”It’s necessary to have an in-depth look at the relationship between the person and the rules. The rules have not always had a positive relationship with ourselves. They don’t always help us; in fact in the course of history the opposite has generally been true. The rules helped someone who was on high, but they penalised the vast majority of the population. Society was organised like a pyramid. On high you can, down below you have to. And given that the pyramid has a really wide base, while at the top there’s just a little point, almost everyone “had to”, while a very few “could”. The fundamental principle for the society was discrimination. The Constitution arrived and changed everything. It turned upside down the way of staying together.”

Passaparola with Gherardo Colombo, former magistrate and writer

Information is essential
Good day to all the friends of Passaparola. I am Gherardo Colombo. I spent more than 33 years as a magistrate, then in 2007 I resigned even though I could have continued for another 14 years.
I resigned because I was convinced that to make the justice system work, it’s necessary above all to reflect on the reason for having rules and on the relationship between the rules and each one of us. If you don’t understand what use rules are, and how they influence our lives, it’s very difficult to manage to spontaneously follow them and if the rules are not followed spontaneously, they are often violated. They are not followed every time it seems more convenient not to. That’s why I stopped being a magistrate to contribute to the reflection, and especially a reflection on the part of young people. I go around the schools a lot. I have 300 meetings a year with youngsters in the elementary schools, the middle schools, the high schools and even in the universities.
The topic is about the rules. I believe it’s necessary to have knowledge of the topic and an in-depth exchange of information. This is why I don’t limit myself to going round the schools, but I’ve written 5 or 6 books on the topic of rules and the Constitution and the approach between the community, the rules and the violation of the rules. Information is essential for us to be not just individuals that have a part that is characterized from the point of view of instincts, we have emotions, we have feelings, we have a brain and a head and it’s necessary for the head and the brain to work to get into a positive relationship with the emotions and the feelings in order to manage to live with other people in the best possible way.
Thus it’s necessary to have an in-depth look at the relationship between the person and the rules. The rules have not always had a positive relationship with ourselves. They don’t always help us; in fact in the course of history the opposite has generally been true. The rules helped someone who was on high, but they penalised the vast majority of the population. Society was organised like a pyramid. On high you can, down below you have to. And given that the pyramid has a really wide base, while at the top there’s just a little point, almost everyone “had to”, while a very few “could”. The fundamental principle for the society was discrimination. The Constitution arrived and changed everything. It turned upside down the way of staying together. The fundamental principle today, and that is the principle to which the rules respond, is that we all have as much dignity as the others. That doesn’t just mean equality, equal dignity, but also recognition of dignity, and thus the positivity of human beings. This recognition, of the importance of persons, is the same principle at the basis of democracy. It’s possible to conceive of the government belonging to the people. This means democracy, only if the thinking is that the person as such has dignity and is important.

The rules that liberate us
The rules of the Constitution, the rules for our staying together, start from this observation: all of us have dignity, consequently the Republic recognises the existence of fundamental rights and by having fundamental rights we are all equal before the law without our particular characteristics whether we are male or female, whether we have one religion rather than another one, a political opinion rather than another, whether we are of one ethnic group rather than another, without these characteristics being a cause for discrimination or removal of rights.
Then, certainly, there are duties, but the duties in a system like our own are a function of the rights. They are used to ensure that the rights can be utilised. Information is essential. Knowledge is essential. Information is the channel by which knowledge is passed, because this idea of society based on the recognition of the dignity of the person is not very well known. The principle that is at the basis of our system of rules is not very well known. So it happens that people find it difficult to grasp the concept that the rules not only can contain obligations and prohibitions but in fact, in the first place they contain the possibilities. The rules help us because they allow us, they permit us to say what we think, they permit us to be cared for, to get information, to have an education, to practice the religion that we believe in. I believe that it is essential to know the relationship between the rules and us. Otherwise the rules seem to us just a source of obligations and prohibitions and no one likes being obliged or finding ourselves face to face with a prohibition. In my encounters with the young people I always start off with a few questions. For example, with the high school youngsters, the first question is “Do you think there is a connection between the rules and your possibility to be happy? Not happiness in an absolute sense because that is complex, complicated, but the starting point.” With the children in the elementary school my question is “When you hear the word “rule” what do you want to do? Do you go “wow – how wonderful!” or do you go “uuuugh”. Nearly all of them say “uuuugh”. “Why do you say “uuuugh”? They explain to me that they do that because they feel oppressed by the rules. Because the rules don’t let you do what you want to do.
Let’s go back to the start. If the rules don’t let you do what you want, it’s unlikely that you will establish a friendly relationship with the rules. It’s as though they were enemies and so the next step is “Can we find some rule that instead of imposing on us, it permits us? Here however is the start of a question that is very difficult to tackle in a few words. The topic is that of the consequence of transgression “What is appropriate to happen to the person that does not respect the rules. Must this person be punished or helped to understand that the rules must be respected?” – Punishment is useful for understanding that rules have to be respected or it is a tool that moves someone away from society instead of reintegrating them, recovering the relationship that was broken? It’s a difficult topic that needs very articulated reflections. I believe that it is possible to get to good, to positivity by the infliction of bad, by means of negativity, given that it’s obvious that if the person who is transgressing is becoming dangerous for others, is a cause of danger, it’s necessary to stop him from transgressing and this is one thing. On the other hand, however, it is to establish to verify whether this preventing the transgression must consist in inflicting suffering. Perhaps we can discuss this another time. However I was keen to raise the question because it’s necessary to reflect on this a lot and it’s possible to reflect by starting off with a response to this question that is double and is the starting point “Is dignity in agreement with the imposition of suffering?” ”Does the imposition of bad lead to good?”

We have to grow up
At times it happens that people ask me this question: “How can we observe the rules if the people that are leading society don’t follow them? I believe that a free person, capable of self determination, who makes his own choices and who doesn’t look at the choices made by others, doesn’t take transgression as an example, but he weighs things up and says “That gentleman has done something that’s not right. I’m not doing that.” and not “I’ll follow his example”. It’s necessary to take responsibility for one’s own choices, to decide for oneself. This is something that is rarely done. To understand the point, we can take the issue of atmospheric pollution. In the last few days, Milan has had some really serious pollution problems. If we ask the people of Milan “Do you like to breathe pure air or polluted air?” all respond: “Well we would like to breathe pure air”. Then we ask “But in your opinion, who is it that is polluting Milan’s air?”, in the end they reply: “the people of Milan” then the next question is “Why do the people of Milan pollute the air of Milan even though they would like to breath pure air?” There are people who cannot do anything but use the car for work. But there are a lot, so so many however, that use the car for a fleeting moment of convenience. We need to grow up. We must stop needing mother and saying basically “Let the others do it” without realising that by saying “Let the others do it” what is not said but understood here is “Because I cannot do it on my own!”
I believe that throughout history it’s never been so possible to get information as it is today. Then certainly one is not helped. We have to look for the information. And that too is a commitment. Perhaps it’s complicated finding it. We need to compare different sources. We need to go and get it rather than wait for it to be supplied to us. Sometimes I happen to ask this question “But is it not perhaps the Constitution that is the newest thing that exists in the world, under the heading of the organisation of society”, because society has always been organised on the basis of discrimination and instead the Constitution sets out an organisation on the basis of an equal distribution of opportunity, is there a case for updating the Constitution in relation to information? The Constitution applies the traditional separation of powers, by which there is a legislative power, an executive and a judicial one, each one having its own competences, and I wonder “Would it not be appropriate to separate the traditional powers and the new powers? Like information and finance? To establish some rules according to which finance and information are separated from the other powers, just as today the legislative, the executive and the judiciary are separate?” Thus remember, spread the word on this issue as well, because information is created and it’s created a lot by spreading the word.