Mario Draghi will find out if he has what it takes to save Italy’s poor South
Hopelessness and despair have plagued the region for generations, but there is now money available for renewal
A half-ripped poster of Mario Draghi, his face crossed out in blood-red paint, greets visitors to a ruined housing estate in Naples that is a symbol not just of the Mob but of the hopelessness and despair that have plagued Italy’s south for generations.
Le Vele, or the Sails, was inspired by French modernist Le Corbusier and built around the same time as the Barbican complex on the edge of the City of London. With the same concrete aesthetic and a shared ideal of modern living, one became a triumph of city planning, the other descended into an urban slum. The common walkways and staircases meant to recreate the vitality of Naples’s old downtown were taken over by drug traffickers and inspired the book and film Gomorrah...
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