Saredo Inquiry
Giuseppe Saredo
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| Date | 1900-1901 |
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| Location | Italy |
| Participants | Officially known as the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Naples, presided by senator Giuseppe Saredo, president of the Italian Council of State. The Commission investigated corruption and bad governance in the city of Naples.. |
| Outcome | The inquiry unearthed a serious situation of corruption, clientelism and general inefficiency and an extensive political patronage system, the so-called "administrative Camorra" or "high Camorra"; the corrupt class of Neapolitan executives in charge of city governments between the 1880s and 1890s. The Saredo Commission's report discredited the Liberal politicians of Naples, who were voted from office in the local elections of November 1901. |
The Saredo Inquiry, officially known as the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Naples ((in Italian) Reale Commissione d’Inchiesta per Napoli), presided by senator Giuseppe Saredo (), president of the Italian Council of State, investigated corruption and bad governance in the city of Naples. The Commission was established in November 1900 and published its findings in October 1901.
In 1899 a new Socialist newspaper, La Propaganda, began a campaign against the rampant corruption in the city of Naples. The paper's main target were the Mayor of Naples Celestino Summonte and Alberto Casale, a Liberal member of the Italian Chamber of Deputies and the local government power broker with extensive contacts in the Neapolitan underworld of the Camorra. As a result of the campaign, reform candidates such as the socialist Ettore Ciccotti and Domenico De Martino were elected in the summer of 1900 in the Vicaria, Mercato and Porto neighbourhoods, the previously unconquerable fiefdoms of Casale and his Camorra associates.
Casale, known as the "uncrowned king of Naples", accused the newspaper of slander, but in the criminal case that ensued, La Propaganda was able to prove corrupt deals and in particular a kick-back from a Belgian tram company after a horse-cab drivers' strike in August 1893 against the expansion of the tram network. The outcome of the Casale case reached the national government in Rome. Casale had to resign, the Naples city council was dissolved, and an official inquiry into the corruption in Naples was initiated.
On November 8, 1900, Prime Minister Giuseppe Saracco signed the decree establishing the Commission of Inquiry under the presidency of the senator and law professor Giuseppe Saredo, to investigate how huge amounts of money that had been poured into Naples after the cholera epidemic of 1884 had vanished without noticeable benefit for the city's poor. The inquiry unearthed an extensive political patronage system in the city of Naples, the so-called "administrative Camorra" or "high Camorra"; the corrupt class of Neapolitan executive in charge of city governments between the 1880s and 1890s brought to light by La Propaganda.
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