The triumph of Giorgia Meloni, as the first woman to lead a winning party in the macho world of Italian politics, is not a moment to celebrate for much of centrist Europeanism.
The prime minister, who comes to power precisely a century after her fascist ancestor, Benito Mussolini, of whom she is declared an admirer, tips the scales to the extreme right as the main current in the EU: the new Italian government will be a coalition led by Meloni’s Brothers of Italy party, together with Matteo Salvinim’s anti-immigrant League, and Silvio Berlusconi’s Forza Italia.
Plants. For years, Giorgia Meloni has criticized Italy’s migration policies, calling them too lenient and risking turning the country into “Europe’s refugee camp.”
Now as Prime Minister of Italy, migration is presented as one of the areas where Meloni can very easily bring about radical change. “The approach is: you come to my house according to my rules,” Meloni marked an interview with The Washington Post in early September. Her proposal aims to significantly close the doors for undocumented immigrants.
While in other areas, such as spending and foreign policy, Meloni would be more constrained by the EU, Italy has room to manage its own borders, and she has long made it clear that stopping flows across the Mediterranean is a of your priorities. Efforts to block humanitarian rescue ships from docking in Italian ports could spark ripples in other Mediterranean countries like Spain: it already happened three years ago when Italy was briefly run by a populist anti-immigration government.
What is certain is that he has fractured a containment network in European politics by bringing to power a party with roots in neo-fascism – in a founding country of the EU, moreover – for the first time since World War II.
And following the rise of the far-right Democrats in Sweden this month, the question is where will European extremism’s next move be? Vox, the third largest political party in Spain, anchored in the most radical right, entered a regional government for the first time in March, and celebrated Meloni’s triumph as its own: they hope that their success paves the way for a greater power in the next elections. A leap to the right that is experienced throughout the Iberian Peninsula: in Portugal, the right-wing party Chega (Basta) won 12 seats in the elections in January this year, compared to only 1 seat in 2019.
Trend. Divisive leaders are gaining ground amid challenges posed by immigration, rising poverty, falling birth rates, the climate emergency, deindustrialization, and youth unemployment.
Meloni will unite the discontent in southern Europe with the eastern flank of the EU. The leader of the European Conservative and Reform Party since 2020, she supported Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban and voted against a motion in the European Parliament to declare Hungary an “electoral autocracy.”
In general terms, his victory also increases the risk of having a destabilizing effect on the heart of Europe: France. Emmanuel Macron lost his parliamentary majority earlier this year. And mainstreaming extreme politics lends itself as much to Marine Le Pen and her national front as it does to Jean-Luc Melenchon’s far-left Nupes (Nouvelle Union Populaire Ecologique et Sociale) party.
Far-right French politician Eric Zemmour meanwhile seized on Meloni’s victory to claim that his strategy of “uniting” right-wing parties could also be beneficial for France.
The good news for his centrist opponents is that Italian institutions have historically served as a ballast against political extremism, from the mafia attacks of the 1980s and 1990s to the rise of Berlusconi.
And Meloni’s list of potential ministerial candidates, including finance, must be considered by the Qurinial Palace and President Sergio Mattarella, a veteran of politics who remained in office ostensibly for this reason, will serve as a counterweight.
challenges. Some Italian analysts point out that Meloni faces what is called the “glass cliff”: when a woman finally obtains significant power, it is at a time of serious crisis, when the risk of failure is greater. Meloni, like Liz Truss in the UK, is facing a worsening economy. Growth is forecast to slow to 0.4% from 3.3% in 2022, according to the average of estimates compiled by Bloomberg.
His government will have limited room for maneuver because it has to hit targets agreed with Brussels to get the full €260bn of post-pandemic financing outlays, which flow remarkably into Italy’s economy.
He will also juggle unreliable political peers and an electorate that has ousted one government after another in the past 20 years: Meloni heads Italy’s 68th government since 1946.
But the weak choice of Salvini’s League, which received around 9% of the vote against 30% in 2018, may strengthen Meloni’s hand and reduce the possibility of instability in the coalition.
But it doesn’t help Meloni that her team is untested, and made up mostly of family and friends, including her brother-in-law. And his victory also came with the lowest voter turnout for an Italian election since World War II.
