"Craxi was not a statesman, he was merely the founder of the system of illegal party financing, a hardened corruptor and corrupt individual who destroyed the Italian economic system by basing it on patronage rather than meritocracy. A system whereby public contracts and works ended up in the hands of the highest bidder rather than the most capable. A man in whose shadow, as in the worst of nurseries, the first-rate politicians who now lead Italian parties grew up."