Berlusconi wrote the playbook for the modern strongman

Former Italian Premier Silvio Berlusconi was Italy's longest-serving premier despite scandals over his sex-fueled parties and allegations of corruption, died, according to Italian media. He was 86. (AP Photo/Alessandra Tarantino, File)

Before there was Donald Trump, before Viktor Orban, before Boris Johnson,
there was Silvio Berlusconi.

The billionaire media tycoon, who died Monday at the age of 86, turned his celebrity into a magnet for Italy’s forgotten everyman, gaining four stints as prime minister and forging an enduring political influence. A former cruise-ship crooner, he wrote the cheat sheet for the populism that today challenges liberal democracies worldwide. From his taut, perma-tanned appearance, to his mockery of women, his railing against immigrants, his abuse of political power to further his personal business dealings and his confrontation with the courts, Berlusconi was the very model of the modern right-wing strongman.

Berlusconi rose to power in the last two decades of the 20th century when television was the dominant medium. His ownership of the country’s first privately owned network allowed him to bombard Italians with his message, laying the groundwork for politics in the age of Twitter and Instagram. His business empire also comprised a newspaper, magazines, a radio station, publishing house and a soccer team. During his nine years at Palazzo Chigi — the most of any postwar premier -- he had control of state TV too.

Berlusconi launched his political career when his connections lost their influence in a vast bribery scandal that razed Italy’s postwar governing class. He decided he needed to shift lanes. He wasn’t wedded to policies or ideology. Private polling he did at the time showed him he would be more likely to win campaigning to the right, even though he’d previously been associated with socialists.

One veteran bank boss told me of a 1994 dinner convened by Berlusconi to inform Italy’s top business leaders about his imminent political run. My source, who was at the event, said the guests expressed astonishment at the intended change of political affiliation. “It doesn’t matter what party I am so long as I win,” Berlusconi replied.

Berlusconi's playbook included ridiculing institutions from the central bank to the judiciary. Accusations that he bribed judges, cheated on his taxes and paid underage women for sex — his infamous “Bunga Bunga” parties made international headlines — helped boost his popularity among Italians who distrusted elites. His shamelessness was a model for the likes of Trump and Johnson.

Ultimately, Berlusconi was involved in more than two dozen criminal court cases during his political career. They involved allegations of vote buying, sex with underage women, tax evasion, lying under oath, bribery and wiretapping. But he was definitively found guilty of just one charge: tax fraud. He evaded conviction in the others following lengthy appeals, legal changes or expiring statutes of limitations. He has always claimed he was the innocent subject of a witch hunt by the judiciary.

Crucially, too, what eventually drove Berlusconi from office was not political opposition — and his own peccadillos — but the markets. He was forced out in the fall of 2011 during the European debt crisis as Italy risked default. As the economy wobbled, he had insisted all was fine because all the restaurants of Italy were full.

There is no doubt his legacy is one of decline. Berlusconi’s overwhelming desire to be loved meant he failed to use his popularity in his years of power to make the tough structural reforms that Italy needed. Entrenched corruption only deepened, and the economy stagnated. Italy remains low-ranked in global categories of business starts, foreign direct investment and the quality of schools. As bad, the lasting damage he inflicted came in the way he celebrated and normalized the flouting of rules.

Meantime, the media empire he built also dwindled. Used to having competition bent in its favor in Italy, Mediaset Italia SpA failed to adapt to the streaming age. Expectations are now high among bankers in Milan that his heirs will end up selling it.

Yet even in his ninth decade, he kept himself, at least, politically relevant.

The war in Ukraine served as a reminder of his two-decade long friendship with Vladimir Putin. The pair holidayed together, going so far as wearing identical bearskin hats in one media appearance. Berlusconi repeatedly embarrassed Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni and coalition partners, claiming Putin was pushed into the war in Ukraine because he wanted to put “decent people” in charge in Kyiv.

Still, Berlusconi paved the way for the hard right to come to power, first by bringing the anti-immigrant League into the mainstream, and then by facilitating the rise of Meloni, having made her youth minister in his last government.

Illiberalism is still gathering momentum across Europe, from Italy and Spain, to Poland and Hungary. And European elections next year may yet reveal the full reach of Berlusconismo.

Rachel Sanderson writes for Bloomberg. Views are personal and do not represent the stand of this publication.

Credit: Bloomberg