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ITALIAN ELECTIONS

EXPLAINED: What’s behind election success for Italy’s far right?

Italy's elections have produced a clear winner. But why did voters choose Giorgia Meloni's Brothers of Italy party, and has Italy really lurched towards the extreme right? Here's a look at what happened.

EXPLAINED: What's behind election success for Italy's far right?
Giorgia Meloni is set to become Italy’s next prime minister. But what’s behind her party’s massive success at the elections? Photo by Andreas SOLARO / AFP

Readers have been in touch over the past few days to express concern at the result of Italy’s elections, with many asking how Italian voters could hand a landslide victory to Brothers of Italy (Fratelli d’Italia or FDI) a far-right party with roots in the post-fascist movement.

“I’m trying to understand why most voters in Italy would be in favour of this party? Has nothing been learned from history?” asked one Italian-American reader in the US.

EXPLAINED: What will a far-right government mean for Italy?

But, though it might not seem like it from some newspaper headlines, or even from the election results at first glance, the majority of voters did not actually choose Meloni’s party – and a large number of people in Italy didn’t vote at all.

Political analysts also say there hasn’t really been any evidence of the “sharp turn to the right” described in many international media reports. The views of voters in Italy overall aren’t necessarily shifting to the right or getting more extreme: Meloni has however been very successful in uniting the existing right-wing vote.

Her strong right-wing alliance, the lack of any credible opposition, and an electoral system that favours coalitions all worked in Meloni’s favour. Here’s a brief look at what this means:

FdI took the right-wing vote from other parties

While it may look a lot like Italy has taken a sharp turn to the right – particularly from a glance at these overwhelmingly blue maps – political analysts say strong support for the right in Italy has long been at around the same level, but was previously split.

As Dr Daniele Albertazzi, Politics professor at the University of Birmingham, put it in his analysis: “Brothers of Italy has attracted negligible support from outside the right.”

Data shows Meloni likely drew much of her recent surge in support from Italy’s other right-wing parties, particularly the League and small hard-right parties, while right-leaning supporters of Italy’s populist Five Star Movement likely also voted for the right-wing coalition this time.

FdI’s success came from it being the biggest party in a strong right-wing coalition able to appeal to voters all the way from the more moderate centre-right to the extreme right.

Many moderate voters said they were giving Meloni a chance because other party leaders were almost all familiar faces who’ve already had a shot at running the country – Enrico Letta, Giuseppe Conte, Matteo Renzi and Silvio Berlusconi have all previously served as prime minister at least once.

While Meloni has been involved in politics for many years, she was previously unknown to most of the electorate. Her profile has risen astronomically over the past 18 months after she chose to make FdI the only party in opposition to Mario Draghi’s broad ‘national unity’ government, attracting the protest vote (which last time went to the populist M5S and League) by presenting it as the only alternative to the status quo.

Voter turnout was historically low

A poor turnout, particularly in the south, is also thought to have contributed to the election result.

Voter turnout fell to a low of around 64 percent, about nine points lower than the last elections in 2018, and the lowest-ever turnout at an Italian general election.

The rate of voter participation was markedly lower in southern regions, with the lowest turnout of all in the region of Calabria at 50.8 percent.

Meanwhile the highest turnout was recorded in the northern regions of Lombardy and Veneto, both at around 70 percent. This area happens to be the heartland of hard-right parties including Brothers of Italy and the League (previously called the Northern League).

Around one in four of those who voted in Sunday’s election backed Meloni’s Brothers of Italy.

At the last elections in 2018 the south of Italy voted overwhelmingly for the Five Star Movement, which promised to tackle poverty, inequality, and other issues primarily affecting southern regions while railing against the political establishment.

But the party seemingly failed to impress once it got into government, and has since lost a lot of support. It also chose to run alone rather than allying with any other parties, which put it at a disadvantage.

Italy’s electoral system favours coalitions

The centre-left’s complete failure to form a strong coalition in order to fight the election is also thought to have contributed to the right’s landslide win.

Such alliances are paramount in Italy due to the way the electoral system works. About 37 percent of seats in both houses of parliament are allocated on a first-past-the-post basis in single-member constituencies, and this works to the advantage of parties who run as part of coalitions. (You can find an explanation of how Italy’s particularly complicated hybrid voting system works here.)

As a result, the right-wing bloc with 44 percent of the vote was able to take more seats in parliament than all the centre and centre-left parties on 49 percent, basically because of the fact it joined together and they didn’t.

Member comments

  1. Is Meloni ‘far right’, ‘hard right’ or ‘extreme right’? She sees herself as an old-fashioned British Tory, quotes left wing Bertolt Brecht in parliament and, as a minister, stood up strongly for Tibet against China. She has also been condemning human rights abuses in Qatar, Saudi Arabia and Pakistan. Can you be on the right and also ‘in the right’, I wonder. Mussolini, of course, started out as a violent socialist and, so, I suppose fascism has it roots in the left. Make up your own mind: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lr1RVO2N6O8

  2. Thank you, thank you, thank you. I am relieved to learn that my analysis was correct, and really angry at Conte, never mind the so-called left. Italy needs another “Dolce Enrico” but I don’t see anyone in that cesspool who can come close.

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TERRORISM

Italy on maximum terror alert over Easter after Moscow attack

Italy was to increase surveillance in busy areas ahead of the Easter holidays and following the bombing of a Moscow concert hall, ministers agreed on Monday.

Italy on maximum terror alert over Easter after Moscow attack

Italy’s national committee for public security, chaired by Interior Minister Matteo Piantedosi, on Monday said anti-terrorism monitoring in Italy must be strengthened ahead of the Easter holidays, with more surveillance to be carried out at popular tourist spots and at “sensitive sites”.

The committee agreed on “the importance of continuing monitoring activity, including online, by police and intelligence forces for the identification of possible risk situations” in Italy, reported news agency Ansa.

The security meeting was convened following the terrorist attack in Moscow on Friday where armed men opened fire and set the building ablaze, killing at least 133 people.

Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani had stressed to the public on Sunday that Italy faced “no concrete risk” and said the country’s security and law enforcement services were “always on the alert to prevent any attack.”

“During the Easter holidays you will need to be very careful. We will always do the utmost to ensure the safety of citizens and tourists,” Tajani said, speaking on national broadcaster Rai’s current affairs show Restart.

READ ALSO: Terror alerts: Should I be worried about travelling to Italy?

The fight against terrorism “has nothing to do with the war in Ukraine,” the minister continued.

“We support Ukraine” as an invaded country in which international law has been violated, he said, “but as the Italian government we have expressed our condemnation of the attack [in Moscow] and closeness to the families of the victims and the survivors”.

Cabinet Secretary Alfredo Mantovano said on the same programme that the main terrorist threat Italy faced at the moment was mainly from “lone wolves” and “not so much from organised groups.”

“I believe that a group like the one that acted in the Moscow attack, which must have been trained and had logistical support, would be intercepted sooner in Italy,” he said.

“The most worrying threat” in Italy was online recruitment, he said, noting that propaganda was closely monitored.

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