Without doubt, oil price rises are often to some extent exogenous. Think of a decision by OPEC to raise prices or of rising tensions in the Middle East. To the extent that such a shock is exogenous, there is little reason to worry about more than the knock-on effect on, in particular, wages.
It is surely not the monetary conditions that are responsible for the growth difficulties of the Italian economy. Again with reference to the twelve years of the euro, annual expenditure for interest payments on Italy’s public debt averaged 5.3 per cent of GDP, against 11.5 per cent in the first half of the 1990s and 7.5 per cent in the 1980s.