{"id":106367,"date":"2021-06-16T16:41:11","date_gmt":"2021-06-16T16:41:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/swissfederalism.ch\/dalla-verantwortung-asburgica-allirresponsabilita-ostentata\/"},"modified":"2021-06-20T18:21:00","modified_gmt":"2021-06-20T18:21:00","slug":"from-habsburg-verantwortung-to-ostentatious-irresponsibility","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/swissfederalism.ch\/en\/from-habsburg-verantwortung-to-ostentatious-irresponsibility\/","title":{"rendered":"From Habsburg Verantwortung to ostentatious irresponsibility"},"content":{"rendered":"

From Habsburg Verantwortung to ostentatious irresponsibility<\/h1>\n

In the Italian bureaucracy, there is a lack of individual reasonableness: the official systematically appeals to decisions taken above him, in order to justify himself<\/em><\/h3>\n

There is a beautiful German word, Verantwortung, which, at one time, was the key idea of the Habsburg bureaucracy: it indicated the responsibility that fell on every single employee, from the most humble up to the highest hierarchies.
\nEveryone was responsible, because everyone represented the emperor: addressing one of them was, in theory, exactly like addressing the sovereign directly.
\nThe result was a bureaucracy with legendary features: sometimes cumbersome and short-sighted, as in some of Franz Kafka’s stories, but usually held up as an example of dedication to work and integrity to the fullest.<\/p>\n

So the emergency in Italy has become a perennial normality<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"Scartoffie
Paperwork forgotten by the short-sighted Italian bureaucracy<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Austrian Lombardy between the peace treaties of Utrecht and Villafranca<\/h4>\n

It goes without saying that, between the peace of Utrecht and the peace of Villafranca, i.e. between 1713 and 1859, Lombardy, which had been annexed to the empire, had also adopted this philosophy and consequently had a full bureaucratic apparatus.
\nCarlin Porta himself, who certainly was not an Austrian, often boasted of his honesty and zeal as a high-level public banker.
\nThen, with the advent of the Kingdom of Italy, something changed: the word bureaucracy gradually lost its meaning of responsibility and commitment, taking on a negative meaning.
\nIt became, in short, that sort of free zone, bristling with red tape and obstacles and populated with idlers and people who were not very correct and very corrupt, which is today the ruin of Italy as a working country.
\nAnd there was no longer any talk of responsibility; on the contrary, it was fled like the devil.<\/p>\n

When the real problem is not the “how much” but the “why”<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n