Giuliano AmatoOMRI (Italian pronunciation:[dʒuˈljaːnoaˈmaːto]; born 13 May 1938) is an Italian politician who twice served asPrime Minister of Italy, first from 1992 to 1993 and again from 2000 to 2001. UponArnaldo Forlani's death in July 2023, Amato became the country's earliest-serving surviving Prime Minister.
Amato began his political career in 1958 when he joined theItalian Socialist Party. He was a Member of Parliament from 1983 to 1993. He was Undersecretary of State to the Prime Minister's office from 1983 to 1987, Deputy Prime Minister from 1987 to 1988, and Minister for the Treasury from 1987 to 1989.[citation needed]
From June 1992 to April 1993, Amato served as prime minister. During those ten months, a series of corruption scandals rocked Italy and swept away almost an entire class of political leaders. Amato himself was never implicated, notwithstanding how close he was toBettino Craxi, a central figure in the corruption system.[citation needed]
At a point, his government was harshly contested because of adecree that suddenly moved the competence for corruption investigations into the hands of the police, which, being controlled directly by the government, would have not been independent. Fearing that the new system would have effectively blocked investigations of political corruption, Italians took to the streets in massive, spontaneous rallies. PresidentOscar Luigi Scalfaro refused to sign the decree, deeming it blatantly unconstitutional. While his justice ministerGiovanni Conso took the blame, it has been disputed whether Amato was a victim of circumstances or whether he wanted to save the corruption-ridden system.[citation needed]
At the end of his period as prime minister, Amato gave a speech to the Parliament in which he solemnly promised that at the end of his term, he would retire from politics, stressing that his was a true commitment and that he would not break this promise as some politicians (whom he characterized as "mandarins") used to do. However, this promise was short-lived; Amato has regularly come under criticism for having made such a solemn commitment and failing to keep it.[citation needed]
Amato was President of the Italianantitrust authority from November 1994 to December 1997,[3] Minister for Institutional Reforms inMassimo D'Alema's first government from October 1998 to May 1999, and, once again, Treasury Minister in D'Alema's second government from December 1999 to April 2000. Amato was nearly nominated for the Presidency of the Republic and was a close contender to replaceMichel Camdessus as head of theInternational Monetary Fund.[citation needed]
Amato served as prime minister again from April 2000 to May 2001. He promoted economic competitiveness as well as social protection. In addition to economic reforms, he pushed ahead with political and institutional reforms, trying to deal with a weak executive and fragmented legislature.[citation needed]
Amato was a Member of the Senate representing the constituency ofGrosseto in Tuscany from 2001 to 2006. In 2006, he was elected to theChamber of Deputies for theOlive Tree list, and he was named Minister of the Interior in Romano Prodi's centre-left government.[citation needed]
On 12 September 2013,PresidentGiorgio Napolitano appointed Amato as judge on theConstitutional Court of Italy, where he has served since then.[6] On 16 September 2020 Amato ran for the position of President of the Constitutional Court, but lost in the second round of voting againstMario Rosario Morelli who obtained nine votes, whileGiancarlo Coraggio obtained five and Amato received one.[7] He was subsequently made Vice President by Morelli.[8] He was confirmed in this position by Coraggio who became president in December 2020.[9]
Amato is married to Diana Vincenzi, a professor of Family Law at the University of Rome. They have two children, Elisa and Lorenzo, and five grandchildren, Giulia, Marco, Simone, Elena and Irene. As of September 2020, Amato is a member of the ItalianAspen Institute.[10]
Giuliano Amato serves as an Honorary Co-chair for theWorld Justice Project. The World Justice Project works to lead a global, multidisciplinary effort to strengthen theRule of Law for the development of communities of opportunity and equity.[11]
In 2011, Amato declared that Italian creativity is not supported by adequate efficiency in organising its public and private entities. He believes it had a role in the lost hope in the future and in the sense of a common national identity, as well as it had not been yet perfectioned as a whole in a way that was congruent with its essence. That loss had favoured the flourishing ofxenophobia and purported regional identities, such as theLega Nord movement.[14]
Amato thinks that thebrigandage in Southern Italy after 1861 was an unfair and unlawful movement that cannot be seen as a form of antinational rebellion; however, the soldiers and the officials of theBorbonic Army who joined the movement cannot be defined as betrayers of the ongoing Italy. It is also not credible that theExpedition of the Thousand could have caused the annexation of theSouthern Italy to theKingdom of Sardinia by itself, while the main political and cultural foundations had been thrown by the works of intellectuals likeFrancesco Mario Pagano andVincenzo Cuoco produced in the 1790s.[14] If he did not believe the national identity is always something more important than sub-national or sovran-national ones, Amato believes in the multi-layer identities model proposed by Alberto Banti in a way for which the European identity strengthens the Italian identity even when they live and work in a foreign country. According to him, the Italian identity is kept alive in any country in which they should have gone.[14]
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