Italy's citizens are waking up

Students, schoolchildren and professors took to the streets in Italy on Thursday to protest against planned cuts in the higher education sector. In Florence there were clashes between students and the police, while students occupied the Colloseum in Rome and the Leaning Tower of Pisa. The protests show that people are finally awakening from their lethargy, writes the left-liberal daily La Repubblica: "They used to say there was only one people in direct and permanent dialogue with the leaders. But now the citizens are making a comeback. This uprising of the social players is putting an end to the unilateral approach of the political power that threatens to end up talking only to itself and treats ideas and people like numbers without giving any answers - answers that the protesting citizens expect and are now demanding. ... The political culture of Berlusconi populism that has driven the country towards the far right is now on its last legs because it came to see the people only as the basis for its own power. ... This culture can be publicly challenged with the voice of the people, with elections."

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