Volume 7, Number 4 · September 22, 1966
'The Society of Friends'
By Luigi Barzini
The Mafia and Politics
by Michele Pantaleone, with a Preface by Carlo Levi, translated by Margaret Stephens
Coward, McCann, 255 pp., $5.50
It would seem that this generation of Italians was in a unique position to do away with the Mafia once and for all. We can determine its historic origins and social causes, define the conditions in which it flourishes, and should therefore be able at last not merely to prune a few branches but to strike at its roots. And at the present time all Italian political parties, both in power and in the opposition, consider the Mafia a national shame and are vociferously determined to do what is necessary—conduct investigations, vote ad hoc laws and special appropriations—to exterminate it. We are only the latest in a long line of defeated Mafia fighters. Our forefathers, fathers, and older brothers tried to cure it according to whatever diagnosis was fashionable at the time. These remedies were by no means wrong: But insofar as they were only partially right they produced only partial results. The Mafia was intimidated at times, once in a while driven underground, but never conquered. In fact it always bounced back more powerful and arrogant than before. One hundred and more years of wrong approaches should therefore have made it easy for our generation to determine exactly what is to be done. For some reason, this has not yet happened. At the moment of writing, the Mafia, though hampered and embittered by national and international initiatives, is flourishing more than it ever did in the past.
Review, 4813 words
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