Italy’s general election is setting off alarm bells around Europe, as early polls predict Giorgia Meloni will be the country’s next leader.
Meloni would be the country’s first far-right leader since the Second World War, when infamous fascist Benito Mussolini was in office.
To make matters even more surprising, she appears to have taken her party from the political fringes to the heart of power in a remarkably short period of time, having won just 4% of the vote in 2018.
Here’s what this means – and why the rest of the West should be paying attention.
Who is Giorgia Meloni?
Meloni is the leader of the political party, Brothers of Italy, which is on the far-right.
According to early predictions, the party is expected to win 26% of the overall vote when the result of September’s election is announced, despite its neo-fascist origins. If Meloni beats her closest opponents, the centre-left Enrico Letta, it will also mean Italy has elected its first female leader.
Although she has limited experience in government, her election campaign was built on promises to provide relief to large areas of society during the cost of living crisis.
And Meloni has tried to move the party – and her own reputation – away from its fascist past, despite still employing a slogan so often linked to that period: “God, fatherland and family.”
She is also rigid on LGBT rights and wants to encourage Italian women to have more babies, and believes in bolstering the workforce with local workers rather than immigration. She has promoted “orderly” management of legal migration and vows to stop human trafficking through intense border control.
Meloni has campaigned for lower taxes, a directly-elected president, and energy self-sufficiency too.
She has also promised to stick to Italy’s Nato commitments, and to continue backing European sanctions against Russia – although this could become a source of tension with her political allies.
What about her political alliances?
Meloni will need political alliances to have a functioning majority. Even though with 26% of the vote the Brothers of Italy is the largest party in the Italian parliament, it is not enough to get any motions voted through.
So, Meloni has an alliance with former deputy prime minister Matteo Salvini’s League, a right-wing populist party, and former prime minister Silvio Berlusconi’s Forza Italia, a centre-right party. All of the parties together are expected to win a clear majority in both the houses of parliament.
However, Salvini has become less popular in recent years – and this could pose a threat to the coalition.
He allegedly called Meloni a “pain in the ass” during a secret recording leaked last year. He also claimed the sanctions against Russia had brought “Italy to its knees”.
Even when it became clear he was part of a winning coalition, Salvini said he is not happy with the eight or nine percent his party looks set to receive in the vote.
And, while Meloni herself has expressed support for Ukraine, both of her coalition partners have links to Russia that could further undermine the government.
What happened in the run-up to this election?
Italy is coping with many of the same issues as the rest of the West right now: an energy crisis exacerbated by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine; high inflation; a potential recession; and fears of a winter Covid wave.
Italian politics have also been particularly volatile over the last decade, with parties soaring in popularity before plummeting once again all within the space of a year – meaning Meloni’s status could be only short-lived.
But, on the other hand, Meloni was the only leader not to have put her party in the last prime minister’s national unity coalition government.
Former PM Mario Draghi’s coalition government collapsed in the summer – seemingly dragging down every party which was associated with it.
Despite this turbulence, Meloni has promised to govern for all Italians, moving her tone from combatant to unifying.
Meloni also has to be nominated as the new prime minister by Italy’s president, Sergio Mattarella, and this is not likely to happen before late October.
What could Meloni’s success mean for the EU?
Well, Brussels is not delighted by the news.
As a founding nation of the European Union and the bloc’s third largest economy, having a Eurosceptic in charge could cause deep tensions.
Meloni has previously prompted fears that she would push for an Italexit (Brexit, but make it Italian), although she has since tried to squash such fears.
She has promised to be more committed to European integration, while calling for a “more political and less bureaucratic EU”.
European commission president Ursula von der Leyen also warned that the country must stick to its democratic principles.
“If things go in a difficult direction, I’ve spoken to Hungary and Poland, we have tools,” she warned, in reference to when the EU pulled the funds of these countries after a long-running row.
French prime minister Elisabeth Borne has also warned that the EU will be closely following Italy’s stance on human rights and values including women’s access to abortion during Meloni’s premiership.
In response to Meloni’s expected win, French president Emmanuel Macron simply said that the government respects the democratic choice of Italian voters.
Meloni is more likely to side with the more troublesome corners of the EU and introduce more instability at a time when the entire continent needs to be united against Russia.
It also comes as a rise in far-right groups is becoming an increasingly pressing concern in Europe. Sweden Democrats have recently become the second largest party in their own country – a group which can be traced back to neo-Nazism – while Marine Le Pen’s far-right National Rally did well in France’s parliamentary election, although narrowly missed out on a win.
The EU is already struggling with “rule of law issues” via the nationalist governments in Poland and Hungary – and the Hungarian prime minister Viktor Oban was quick to send his congratulations to Meloni on Monday.
What about outside of the EU?
The US has made it clear that it’s “eager” to work with Italy on “shared goals”.
Secretary of state Antony Blinken explained on Twitter that the priorities would be supporting Ukraine’s freedom and independence, respecting human rights and building a sustainable economic future.
He said: “Italy is a vital ally, strong democracy and valued partner.”
Moscow has spoken up too, saying it is ready to develop “constructive” ties with Rome.
A Kremlin spokesperson told reporters: “We are ready to welcome any political forces that are able to go beyond the established mainstream, which is filled with hate for our country.”
This comes after Meloni’s political ally Berlusconi said Vladimir Putin was “pushed” into invading Ukraine, although he later said the aggression against Ukraine was “unjustifiable and unacceptable”.
Salvini has also questioned the Western sanctions on Moscow.
China, too, has said it hopes there would be a “healthy and stable” relationship between the two countries. Meloni said earlier in September that Italy would not be the “weak link” in the Western alliance under pressure from China or Russia.
The UK government has not yet commented.
