country which, as we will see below, does not represent these cases. Of course, we must always bear in mind, as history teaches us, the inherently evolutionary nature of politics itself, and meanwhile, among others, take a look at the various
institutional competences and
related entities of the United States political system. This, of course, is regardless of the fact that governments themselves can 'do damage'. However, upon closer analysis of the Italian case,
I do not know to what extent the Constituent Assembly of 1946 wanted the figure of the President of the Republic 'essentially' as a representative of national unity (essentially of Italians) and as an 'arbitrator' or guarantor of the Constitution without any further extension of powers, given that we must carefully consider its historical and current form, where he has a whole series of
functions (and
here is an overview), established in different parts of the current Constitution, which favor his role as an actor of
interference in political action. Therefore, in my opinion, based on the organization of the Italian political system, these are powers that confer on the Head of State, real extra powers, which can be deduced from those that you will see
underlined in the list below. First of all, I invite you to seriously consider some of them: those of
Head of the Armed Forces (in other strictly parliamentary republics, this power is held by a President-Prime Minister) and
President of the Consiglio Superiore della Magistratura (an administrative body of self-government, with the exception of its president, of the judiciary).There are also other functions which, although 'indirectly', strengthen his role in
political decision-making, even though Article 89 of the Constitution requires ministers to countersign presidential acts. Then, some of his powers are a guarantee, some are 'with reservation', and some are not very significant. I will list them here for the benefit of most readers: he appoints one third of the members of the Constitutional Court, ratifies international treaties subject to parliamentary authorization, declares a state of war decided by the Chambers, can dissolve the Chambers, calls elections, appoints the Prime Minister and Ministers, appoints up to five senators for life, promulgates laws (with the possibility of sending them back to Parliament) and
issues decrees having the force of law and regulations, and authorizes the presentation of government bills to Parliament, calls referendums, and appoints certain high-ranking state officials. So,
given the powers given to him, which are concentrated in this monocratic institution (meaning it's a single body made up of just one person) and self-determined (there are no oversight mechanisms for his actions), which is currently the President of the Republic,
these often and unhindered result in powers of political direction, despite the fact that some, whether partisan or not, would have us believe otherwise: proof of this is the long history of various interferences in Italian politics by the Head of State, of which I will shortly mention some of the most recent and representative episodes. As I said before, I have my doubts on its definition as essentially a "representative" and an "arbitrator" or a "guarantor".
Various episodes in our history could therefore only confirm a power parallel to that of the government, Parliament, and the judiciary (among the most prominent examples I have gleaned from online AI sources are the mandates of Giovanni Gronchi, Francesco Cossiga, Oscar Luigi Scalfaro, Giorgio Napolitano, and Sergio Mattarella, to which I would add Carlo Azeglio Ciampi, who was in office during that sinister political period of the 'sinisters' , which I discussed in
this article). Besides
this article, which will please some and displease others, but here it is not the purpose of these interventions by the presidential institution that interests us now, but rather how these episodes, among the most recent, are very representative of the interference of heads of state (which is why I propose
radical reforms to this problem below), I leave here a brief list of historical analyses on the subject for those who wish to learn more, almost all English:
1,
2,
3,
4,
5,
6,
7,
8.
From the examination of that notorious period in European history as described therein, corroborated by significant statistical data from my own research that correlates forms of government around the world with the presence of more than one police force operating nationwide, given that in some countries the police are supplemented by a gendarmerie, we therefore have evidence that, in addition to the phenomenon of the spread of the Gendarmerie, the Presidents of the republics of those countries whose governments are organized in certain ways, such as Italy, also present aspects inherited from the monarchs of the Conservative Order, which in turn were inherited from Napoleon, and these presidents have powers of influence over the main institutional bodies, the government, parliament, and the judiciary: so I see
Italy's political system as having certain similarities with a semi-presidential republic, guess what? French-style, which has a diarchic structure in the management of executive power, split between the President of the Republic and the Prime Minister [external note], with some differences compared to France, where the President of the Republic is elected by the people, as is the National Assembly (part of Parliament along with the Senate), and his term of office has been reduced to 5 years⁹.
According to a definition that is
unfortunately widely accepted, Italy has a parliamentary republic form of government, as classified by Wikipedia itself, but, perhaps for reasons of brevity, it presents categories in general terms (the same entry in English has a few more), which gloss over the many variations/details that exist on a case-by-case basis (with the extreme case being that each state or community would be a category in itself), although this aspect is discussed in the text of the referenced entry. Moreover, in Italy, a nation with many dark, nuanced aspects, which no ruling class has ever escaped, and with which the Cupola generally 'wallow', our '
hybrid' political system presents shady areas that are unacceptable for a true republic. I would therefore define Italy as a parliamentary republic,
at least with reservations.
The issue is complex and of the utmost importance; however, first and foremost, we must thoroughly review the institutions of the Presidents of the Republics in certain nations: one option could be to replace them with collegial bodies (in some countries, such as Switzerland, there is a collegial directors' board that serves as both head of state and head of government, but it cannot be removed from office through a vote of no confidence), in a popular sense, with the aim of implementing, to borrow a metaphor that has gained some traction among those interested in politics (which, unfortunately, not many cultivate), a form of 'counterweight' to the other branches of government (in France, a sort of balance between its two executive bodies can only be expressed during periods of cohabitation, which are now much less likely after a reform of election schedules and the length of the presidents’ terms). Alternatively, following comparative analyses with other countries around the world where other forms of government have been tested to a reasonable extent, like Germany, Ireland, Iceland, India, and many Commonwealth nations that have maintained clearer distinctions between ceremonial and executive authority, we should consider whether the constitutional reform should go further, providing for a more 'parliamentary' reorganization, which would involve either a Head of State with a purely representative/ceremonial role, with executive power vested exclusively in a President-Prime Minister and his ministers, whose actions would be "scrutinized" by Parliament and other existing bodies (which I will mention), or the abolition of this institution. Therefore, in order to progress towards a more realistic Republic, in addition to the reform of the police force, institutional reforms of historic significance are needed for Italy and other nations that have been left behind.
Therefore, to move toward a more realistic republic, in addition to reforming law enforcement, we need institutional reforms of historic significance for Italy and other nations that have fallen behind.
Now, I am not an expert in some humanities discipline supported by legal scholars, political scientists, and other technical professionals useful for this purpose who truly have ideas for renewal (if only more people had them!), but in short, complex yet urgent issues arise, for which working committees had already been established during past legislative sessions to address such important matters, without ever managing to make concrete progress in a reform process. This is because the problem that proposals for major reforms have encountered so far, which have turned out to be inconclusive, is mainly due to the fact that one must take into account the procedure for approving constitutional amendment bills (under Article 138), which is more complex than that required for the approval of ordinary laws. It is important to respect the procedure, but at the same time these past experiences teach us that there is a risk of an indefinite deadlock; so the need for major reforms like these should bring all political factions seriously to the table, such as a constituent assembly (or what was called at the time a “bicameral” assembly), with greater capacity for synthesis to avoid impractical complexities, because this should be in the interest of all parties for the good of the people!
In this regard, this
fact sheet highlights some past attempts at constitutional reform.
Now, I am going to make here an empirical reasoning, that involves reforms revising Part 2 of the current Italian Constitution.
Therefore, starting from this 'confused' Italian political reality, in my opinion one of the priority solutions is a parliamentary appointment of governments without the presidential passage for the more or less "formal" appointment of the Prime Minister and Ministers, and the protection of their pre-established temporal stability, obviously regardless of their political 'color', naturally with maximum time limits for each term of office, but as we will see in more detail, in cases of re-election, I propose gradually decreasing periods. And since, regarding this matter, the current government (2026) is proposing the election of the Prime Minister by universal suffrage, and elsewhere we have cases of the direct election of a head of state (for example, in France), based on
what I discussed earlier regarding democracy, I have asked myself questions like: ignoring considerations regarding current characteristics and composition of a “people,” how much direct “people power” vs. expert or deliberative “qualified majority” power (e.g. a Parliament) should shape the executive? I discussed this topic with the AI;
here is the reference link.
Here I am dealing with urgent issues and calling for practical and effective proposals to be tested, and I repeat, without any political partisanship: I believe that the advantage of averting politically unacceptable external interference in the main political bodies is a priority.
Continuing the discussion, beyond comparisons with other 'demilitarized' nations, for the sake of brevity I will limit myself to considering the hypothesis, which, as already mentioned, is one of the possible options, that goes in the direction of a significantly 'parliamentary' republic, with the replacement of those historical functions that we have seen to be the prerogative of the President of the Italian Republic with more 'widespread' and 'dispersed' (but not too much so) bodies/entities.
Thus, in order to supervise the work of the executive and legislative powers, to begin with,
the relative balance of power between the government and parliament could be well modulated. Then, as regards who elects the Constitutional Court
², which is the most important institution guaranteeing the constitutionality of laws in Italy, an issue that I consider very delicate, in my (not so modest) opinion, the power of the President of the Republic to appoint one third of the members would either be abolished (in which case half of the members would be appointed by Parliament and the rest by the higher courts), or would be assigned to some collegial body of another legal nature competent to indicate personalities suitable for the guidelines referred to in note (
2a) (here, the same point applies that I made when discussing democracy in
another post, namely, a body including experts in the humanities); furthermore, speaking as a layperson, I would suggest that the Constitutional Court have the power to intervene on its own initiative in cases where it deems it necessary to do so. With regard to another sensitive issue, namely the need to 'mediate' or 'arbitrate' on the proper management of the constitutional autonomy of the judiciary, a role now assigned to the President of the Republic in his capacity as President of the
Consiglio Superiore della Magistratura, there would probably be more debate on how to replace this role: for example, whether by an individual or collegial body (in this case, a more collective presidency would add bureaucratic complexity), composed of whom, whether it would also be a supervisory body, and if collegial, whether composed of legal entities of different natures, etc. Similar questions apply to who would elect the president(s), since they would have to be elected by someone independent of the C.S.M. itself. A few words about the work of magistrates (but also lawyers, who I understand are rightly well paid; in my opinion, there should also be public lawyers who are equally well paid): their work requires, first and foremost, impeccable
moral integrity (as for intelligence services), and think about it, they play a highly responsible role (even more so in criminal proceedings), for some there is a high personal risk, combined with what I believe to be a very demanding commitment, so they must not only be paid a lot (as public doctors must be), but the judicial work organization must also ensure that possible (and perhaps currently probable) work overload is avoided (there is a technical term for this,
Occupational burnout): are there enough judges in Italy for the workload of the proceedings? No? Let's hire them with assistants and support staff. It's a matter of protecting those who already work and ensuring fair rights for everyone.
Having closed this parenthesis, continuing with the case of possible reforms towards a parliamentary republic, if some people, and currently it will not be a few, think that the abolition of the office of President of the Republic seems too much, I would say to them that consideration could be given to maintaining this institutional figure in a purely representative role for the nation.
For the sake of completeness with regard to the current institutional control bodies, I would like to mention also
other organs provided for in the Constitution in the
Italian political system (
here is more detailed in italian), which is summary, taken together, have jurisdictional, control, public audit, advisory, and executive powers (i.e., they can impose mandatory actions), such as the Council of State
³ (which is also the court of appeal for decisions of the Regional Administrative Courts) with regard to
administrative acts, the Court of Auditors
⁴ with jurisdiction over public accounting matters, and, at a more purely advisory and monitoring level, the National Council for Economics and Labor (CNEL)
⁵, with powers of legislative initiative and the faculty to contribute to the drafting of legislation on economic and social matters. it should be noted here that towards the end of 2016 this body came to the forefront of Italian public opinion, as its abolition was provided for in the Renzi-Boschi constitutional reform, which was then rejected by a constitutional referendum. The list of these bodies is completed by the
controversial Consiglio Supremo di Difesa ⁶.
In conclusion, I would like to mention cases in which binding consultative power is vested in the people, through the institution of the abrogative referendum and, in constitutional matters, through the institution of the confirmatory referendum on constitutional laws (for an overview, see this this
section of a Wikipedia entry).
If a more general revision were to be considered, moving towards a broader reform of the organization of at least certain parts of the Italian political system, I imagine a concerted effort by cleverly devised political bodies inspired by ideas such as control, guarantee, supervision, and mediation, by and between different public institutions, also including/reviewing more or less the current ones (for example, we have auditors),
with a possible Head of State having only representative/ceremonial functions,
and introducing where necessary arbitration panels similarly to probity arbitrators, juries, auditors and 'peer reviewers' without policy-making powers, and certainly without functions such as presiding over the Armed Forces and others such as those specifically underlined above with regard to the Head of State in its current form, all without overburdening the bureaucratic machine. Finally, I will not elaborate here on questions such as who controls the controllers (but then who controls the controllers of the controllers? Or: what mutual control mechanisms should be introduced? Etc.), since it is impossible to control everything, seeking a balanced synthesis so as not to undermine decision-making capacity and timing: we could simply say that it would be 'too much bureaucracy of bureaucracy'. Perhaps this will be the subject of a separate post with technical details, which I will link to here.
In addition, these desired reforms will provide for well-modulated limits on the number and duration of the mandates of a President-Prime Minister, as well as his or her overall term of office, in order to control potential autocratic tendencies. As for the length of terms of office, among my reflections, I’d like to throw out an alternative idea for consideration, with the benefit of the doubt, since, being an original concept, its potential effectiveness has not yet been tested. The idea is to set the term of a single Prime Minister, including cases of reappointment, divided into sub-periods of progressively decreasing duration, for example, 5 then 3 then 2 years, or 4-3-2-1, or 4-3-3 years: a longer duration at the start would account for the “start-up” phase, and subsequently decreasing durations would mark moments of review: if, after a certain period, the leader retains the voters’ confidence, they will be re-elected; otherwise, in the event of a new government, the process starts over from the first sub-period, until the next electoral review, with a maximum limit of, say, 10 years of total tenure for each Prime Minister. Then, as is the case now, provisions will be made for managing other aspects such as cases of no confidence/resignations/interruptions of government for any reason. And I would not expect prohibitive increases in organizational and electoral costs, especially by making greater use of proven technology, such as televoting systems at polling stations, with verification systems using digital signatures.
Then, if any readers have better solutions to the big problem of illegitimate interference in political institutions, I would be happy to hear them.
Then, of course, there are lobbies and historical and non-historical power brokers. For example, I have good reason to believe that oil and other lobbies are still active. However, I personally do not believe in what have been highlighted as
conspiracy theories, such as the Kalergi Plan, reptilians, and the 'villains' George Soros and Bill Gates (beyond the opinions expressed by the figures mentioned here, the conspiracy theory concept is to see them as those who are plotting something, but no one has ever proven these 'conspiracies'; rather, it seems to me that there is someone who feeds them, as I mentioned earlier), the 'powerful' World Economic Forum, mysterious treaties, etc., which in my opinion are more distractions when not misdirection of public opinion: I don't think the real Cupolas should be sought in those places. To be a little more aware of them, I will mention some other powers that influence political decisions, both historical and real, such as the Pope and other religious authorities, certain Masonic lodges with their connections (in addition to the past Italian affairs of the '
P2 Lodge' (
2) (
3) (
4) and '
P3-P4'), and the now fairly well-known Bilderberg Club. And about these 'parallel worlds', whether interconnected or not, there is fortunately now a wealth of investigative literature (of which I leave here a few examples (
1) (
2) (
3), included a public '
network of archives'). Those who have the time to search around and
carefully examine the sources can therefore educate themselves on the subject, given that ordinary citizens, if and when they become aware of such matters, usually do so after some time has passed, including following the declassification of confidential historical institutional documents.
Notes
1) A story in itself is the tax haven Republic of San Marino, which also maintains multiple police forces, military-ordered and civilian jurisdiction, on the other hand in a country that seems proud of chivalric orders of nostalgic medieval evocation... I have nothing against medieval history, but history is also about change, to indicate here 'methods' that are no longer applicable to the modern era (San Marino medals, decorations and chivalric orders).
As for the birth of the Corps of Gendarmerie of Vatican City, is called this considering that from a legal point of view this state is an absolute monarchy, with a legacy similar to other former European monarchies, hinting that they are militias with a historical evolution similar to their gendarmeries.
2) The Constitutional Court judges any disputes on the constitutional legitimacy of the laws, and conflicts of attribution of powers between different organs of the State. The ways in which it acts are in principal or action, considered a prior action, and in an incidental or exception, considered a subsequent action; this does not provide for the Court to apply a 'motu proprio' principle, nor is it obliged to checks within its competence on each and every legislative enactment or act having the force of law. Italy ratified the Treaty on the Establishment of the International Criminal Court, the European Court of Human Rights and, in 2014, accepted the mandatory jurisdiction of the International Court of Justice.
2a) [voters of the Constitutional Court] "This mixed structure is intended to give balance to the Constitutional Court: to foster this balance the constituent [Assembly] associates, in the composition of the body, the high technical-legal background and the necessary political sensitivity."
[https://it.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corte_costituzionale_(Italia)#Composizione]
3) In the exercise of its advisory function, the Council of State provides opinions regarding the regularity and legitimacy, merit, and expediency of administrative acts of individual ministries, the Government as a collegial body, or regions.
[https://it.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Consiglio_di_Stato_(Italia)#Attribuzioni_consultive]
In the judiciary, it has the function of tutelage [including of citizens] against the acts of the public administration. In particular, the Council of State is the second instance of administrative justice, i.e., the court of appeal against the decisions of the Regional Administrative Tribunal (TAR). In addition, the Council of State functions as a single-degree judge in the judgment of compliance, that is, in that judgment aimed at obtaining that a public administration execute a judgment issued by the ordinary judge or the Council of State itself. [https://it.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Consiglio_di_Stato_(Italia)#Attribuzioni_giurisdizionali]
4) Corte dei conti
https://it.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corte_dei_conti_(Italia)
5) Consiglio Nazionale dell'Economia e del Lavoro (CNEL), a detailed description in Italian:
https://it.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Consiglio_Nazionale_dell%27Economia_e_del_Lavoro#Funzioni.
A description in English:
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Council_for_Economics_and_Labour
6) (Supreme Council of Defence (Italy))
"Its powers are largely delineated in negative terms, this is because in practice the majority of the practical decision-making powers mentioned in Law no.624/1950 actually belong to other institutions. In particular, those elements of the political process which relate to foreign affairs and military policy belong to the executive, and the Chief of the Defence Staff is responsible for the formulation of strategic plans and the defence of the borders. As a result, the council limited to playing a consultative and advisory role to the Council of Ministers, much like an Inter-ministerial Committee." (cit. Wikipedia)
7) President of the Republic from 1999 to 2006: Carlo Azeglio Ciampi.
1998-2000: Government of D'Alema 1 and 2, with Russo Jervolino and Bianco (Interior) -Pasini and Mattarella (Defense) -Visco (Finance) -Diliberto (Grace and Justice); it is worth noting that in those years Italy also participated in the Kosovo war.
2000-2001: Government Amato 2, with Bianco (Interior) -Mattarella (Defense) -Del Turco (Finance)-Fassino (Grace and Justice).
Also worth noting is the European Council of Nice in December 2000, which gave rise to the aforementioned phantom EuroGendFor.
8)
9) In France, an example historically taken as a reference by observers as a semi-presidential republic, the French executive power is given the appellation Bicephalous ('two brains', editor's note), shared between the President of the Republic and the Prime Minister, head of government, and France remains a parliamentary republic with (strong) presidential influence. A more accurate definition of the form of government could be a presidentialized parliamentary regime or a bi-representative parliamentary regime [external note], or we can still speak of, excluding periods of cohabitation, a presidential interpretation of the Constitution
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