Carlo Calenda

Carlo Calenda
Minister of Economic Development
In office
10 May 2016 – 1 June 2018
Prime Minister Matteo Renzi
Paolo Gentiloni
Preceded by Federica Guidi
Succeeded by Luigi Di Maio
Permanent Representative of Italy
to the European Union
In office
21 March 2016 – 10 May 2016
Prime Minister Matteo Renzi
Preceded by Stefano Sannino
Succeeded by Maurizio Massari
Personal details
Born (1973-04-09) 9 April 1973
Rome, Italy
Political party Civic Choice
(2013–15)
Independent
(2015–18)
Democratic Party
(2018–present)
Spouse(s) Viola Guidotti[1]
Children 4
Alma mater La Sapienza University
Profession Manager

Carlo Calenda (born 9 April 1973) is an Italian manager and politician, member of the Democratic Party.[2] In 10 May 2016 he was appointed Minister of Economic Development in the government of Matteo Renzi and continued in that role in the government of Renzi's successor, Paolo Gentiloni. From 21 March to 10 May 2016, he served as Italy's Permanent Representative to the European Union.[3]

Early life and business career

Carlo Calenda was born in Rome in 1973. He is the son of Fabio Calenda, a journalist, and Cristina Comencini, a film director and screenwriter, and the grandson of Luigi Comencini, a popular director of Italian comedy movies, and Giulia Grifeo di Partanna, descended from an ancient aristocratic family from Sicily.[4]

In 1983, at the age of ten years, he played the lead role in an Italian movie Cuore, directed by his grandfather, Luigi Comencini.[5] During his adolescence, his aristocratic background did not prevent him from joining the Italian Communist Youth Federation (FGCI).[6]

He graduated in law at the La Sapienza University in Rome, after which he worked in various finance companies until 1998, when he became a manager of Ferrari under the presidency of Luca Cordero di Montezemolo. In the early 2000s he became the marketing manager of Sky Italia. From 2004 to 2008 Calenda served as assistant to the then president of Confindustria, Luca Cordero di Montezemolo.[7]

Political career

In 2009 Calenda was appointed political coordinator of Future Italy, a liberal centrist think tank founded by Montezemolo.[8]

In 2012 he joined Civic Choice, the liberal political party of incumbent Prime Minister Mario Monti. Calenda ran in the 2013 general election, but failed to win a seat in the Chamber of Deputies.[9]

On 2 May 2013 he was appointed Deputy Minister of Economic Development in the government of Enrico Letta,[10] and was later confirmed in that post in the cabinet of Letta's successor, Matteo Renzi.[11]

On 20 January 2016, Renzi appointed him Italy's Permanent Representative to the European Union, an office he took up on March 21 that year.[12] This appointment was criticised by both the opposition and Italian diplomats, because the office of Permanent Representative had always been held by a diplomat and not by a politician such as Calenda.[13][14]

Minister of Economic Development

On 10 May 2016, following the resignation of the incumbent minister Federica Guidi, Calenda was appointed Minister of Economic Development.[15] Calenda continued as minister in the government of Paolo Gentiloni, who succeeded Renzi when he resigned on 12 December 2016 as Prime Minister following the constitutional referendum.[16]

Before his nomination, Calenda was widely seen as a strong supporter of free market and globalization, moreover he often expressed his positive view about TTIP, a proposed trade agreement between the European Union and the United States, with the aim of promoting trade and multilateral economic growth.[17][18] However, his tenure as minister was charachterized by his opposition to foreign multinational corporations and his defence of Italian workers. His policies became particularly evident in January 2018 when the Brazilian company Embraco, a subsidiary of the US multinational Whirlpool, announced an offshoring to shift its production from Turin to Slovakia.[19] After weeks of tensions and protests, the Italian government and Embraco reached a deal to postpone the relocation and suspend the layoffs, permitting to reach a better agreement for workers during the following year.[20][21]

Carlo Calenda in February 2018.

On 6 March 2018, two days after the Italian general election, which saw the defeat of Renzi's Democratic Party and a strong showing of populist forces like the Five Star Movement and the League, Calenda announced he would join the Democrats, stating that "we must not form a new party but work to uplift the one that already exists."[22] He also added that the PD must be reorganized as a real leftist force and must not support any cabinet led by populist parties.[23][24]

Especially after his enter in the PD, Calenda became increasingly critic toward Third Way policies promoted by Bill Clinton in the United States, Tony Blair in the United Kingdom and more recently by Renzi in Italy, which according to him were made only by optimism and slogans and had mainly contributed to the defeats of the centre-left in the Western world.[25] He also expressed his pessimistic view about globalization and centre-left politics, which according to him, have failed in protecting workers from offshoring and unemployment.[26] According to him, the new left-wing must "defend the workplace and not the work itself, and must offer protection to workers."[27] Due to his statements, Calenda was labeled by many political commentators as a workerist.[28]

In April 2018, workers of the Italian section of Alcoa, an American industrial corporation, get a 5% of shares and a place on the board of the new company created by Swiss-based Sider Alloys' acquisition of the Sardinian aluminium mine. Calenda stated that "it will be the first case in which workers participate in the management of a company and they have fully deserved it".[29]

References

  1. ↑ Carlo Calenda – Twitter
  2. ↑ Calenda si iscrive al Pd. E ha già un programma
  3. ↑ Nomina di Carlo Calenda a Rappresentante Permanente d’Italia presso l’Unione Europea
  4. ↑ Chi è Carlo Calenda?
  5. ↑ Ricordate il piccolo protagonista di «Cuore»? Ecco il ministro Calenda quando aveva 10 anni
  6. ↑ Chi è Carlo Calenda, il nuovo ministro dello Sviluppo Economico amico di Montezemolo
  7. ↑ Biografia di Carlo Calenda
  8. ↑ "Noi alternativi ai democratici, li batteremo
  9. ↑ Candidati di Scelta Civica alla Camera dei Deputati
  10. ↑ Consiglio dei Ministri
  11. ↑ Che tristezza quella felicità nella svendita dell’Italia
  12. ↑ Carlo Calenda è il nuovo rappresentante dell'Italia a Bruxelles. Gentiloni: "Scelta eccezionale"
  13. ↑ La protesta degli ambasciatori, a disagio per il caso Calenda. Le lettere al capo del governo
  14. ↑ Calenda a Bruxelles? Una misura eccezionale, come nel dopoguerra
  15. ↑ Sviluppo economico, Calenda nuovo ministro: domani la nomina
  16. ↑ Gentiloni presenta governo, Padoan confermato all'Economia
  17. ↑ Transatlantic Interests In Asia, Russel, Daniel R., United States Department of State, 13 January 2014
  18. ↑ Calenda: ci vorrà tempo per il Ttip ma per il nostro export è essenziale
  19. ↑ Italy rails against company relocations in bitter election campaign
  20. ↑ Embraco, Calenda: "Raggiunto accordo, licenziamenti sospesi"
  21. ↑ Embraco, Calenda: accordo su blocco licenziamenti fino a fine anno
  22. ↑ Carlo Calenda [@CarloCalenda] (2018-03-06). "Non bisogna fare un altro partito ma lavorare per risollevare quello che c'è. Domani mi vado ad iscrivere al @pdnetwork" [We must not form another party but we must work to uplift the one that already exists. Tomorrow I am going to join the Democratic Party.] (Tweet) (in Italian). Retrieved 2018-03-06 – via Twitter.
  23. ↑ "Calenda mostra la tessera del Pd: "Nessuna alleanza con M5S"" [Calenda shows his membership card in the Democratic Party: “No alliance with the Five Star Movement”]. La Stampa (in Italian). 2018-03-10. Retrieved 2018-03-10.
  24. ↑ Calenda prende la tessera del Pd: «Abbiamo dato sensazione di essere élite»
  25. ↑ Calenda ha detto qualcosa di sinistra
  26. ↑ Calenda a ruota libera sul Pd: “Il problema non è Renzi, ma sono i 25 anni di errori”
  27. ↑ Il pessimismo di Prodi e il tentativo di Calenda. Racconto di una serata nel salotto Laterza
  28. ↑ Calenda: "Io operaista? È un grande complimento"
  29. ↑ Alcoa, Calenda: ai lavoratori il 5% e un posto nel Consiglio di sorveglianza
Political offices
Preceded by
Federica Guidi		 Minister of Economic Development
2016–2018		 Succeeded by
Luigi Di Maio
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