EUROPE, ITALY, Election gridlock stalls higher education reforms

With Italy in the grip of a post-election stalemate that could result in a short-term centre-left minority government, funding increases and desperately needed reforms to the university sector could be stalled for months if not longer.

Italy’s beleaguered tertiary education sector has seen a decline in enrolments of 58,000 students over the period 2003-12, according to the latest figures from the Ministry of Education, Universities and Research.

Many institutions are struggling with critical financial shortfalls. The inconclusive election result could not have come at a worse time.

Although a centre-left coalition led by the Democratic Party won a majority in the Chamber of Deputies ballot on Sunday and Monday, the Senate has been split between the centre-left and centre-right coalitions with a decisive number of seats won by the ‘anti-politics’ Movimento 5 Stelle (Five Star Movement) led by comedian Beppe Grillo.
A return to the ballot box is looking increasingly unlikely, and with its lower house majority the centre-left coalition is seeking an almost impossible alliance with the Five Star Movement for a semblance of stability in the Senate – and with it, the possibility of government.

Although founded just three years ago, the Five Star Movement has garnered wide popular support, and managed to win a quarter of the vote in both the Chamber of Deputies and the Senate.

The party and its platform of citizen-led change has become a third important force in Italian politics, tapping into a general sense of frustration and disillusionment in Italy that has been inflamed by both the recession and political and financial scandals.

Grillo authors the most popular blog in Italy, and uses the internet to spread his message and dialogue with both his supporters and critics while refusing to be interviewed on television.

“We are clearly in a situation of instability, but you must acknowledge that Grillo’s movement has captured people’s rage,” said Domenico Pantaleo, secretary of the FLC-CGIL (Federazione Lavoratori della Conoscenza), one of the country’s major education unions.

“This was a vote for change, and that can’t be ignored,” he said.

A possible positive

While Grillo has categorically refused alliances with either the left or right coalitions, saying that Five Star representatives will vote on a case-by-case basis, a centre-left minority government that has their partial support in the Senate could be positive for the higher education sector.

The education platforms of the Democratic Party and the Five Star Movement have two important points in common: the reversal or at least re-visiting of the so-called Gelmini reforms that introduced sweeping cuts and centralised administrative reform under the Berlusconi government; and increasing funding for research and development in tertiary education as a driver for growth.

Their approach to some key issues, however, is quite different. The Democratic Party, for example, wants to abolish funding of digital universities while net-savvy Grillo wants public access via internet to university teaching and closer links between universities and industry.

Another important consequence of the election will be the replacement of the current Education Minister Francesco Profumo, rector of one of the country’s best technical universities Politecnico di Torino, who ran on outgoing Prime Minister Mario Monti’s ticket.

Monti’s coalition of centrist reformers turned in a less than spectacular performance, winning around 10% of the vote, a clear rejection of their unpopular austerity measures.

Although criticised for not addressing pressing issues in enough depth – a criticism levelled at the whole Monti government – Profumo introduced several measures to modernise and improve the university sector, with a particular focus on funding university research and improving the system of entrance exams and national grading for fixed-place courses.

Although it is too early to say who might take his place, Professor Andrea Lenzi, president of the National Italian University Council (CUN), said that “in the last weeks of the election campaign, all parties, regardless of their political orientation, came out with a position on the tertiary education sector, and regardless of the eventual government that is formed, we are expecting greater attention from all quarters”.

Lenzi said that a new education minister would be faced not just with critical funding issues but also with recognising the important plurality of universities in Italy, from the more industry-focused polytechnics to the cultural contributions of the country’s largest institutions, with funding and administrative systems that support such plurality.

Priority issues
The CUN, an elected government advisory body drawn from both the professorial body and university management, recently published a document identifying critical areas of the Italian university system in need of urgent attention.

Top of the list is baseline funding, which has decreased by around 20% since 2009, when adjusted for inflation.

Financing research to prevent Italy’s chronic brain drain (Italian researchers earn 50%-70% more working abroad, according to the document), recruitment of teaching personnel (removing the current freeze on recruitment that has seen the overall number of professors drop by 22% in six years), and financing study grants (only two-thirds of students entitled to study grants actually receive them) are the most pressing financial considerations identified.

But equally important are structural reforms such as making PhD programmes more flexible and open to industry sponsorship, rationalising course offerings, making university data more transparent and accessible, and working towards greater autonomy for universities in managing their own affairs.

“You can’t think about development [of the sector] with assigning resources to it. But we don't need 'scattergun' funding, and we also need less bureaucracy and more reform of process,” said Lenzi.