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Giorgia Meloni swings Italy to the right

2022-09-26T18:06:25.302Z


Headed by the Fratelli d'Italia party, the right-wing coalition clearly won the legislative and senatorial elections.


Rome

It is an indisputable victory that the coalition of Italian rights won on Sunday in the parliamentary elections, driven by its neo-fascist and conservative component, Fratelli d'Italia.

And by the personal success of its leader, Giorgia Meloni, 45.

With 7.3 million votes (compared to 1.4 million in 2018), representing 26.4% of the votes cast, Giorgia Meloni alone won three times as many votes as each of her two great allies, and as many as the small left-wing coalition united around the Democratic Party.

Which PD, with 19% of the votes cast, suffered a historic failure, having received 820,000 votes less than Matteo Renzi in 2018, which was until now the lowest point of the party.

In just over four years, Giorgia Meloni has multiplied by five the number of his voters, winning them entirely over Matteo Salvini's League and Silvio Berlusconi's Forza Italia, which won only 8.9% and 8 respectively. .3% of votes.

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With 44% of the votes, the coalition has secured a large majority in the two assemblies: ie 237 deputies out of 400, and 112 senators out of 206, according to projections by the Ministry of the Interior.

Without however reaching the control of two thirds of the seats which would have enabled him to impose a presidential regime without going through a referendum, and which would have ensured him stability over five years.

She will be able to govern as long as there is no possible alternative majority in Parliament.

“Find compromises”

“If it has won a clear institutional victory, these elections do not mean that all of Italy has swung to the far right”,

warns against any hasty interpretation the political scientist at Luiss, Giovanni Orsina.

Because it is not a plebiscite: with less than 64% participation, the lowest level in the history of the Republic, only 28% of registered voters voted for the right, and less than 14% for Fratelli d 'Italy.

And Giovanni Orsina recalls:

“The right is today faced with a country that is mostly skeptical, and which is not ready to give it its confidence.

So she should be careful."

Nevertheless, it is indeed a nationalist and sovereignist radical right that brings it to power.

Political sociology expert Jean-Yves Dormagen, who has analyzed the "clusters" of the Italian electorate for the journal

Le Grand Continent

, calls this coalition

"Trumpian",

fueled by

"very anti-immigration workers, a middle class anti-welfare, and many sectors in demand of protectionism and authority”.

Segments of the population who, to varying degrees, yearn for the affirmation of Italy's Christian identity against multiculturalism, for order and security, and are fiercely opposed to

"the assistantship which diverts work".

Giorgia Meloni collected the votes of the periphery, workers, craftsmen, traders and small Italian bosses.

She also won spectacular victories on the red soils of Tuscany and Emilia-Romagna.

While the center of the big Italian cities remained in the hands of the left or the center, Giorgia Meloni recovered the votes of the periphery, of the workers, craftsmen, merchants and small Italian bosses.

And not only in the north-east of Italy, where it collected twice as many votes as the League, of which it is however the region of origin.

It also won spectacular victories on the red soils of Tuscany and Emilia-Romagna.

Still, his score will not allow him to do without a single one of his allies.

“Although she is the leader of the largest party of the radical right in Europe, she is not Viktor Orban,

explains political scientist Roberto d'Alimonte.

Even with about 30% of the elected, she will not have a free hand and will have to find compromises on each question with her allies.

Allies whose weakness she also fears, both Salvini and Berlusconi, who, at 85, was elected in Monza and is making a comeback in the Senate.

Because, says Giovanni Orsina,

“a weak ally sooner or later turns out to be unstable and unpredictable”.

Read the file

Family, immigration, Europe... The conservative program of Giorgia Meloni in Italy

Initially, on the strength of her victory, Giorgia Meloni should be able to seize the levers:

"It is she who should be called by the Quirinale to be the next president of the Council, she who will form the government with the agreement of the President of the Republic, and she who will set government policy,”

says Giovanni Orsina.

The formation of the government will also constitute a first test of its room for maneuver and its ability to block Matteo Salvini, who dreams of managing immigration again at the Ministry of the Interior.

Lorenzo Castellani, from Luiss, predicts that

“Giorgia Meloni will probably give more weight to his allies in his government than their electoral results, even if it means depriving his own party of a few seats, to get them to follow his political line without flinching”.

But for how long?

“There is no stable political coalition in Italy,

replies Roberto d'Alimonte.

Its longevity will largely depend on the international situation, which may make it easier or much more difficult for it.

Source: lefigaro

All news articles on 2022-09-26

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