Meloni and Schlein. Where did the girls go

THEn a day apparently like so many in Italian politics, Tuesday 9 May, a woman prime minister and a woman at the head of the opposition spoke to each other for twenty minutes, by themselves, giving each other the familiar name.

He wrote Monica Guerzoni on Corriere della Sera: «When it was Elly Schlein’s turn, Giorgia Meloni took her aside and, away from the respective delegations, spoke to her face to face for almost 20 minutes. At the moment of greetings, even an embrace was triggered between the two leaders».

Then, at the working table on institutional reforms in the hall of the Montecitorio Library, Meloni and Schlein switched to “she”. AND the differences on presidentialism, semi-presidentialism and strengthened premiership remained unbridgeable.

But that Ansa photo (below) remains at the end of a day not like many others: Elly Schlein, 38, in a red jacket and white shirt, Giorgia Meloni, 46, in a black dress with white piping, an unconventional handshake, both relaxed and smiling.

In the midst of a cloud of tense men, older on average, embarrassed by the unexpected closeness between two presumed enemies. We’re talking about details, are we about to slip into considerations of the color scheme – which seems to have become the national devil – or the smooth crease – if there was one – that unites them? Not at all. There is a lot of substance at stake here.

A different climate?

Perhaps the “institutional” novelty of this umpteenth round of talks, dedicated to the possible modernization of the state, is precisely the unscripted proximity between two women who the centre-right and centre-left electorates have brought to the helm with their respective votes.

Two women who have parallel personal/public stories, destined never to meet, but who have proved to be free to “pierce” the schedule of expectations and conventions.

Perhaps they will not find a point of agreement on reforms, on migrants, on unemployment. However, they have already managed to demonstrate that politics can be conducted without starting from the pre-packaged contrastrepetitive, shouted with pleasure and in favor of cameras.

Waiting to find out how long the government will last and if the Democratic Party will be able to recover from a long crisis of consensus, the Italian girls finally read between the lines of the chronicles of the Palace that you can confidently put together the pieces of your identity – being a mother, Christian, heterosexual, always conservative, or not a mother, homosexual, pro-enlargement of civil rights, cosmopolitan at the root – and aspire to power.

If that sounds like a good job to undertake. Tiring as few, decisive as perhaps no one. We didn’t see them coming – as Schlein said on the night of his primary victorythen quoted by Meloni who made his sentence and synthesis – but now that there are, it makes sense to observe them without prejudice and predictions of all kinds. In just one season a gap was opened, or rather two.

Is the style of women in power really different from that of men? Write to us at [email protected]

All articles by Barbara Stefanelli

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