ITALY: Italy Says No to Nuclear Power — and to Berlusconi!

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By Stephan Faris / Rome Tuesday, June 14, 2011.

Demonstrators during the run-up to the June 13, 2011, referendum

Alberto Pizzolo / AFP / Getty Images.

The fallout from Fukushima continues. Concerns about an effort by Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi to revive his country's nuclear power program helped drive millions of Italians to the polls June 13, when they voted overwhelmingly to block any such revival amid safety concerns following the meltdown in March of the Japanese plant.

Berlusconi's name didn't appear on the ballots, which also offered voters the opportunity to overturn laws governing the privatization of water and a controversial measure protecting top government officials from prosecution. But it might as well have. Italy's law on referendums requires more than a 50% turnout in order to overturn legislation. And while the opposition framed the vote as a referendum on the way the country is being governed, Berlusconi spent the days leading up to the polls challenging the nuclear power measure in court, declaring he wouldn't vote and suggesting his fellow Italians stay at home too. "This vote was a mix of policies and politics," says Roberto D'Alimonte, a professor of political science at Rome's LUISS University. "It was about the issues, and it was about delivering another knockdown to Berlusconi." The result was seen as an overwhelming rebuke to a man who has spent his career conflating the personal with the political. Some 57% of voters in Italy went to the polls, with roughly 95% voting to strike down the various laws. It was the first time the 50% threshold had been breached on a referendum since 1995.

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Good, for whatever reasons, they are going for more sustainable living!

Full Story at,

http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,2077622,00.html