The Rise and Fall of Berlusconism

Abstract

When analyzing political phenomena from a historical perspective, it is as dangerous to talk about “failure” as it is to talk about “necessity.” In relation to what, for example, is a particular movement or person or party supposed to have failed? Did it fail because it did not get the results it had set out to get? Or because it did not do what scholars writing with the benefit of hindsight think it should have done? Or because it degenerated over time? Or because it did not leave a worthwhile legacy? Questions like these are always answered on a number of different levels and never with a simple or unanimous conclusion.