Coordinated populism: a reconstruction of M5S Directorate’s communication from 2013 to 2019

In the last decade, the rapid rise of the Five Star Movement has been the focus of many studies investigating populism and its characteristics. While the communicative role of the founder Beppe Grillo has been widely discussed in the literature, to date little attention has been paid to the relevance of the Directorate in shaping the political assets attributed to M5S. By analysing all the tweets posted by Di Battista, Di Maio and Fico from the Italian electoral campaign of 2013 until the European election of 2019, we will show how instead the peculiar political proposal of M5S has been built over time also thanks to the communicative coordination capacity of the Directorate and their strategic exploitation of digital platforms’ affordances. Indeed, the presence of a shared communicative leadership has laid the ground for the construction of a political proposal capable of intercepting and shaping the different souls of the Movement, without, however, affecting the rhetoric of opposition between people and elite on which populist movements rely. The algorithmic logic of customization that governs social media has instead accentuated the possibility for users to choose the «face» they like among the various and contradictory positions of the Directorate. In these terms, M5S communicative strategy highlights the elective affinity between social media and populist rhetoric, showing how the Directorate presence on Twitter has been an exemplary case of populist ability in using the algorithmic governance of digital platforms to one’s advantage. In this view, the avoidance of overlapping between the components of the Directorate is extremely relevant: the coordinated communication between different leaders ensures that no contradictions emerge within the discourses of the individual but also that the broad political proposal can generate a chameleonic and catch-all dimension inside the party.

A sovereignist revolution? Italy’s foreign policy under the “Yellow–Green” government

In Italy, the Five Star Movement (M5S) and the Northern League (LN) formed a coalition government after the legislative elections of March 2018. What has been the actual impact of the populist executive in the Italian foreign policy? Relying on the (few) existing analyses that have developed specific hypotheses on the expected international repercussions of populist parties-ruled governments, the paper examines Italy’s foreign policy under the Italian “Yellow–Green” cabinet (June 2018–August 2019). The manuscript advances three hypotheses. First, the foreign policy of the Conte’s government has been featured by a personalistic and a centralized decision-making process. Second, the Yellow-Green executive has adopted a vocal confrontational stance on the world stage, especially within multilateral frameworks, to “take back control” over national sovereignty. Third, such sovereignist foreign policy was largely symbolic because of “strategic” populist attitudes toward public opinion and due to domestic and international constraints. The manuscript—which is based on secondary and primary sources, such as interviews with former ministers, MPs, and diplomats—aims at offering a new perspective on populist parties and foreign policy, alimenting the rising debate on foreign policy change.

Italy’s next government rests on Draghi’s fortunes

Significance This has put Salvini under pressure, though it has not weakened his support for Prime Minister Mario Draghi’s government of national unity. Support for Draghi suggests the League is becoming a more moderate party, which could help FdI consolidate support on the far right ahead of the next election, currently scheduled for 2023. Impacts The prospects of an amalgamation between the League and Forza Italia are strong, and would boost the former’s centrist credentials. While Five Star Movement support for Draghi is unreliable, its MPs do not want a general election as many of them would lose their seats. An unforeseen crisis, such as an uncontrollable wave of illegal migrants, would play into the hands of the right-wing parties.

A matter of representation: Populism and the pandemic in Italy

This chapter deals with how populist parties reacted and engaged with the pandemic in Italy, one of the European countries most affected by the spread of the SARS-CoV-2 virus. The main argument of this chapter is that populist actors are successful in profiting from a crisis when they can credibly frame it as a failure of representation. The case of Italy, which has been defined as a “country of many populisms” (Tarchi 2008), is particularly insightful. Since the outset of the pandemic at the end of February of 2020, there were two populist parties in the system , both on the right of the political spectrum: the League (former Northern League) and Brothers of Italy. After a first period known as “rally around the flag” the two parties' strategy was somehow similar until they started to diverge substantially in February 2021. In general terms, we can say that—until the breakdown of the second Conte government—the League discursively attacked the government on managing the pandemic, focusing mainly on two issues: migration and the economy. When the League entered the government, supporting Mario Draghi’s cabinet, its discourse changed even if its loyalty to the government has been flaky, at least. This strategy of keeping one foot in and one out of government (see Albertazzi and McDonnell 2005) has always been a trademark characteristic of the (Northern) League since the 1990s. Conversely, Brothers of Italy, while sharing with the League the critique to the government supported by the Democratic Party and the Five Star Movement during the first year, has later changed its strategy becoming the only relevant party in opposition to Mario Draghi’s government. This allowed FdI to systematically challenge the government's actions and depict itself as the only party to act in the interest of the people, opposing to the elite. Even if the pandemic is still unfolding, vote intention shows that Brothers of Italy has become the first Italian party, demonstrating to have taken advantage of the crisis, through a framing that was more functional with its populist appeal and in turn resulted more credible to voters.

Methods for analysing citizens’ attitudes: a hypothetical Italian referendum about the membership of the European Union as a case study

The European Union is an unprecedented unification project that successfully preserves political peace and integrates Europe’s countries into a supra-national model. However, recent economic and political crises have shown that there are institutional problems that have undermined the EU and lost the trust of many citizens. In Italy after the ‘political earthquake’ of the 2013 national elections, the party system suffered a further shock in 2018 with the consolidation of the centre-right and Five Star Movement as the main competing political actors. In this context, the relationship with the EU has undergone numerous tensions, impacting directly on Italian public opinion and its perception of European institutions. This paper investigates whether and how the ‘exit’ issue from the EU affects Italian citizens, particularly how they react to a UK-style hypothetical referendum on leaving the EU. By analysing a 2019 voter study, it tries to identify clusters of Italian citizens by their attitude to European policies and a possible EU referendum.

Italian populists and the Pact

Still on the Stability and Growth Pact, this chapter focuses on the Italian case, the third largest economy in the eurozone. After years of trying to find with Matteo Renzi’s Democrats a “narrow path” that would allow Italy to reduce its public debt, relations between the commissioner and Italy turn into an open political crisis when the Lega–Five Star Movement coalition government comes to power and decides to openly flout budgetary rules. After the Greek summer of 2015, the Italian autumn of 2018 is the most dramatic moment in the cabinet’s life. The chapter explains why, despite Rome’s growing isolation, the Commission ended up not sanctioning Italy.

Populism without host ideologies: A new home for voters with exclusionary attitudes in Italy’s Five Star Movement?

The Five Star Movement (M5S) emerged as Italy’s largest party in the 2018 election. After one year in government with the far-right League, the party formed a new coalition with the center-left Democratic Party (PD). These unconventional alliances and the M5S’s ambiguity on substantive issues such as immigration and minority rights raise questions on the value positioning of its voters. Does the M5S represent a socially liberal electorate, or has the party become a new home for voters expressing sentiments of hostility toward immigrants and minorities? I hypothesize that the M5S’s ambivalence on social issues enabled the party to attract a significant share of voters with exclusionary attitudes toward foreigners and minorities. I use survey data to measure individuals’ dispositions toward outgroups and run binary and multinomial logistic regressions to predict vote choice for the M5S and the other main parties in the 2018 election. The empirical findings suggest that the M5S has become a valid option for voters adhering to exclusionary attitudes, and show that there is no particular elective affinity between the voters of the M5S and the PD.