Claudio Magris and the "Lumpenbürgertum"

Claudio Magris, in an interview with the Neue Zürcher Zeitung (december 20, 2006), has an interesting definition for the followers of former Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi:
"Lumpenbürgertum". The term is apparently derived from "Lumpenproletariat" (Russian:
Люмпенпролетариата), which in classical Marxist terminology describes the dispossessed masses "without class consciousness", which are therefore considered as useless for the systematic buildup of a revolutionary movement. The terminology suggested by Claudio Magris deserves some reflexion: first, the perception of the "Lumpenbürgertum" as a mass without "class consciousness" may be biased. The followers of Silvio Berlusconi are proud to consider themselves as the elite of postmodern liberalism, even if their conception of liberalism may be closer to mafiose ethics than to classical liberal thinking.
On the other hand, from a post-communist and post-fascist point of view, the masses may very well serve a revolutionary cause, but in a quite different way than Marx thought.
The "Lumpenproletariat" and the "Lumpenbürgertum" or "Lumpenbourgeoisie"
(Russian: ЛюмпенБуржуазии ) has been useful on various occasions during the 20th century for the orchestration of "coups d'état" (German: Staatsstreich, Spanish: golpe, Italian: colpo di stato). A colleague of Claudio Magris, Curzio Malaparte,
described the technique of the coup d'état in his famous book "tecnica del colpo di stato" back in 1931. The author describes the power struggle within the Russian revolution that led to Stalin's dictatorial regime, the methods used by Mussolini to get into control of Italy, and predicts the success of Hitler in Germany. At that time Malaparte is convinced that Hitler is a "particularly intelligent communist". The book has been published first in France, and then in Vienna, to be immediately forbidden in fascist Italy and in Nazi Germany. It is still recommended for those who like to look at history from different angles.
A modern edition of "tecnica del colpo di stato" has been published under the direction of the actual chief of the historical service of the Foreign Office (servizio storico del ministero degli esteri) of the Repubblica Italiana, Francesco Perfetti, at Mondadori, in 2003.
If we combine the terminology of Claudio Magris with the Malaparte's observations, the conclusion that Silvio Berlusconi has been (or still is) an admirer of Malaparte's tecnica del colpo di stato and that his most important personal success may be to have awakened the consciousness of his fellow citizens of the possibility of a colpo di stato within the framework of a democracy...