Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni of the “post-fascist” Brothers of Italy (FdI) party has a couple of policy ideas:
Italy’s far-right prime minister, Giorgia Meloni, has been accused of “splitting the country” after parliament approved a controversial bill granting regions more power, which critics say will increase poverty in the south. …
The “differentiated autonomy” bill, sought by the wealthy rightwing-led Lombardy and Veneto as well as the leftwing Emilia-Romagna, gives regions more power over how their tax revenues are collected and spent, and over public services such as health and education.
The approval of the bill, which passed with 172 votes in favour and 99 against, was hailed by Matteo Salvini, the leader of Lega, the ruling coalition member which for years has championed the move, as “a victory for all Italians”. (1)
In other words, this is a policy to make the richer regions even richer and the poor ones more poor. The left opposition Five Star Movement and the center-left Democratic Party (PD) criticized the measure. PD leader lly Schlein said, “Meloni, the patriot who splits the country. Brothers of Italy has bowed to Lega’s secessionist dreams.”
The Lega to which Schlein refers as part of Meloni’s governing coalition is the Lega per Salvini Premier (LSP), which is the successor party to Lega Nord, a party founded in 1989 as a secessionist party, that wanted to split off the wealthier northern parties from the national of Italy. In other words, let’s get rid of all those poor people and industrial workers in the southern part of the country. Forget about developing the economy in the south, let’s just get away from it!
The idea of secession was a crackpot radical notion. But now Meloni has incorporated a “soft” version of the idea into her government’s program.
Meloni also has an idea for, uh, improving governance in Italy, which is to have the prime minister directly elected by a popular vote. Conceptually that sounds strange, because Italy has a President (currently Sergio Mattarella) who is the head of state and a prime minister who is the head of government. In the US, the President is head of state and government. But even in France, which has a strong Presidency, the prime minister is selected by parliament itself.
So what’s the deal with Meloni’s elected PM idea?
The bill allowing the direct election of a prime minister is a significant constitutional overhaul which Meloni has vigorously promoted, describing it as “the mother of all reforms”.
Under the proposal, the prime minister would be elected for five years and the coalition supporting the winning candidate would be given at least 55% of seats, a law Meloni argues would help end Italy’s revolving-door governments. Critics fear the bill, reminiscent of a constitutional change made by the fascist dictator Benito Mussolini about a century ago, could lead Italy towards authoritarianism. [my emphasis]
Two big takeaways from this: One is that Meloni’s version of populism means in reality supporting the wealthy against the poor, not the The People vs. The Elite.
The second is that she has a definite authoritarian agenda that looks to move the country away from liberal democracy to Orbanism or some other variation of rightwing authoritarianism.
Mussolini is long gone. But he still casts a large shadow.
Santiago Zabala and Claudio Gallo provide a comparison for Al Jazeera between Meloni and far-right Argentinian President Javier Milei:
When far-right “outsider” Javier Milei was elected Argentina’s president in November, hard-right Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni was the first European leader to congratulate him. In February, Milei returned the favour by making Italy the first country in Europe he visited as president. Since then, the two leaders had nothing but praise for each other.
It is not surprising that Meloni and Milei support one another, given the many hard-right views and policy positions they share from opposition to abortion to hostility to the LGBT community. On paper, they are both socially conservative “populists” who capitalise on their people’s growing frustration with establishment politicians who they perceive as serving “globalist forces”. But the apparent bond between the two leaders – who both addressed a far-right convention in Madrid this past weekend – is not based solely on ideological affinity. In fact, Milei’s and Meloni’s politics are far from interchangeable: The Italian prime minister leads a statist, nationalist party with historic links to fascism while Argentina’s president self-identifies as a libertarian and an “anarcho-capitalist”. While Meloni views curbing immigration as a leading cause of her government, Milei is largely indifferent to the issue. The most important factor that brings the two leaders together appears not to be their shared ideological convictions but the hypocritical “neoliberal populism” they practice in the service of Western imperialism. [my emphasis] (2)
The difference between these two authoritarians on the issue of immigration is notable, and a reminder that soulmates in authoritarianism aren’t necessarily cookie-cutter images of each other. Argentina has relatively permissive immigration standards, reflecting a tradition going back to the late 19th century of encouraging and accepting immigrants, notably from Italy and Germany, including Jewish immigrants. (And, yes, German immigration in Argentina started long before the end of the Second World War!)
Notes:
(1) Giuffrida, Angela (2024): Giorgia Meloni accused of splitting Italy over law to let richer regions keep taxes. The Guardian 06/19/2024. <https://www.theguardian.com/world/article/2024/jun/19/giorgia-meloni-accused-of-splitting-italy-over-law-to-let-richer-regions-keep-taxes> (Accessed: 2024-20-06).
(2) Zabala, Santiago & Gallo, Claudio (2024): The neoliberal populism of Milei and Meloni. Al Jazeera 05/21/2024. <https://www.aljazeera.com/opinions/2024/5/21/the-neoliberal-populism-of-milei-and-meloni> (Accessed: 2024-20-06).
No comments:
Post a Comment