A-Infos (en) Italy, FAI, Umanita Nova #8-26 - Signs of a Growing Crisis. Strike and Protest by La Stampa Workers. (ca, de, it, pt, tr)[machine translation]

This writer is accustomed to reporting to the press, in a broad sense, 
on events of various kinds-strikes, demonstrations, protests, workplace 
issues, etc. ---- In the case of the La Stampa strike, the coverage 
followed a different path; in fact, a journalist with whom he is 
connected for the aforementioned regions invited him to attend a strike 
and protest by La Stampa staff on February 25, 2026. ---- An objectively 
unusual event, given that it hasn't occurred in the 159 years since the 
newspaper was founded in 1867, when it was then called the Gazzetta 
Piemontese. During the protest, a photographer later told him that 
something similar had occurred 45 years earlier, with unfortunate results.

Now, a strike and a demonstration with such a broad turnout as the one 
on February 25th is unusual, just as the interest it has aroused among 
institutions, at least local ones, and broad sectors of the political class.

It's worth reflecting on the contingent and structural reasons for this 
mobilization and on some general social signals that can be gleaned from it.

Let's start with the union-related reasons for the mobilization, based 
on a statement from the Editorial Board and the company union 
representative union:

"Journalists, workers, and collaborators ask the company to respond, 
once and for all, to the rumors that have fueled and continue to fuel 
confusion and uncertainty about the future of our newspaper... A fear 
that not only concerns our future employment, but also affects the 
quality and diversity of information in the country...

Even today, during exclusive negotiations, we experience a constant 
stream of contradictory and often demeaning rumors...

La Stampa is taking a break today to demand answers and guarantees 
regarding its future. Furthermore, we believe that the seller cannot and 
should not fail to provide guarantees regarding employment and salary 
levels, the confirmation of existing contracts, a clearly defined scope 
for the sale of the business unit, and a certain timeframe: we ask for a 
precise date for the conclusion of the ongoing due diligence process 
with the SAE group, and even before that, the composition of the 
purchasing group.

We also ask politicians, both local and national, what has happened to 
the promises of support and attention to the affairs of our newspaper. 
To date, for example, we are still awaiting the date of the hearings of 
the Gedi group's leaders in the Chamber of Deputies' Culture 
Committee...The press is not just any commodity: it is a public good, a 
bulwark of pluralism and free information, built every day for over 150 
years, and as such must be protected."

It is now worth examining the sector's situation in greater depth and 
broadening our assessment. Let's start with newspaper circulation, based 
on the Communications Regulatory Authority's report:

"The collapse of newspapers: the first six months of 2025 are also 
proving difficult for newspapers: considering total copies sold 
nationwide, equal to 220 million units (approximately 1.4 million 
average daily copies from January to June), we observe a year-on-year 
decline of 7.1% and 29.6% compared to the first half of 2021. This is 
the finding of the Agcom Communications Observatory, highlighting how 
newspapers that report mainly news of national interest recorded a more 
modest year-on-year reduction than those with predominantly local news 
(-6.2% compared to -8.3%).

Total paperback copies sold, equal to 186.6 million (1.2 million copies 
per day), decreased by 7.8% on an annual basis (202.4 million in the 
first six months of 2024) and by 31.5% compared to the first half of 
2021 when a total of 272.4 million copies were sold (with a daily 
average of approximately 2 million copies per day).

Digital newspapers: A similar, albeit more modest, trend can be observed 
for newspapers sold in digital format (replica copies of the print 
version), which recorded a decline in overall circulation of 2.9% 
compared to the previous year in the first half of 2025 and 16.6% over a 
five-year time horizon (first six months of 2021). The distribution of 
digital copies among individual newspapers is more concentrated than 
that of print. In fact, in the first half of 2025, the top five 
newspapers in terms of digital copies (Corriere della Sera, Il 
Gazzettino, Il Sole 24 Ore, La Repubblica, La Stampa) accounted for over 
61% of total copies sold, while the print copies of the top five 
publications (Corriere della Sera, La Gazzetta dello Sport, La 
Repubblica, Avvenire, and La Stampa) accounted for 33% of total 
newspaper sales in this format.

Generalist Newspapers: Analyzing newspapers by editorial genre, the five 
main national newspapers with generalist content (in order of total 
copies sold: Corriere della Sera, La Repubblica, Avvenire, La Stampa, 
and Il Messaggero) recorded a 7.6% decline in print sales in the first 
half of 2025 compared to the corresponding volumes in the same period of 
2024 (-4.8 million copies); this decline widened to 32.7% compared to 
the first half of 2021 (-28.5 million copies). Looking at overall 
digital sales for this genre, a less marked decline is observed, both 
compared to the first six months of 2024 (-1.7%, or -287,000 copies) and 
compared to the first half of 2021 (-3.4%, or -577,000 copies).»

I apologize for the length of this quote, but I believe it is useful for 
a realistic assessment of the current state of newspapers and to 
understand that we are facing a genuine anthropological transformation.

In a country characterized first by high rates of outright illiteracy 
and then by functional illiteracy, newspaper readership, and 
consequently, their social and political relevance, has plummeted.

The President of Agcom, Giacomo Lasorella, during a hearing before the 
Chamber of Deputies' Culture Committee on the current situation and 
future prospects for publishing, predicted that if newspaper sales 
continue to decline at the current rate, in ten years only 1.5% of 
households in the country will own daily newspapers and periodicals, 
compared to the current 25%.

This situation inevitably raises two questions: how will citizens keep 
themselves informed in a few years? What purpose do newspapers have 
today? It goes without saying that I am not referring to Umanità Nova.

I could close this article by expressing my mixed feelings of 
embarrassment and amusement at the realization that I'm part of an 
elite. However, I believe it's right to emphasize the novel and 
interesting nature of the mobilization of the workers of "La Stampa," a 
sector of the working class already largely proletarianized thanks to 
the spread of precarious work and in the process of further 
proletarianization. Obviously, the defense of political and civil 
liberties that accompanies the mobilization is, in my opinion, 
respectable, but we must be aware that it directly affects sectors of 
the middle class. On the other hand, "interested" does not mean 
"concerns"; the defense of freedom of struggle, organization, and speech 
primarily concerns the working class, and it is in our interest, as well 
as politically and ethically correct, to closely connect the fight for 
wages and income with the fight for freedoms and rights.

Cosimo Scarinzi

https://umanitanova.org/segnali-di-una-crisi-crescente-sciopero-e-presidio-delle-lavoratrici-e-dei-lavoratori-de-la-stampa/
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