Transcript: Italy and the Giorgia Meloni phenomenon

This is an audio transcript of the Rachman Review podcast episode: ‘Italy and the Giorgia Meloni phenomenon’

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Gideon Rachman
Hello and welcome to the Rachman Review. I’m Gideon Rachman, chief foreign affairs commentator of the Financial Times. This week’s podcast is about Italy and the country’s prime minister, Giorgia Meloni. My guest is Amy Kazmin, the FT’s Rome bureau chief.

With European elections coming up and Italy chairing the G7 this year, Giorgia Meloni is set to play a key role in European and international diplomacy. Meloni’s political party is on the far right of the Italian political spectrum. So how will she handle Italy’s international and domestic role? 

Giorgia Meloni voice clip
With the left in power, the state has turned hostile to citizens and businesses, increasingly violating individual liberties. Freedom is for us the most precious wealth. This compass guides our historical judgment. The Italian right has handed fascism over to history for decades now, unambiguously condemning the suppression of democracy and the ignominious anti-Jewish laws. 

Gideon Rachman
That was Giorgia Meloni, the Italian prime minister, speaking in 2022, shortly before the elections, which led her to take power as the leader of the coalition government. As you have heard from that clip, Meloni was keen to reassure foreigners and Italians that fascism is a thing of the past in Italy. She needed to get that message across because the party she leads, the Brothers of Italy, is widely regarded as a far-right party with its roots in fascism. Since coming to power, Giorgia Meloni has reassured many of her international critics. She struck up a good relationship with Ursula von der Leyen, the president of the European Commission, who’s on the centre right. And unlike other European leaders with roots in the far right like Hungary’s Viktor Orbán, she’s shown no sympathy for Vladimir Putin’s Russia.

But Meloni’s domestic critics are not reassured. This week, journalists at the Italian public broadcaster went on strike, complaining political interference from the government. So I began my conversation with Amy Kazmin by asking her about Meloni’s performance. Given the fears about her when she came into office, has she surprised on the upside? 

Amy Kazmin
Well, there is no doubt that when Giorgia Meloni came to power in the middle of 2022, there was a lot of apprehension about exactly what she was going to do and how she was going to lead the country. It was a very sensitive time, of course, just months after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, and people really did not know what to expect from this person. I mean, 10 years ago, Giorgia Meloni had been a kind of a marginal, little-known figure from an obscure far-right party. And here she was, suddenly, within a decade, catapulted to the prime minister’s office. So people really weren’t sure what to make of her and what they could expect from her. But in fact, I think that what we have seen is that Giorgia Meloni has really reassured international markets, Italy’s international partners, other members of Nato, that she isn’t quite the extremist that maybe many feared she might be. 

Gideon Rachman
And at home, she seems — despite the record of Italian prime ministers being cycled through very quickly — to have established a reasonable political base and to be quite popular. 

Amy Kazmin
She is indeed quite popular, and at the moment she does seem to have a very firm grip on the country and a very firm grip on her three-party coalition. She leads a coalition with two other parties, one of which was founded by the late Silvio Berlusconi, who of course died since she took power. The other is led by Matteo Salvini, who’s really the extreme right of Italian politics at the moment, but whose popularity is falling.

I think she’s convinced many Italian voters that she’s a very serious leader who is really wrestling with political problems that is a good representative for Italy on the global stage. In the upcoming European parliamentary elections, her Brothers of Italy party is likely to even do better than it did in the 2022 general elections. So she does seem to have a very firm grip on things. 

Gideon Rachman
And you mentioned the European parliamentary elections. And given that she and her party are likely to do well, and the far right in Europe, which is a, you know, pretty heterogeneous group, are also likely to advance, it seems like that — I think in a phrase you used in a recent article — she will emerge at the middle of the year as a power broker in Europe as people try to find a sense of political gravity. 

Amy Kazmin
She does have the potential to really emerge as a power broker. The far right in Europe is, of course, broken up into different blocs. She leads the ECR, there’s the centre EPP and then there’s Marine Le Pen’s far-right Identity and Democracy. And as of now, there’s no prospective of an alliance between Identity and Democracy and the ECR. So I think there’s a lot of thought that Meloni could lead the ECR and her Brothers of Italy party into the centre of a new political alliance. She’s very often talking about the possibility of shifting Europe to the centre right and forming a centre-right alliance without the participation of left parties. 

Gideon Rachman
And she does seem to have struck up . . . interestingly, one of her most important relationships in Europe is not with other far-right figures like Marine Le Pen or Viktor Orbán in Hungary — although I think she’s, you know, she’s got relations with both of those figures — but with Ursula von der Leyen, the commission president. Why are those two leaders getting on and what’s the potential significance of their relationship? 

Amy Kazmin
Well, I think that’s one of the very interesting things about Giorgia Meloni. People who knew her for a long time did tell us ahead of her elections that the world was gonna be surprised when Giorgia Meloni took power and they saw what she really was. I think that she has very strong individual people skills and is really willing to sit down and talk and engage and dialogue with other people.

She has been able to forge a really good working relationship with Ursula von der Leyen, and I think that she also came to power with an approach that she couldn’t just go and sort of declare war in Europe and, you know, shout slogans of revolution; that if she wanted to meet the goals that she had set for herself and address the needs of the Italian people, then she was gonna have to kind of work collaboratively and be able to persuade people, you know, that Italy’s interests needed to be taken more seriously, and that maybe she did offer alternative approaches.

And, of course, Ursula von der Leyen, for her point, is interested possibly in a second term running the commission and sees Giorgia Meloni as a possible ally or someone who might support her second bid, though Giorgia Meloni remains very non-committal and hasn’t wished to kind of openly declare support for anyone and says it’s too early to talk about this, we’ll discuss it after the parliamentary elections. 

Gideon Rachman
I mean, my impression is also that a kind of key moment in persuading those on the sort of centre and centre right in Europe that Meloni was perhaps not quite the person they feared was when she made quite a strong speech condemning Russia, supporting Ukraine. She’s travelled to Kyiv. And so, that unlike Viktor Orbán in Budapest, who is pretty clearly sympathetic to Russia, hosting Xi Jinping this week and is seen as somebody who’s kind of actively undermining the EU’s liberal project, Meloni, at least on the Ukraine issue, has been pretty mainstream. 

Amy Kazmin
That’s right. One of the most important decisions of Giorgia Meloni’s political career was where to stand after the Russian invasion of Ukraine. In the past, she had expressed some mild kind of admiration for Putin and wasn’t necessarily very strong on the geopolitics of, you know, Russia’s nibbling away at Ukraine with the invasion of Crimea. However, after the invasion in 2022, she absolutely came down super solid strong against Russia, against the invasion and in favour of Ukraine.

And this actually predates her election. Very shortly after the invasion, she appeared at the CPAC, the Conservative party conference in America, which is kind of run by the mainstream of the Republican party. And at that point, she was absolutely unambiguous in her expression of support in very, you know, moving and strong tones for Ukraine. And I think that there’s been no doubt that she’s been unwavering in her support for President Zelenskyy. And with that, she has clearly shown that on the major geostrategic visions of the day, her approach is solidly pro-Nato and solidly pro-the western alliance, solidly pro-America. So with that has come other things, which is that she can’t really just afford to shred the EU. And in fact, it’s very interesting. She just gave a speech to her party supporters, a major speech. It was the conference, that annual conference of the Brothers of Italy party. And she actually talked about the need to strengthen European common security, European foreign policy.

So I think that the notions that people might have had that Giorgia Meloni was somehow anti-Europe, I think, was maybe a little simplified or oversimplified. While there’s no doubt that she’s very, you know, grumpy about European bureaucrats that prescribe one-size-fits-all solutions to some of the internal issues, like how to follow the green transition and other kinds of issues, when it comes to shoring up Europe as bloc, as an actor in the world ready to face external security threats such as Russia and such as China, she is very clear and very strong on the need for a stronger Europe. So one of her formulas is that she wants to see Europe do fewer things, but do the things better than it does and do the things that really matter, especially from a geostrategic perspective.

Gideon Rachman
So that is all a very interesting description of where she stands, sort of on the international spectrum. But it leaves me wondering, why was this woman a member of the far right, anyway, through most of her political career if this is what she appears to stand for? Presumably it’s not an accident that she was in the Brothers of Italy, and as you mentioned, she went to see PAC, which is where Donald Trump makes regular appearances and where Viktor Orbán is a great favourite. So are we too quick, perhaps, to write off Meloni’s roots in the far right? Are they still there? And why has she emerged from this political milieu? 

Amy Kazmin
That’s also very interesting. It’s very important to understand the time and the moments at which she entered politics, which was as a teenager of just about 15 years old, in the local branch of what was then called the Italian Social Movement. The Italian Social Movement was the rightwing party founded by the surviving comrades of the late fascist dictator Benito Mussolini. And why did she wind up there?

The context is, in 1992, Italy’s postwar political system was essentially collapsing. The two parties that had both dominated politics were seen as completely corrupted and had lost all legitimacy, and, interestingly, neither of them exists anymore. Giorgia herself talks about having been motivated by the assassinations of the two great anti-Mafia prosecutors, who were both assassinated in 1992 in Sicily in spectacular bombings. And it was a time when people were also starting to realise that the Mafia in Sicily had been flourishing under the political protection of what had been one of the ruling parties. So if you were looking around and you wanted to revolt against a corrupt system that had lost all its legitimacy, the one place that you might be able to go was in fact the Italian Social Movement, because they had been such political pariahs, they had never been close to power, and they were clean because they were so out of the system that they weren’t, like, discredited by the system. So at that point, she enters and then, of course, she stays with them for her career. But of course, that party also begins to morph. A year or two later, they drop their name Italian Social Movement. They take another name. The then leader, you know, renounces or makes comments about the fascist past and the race laws. And the party itself begins to distance itself from the fascist past.

And of course, today’s Brothers of Italy party, which was founded about 10 years ago by Giorgia Meloni herself, in fact, has two kind of streams within the party. One of them is the old MSI crowd that Giorgia Meloni grew up with and came up through the ranks of the real far-right political movement, even as it tried to slightly lose its kind of far-right taint. But there’s another stream of politicians that have actually come from far more mainstream parties, including Silvio Berlusconi’s Forza Italia, and maybe some of them originally came from the Democratic Christians who had, like, run Italy and was the political establishment in the postwar decades. And they have also joined Giorgia Meloni, recognising her political talent. So the party actually has these kind of two disparate groups and streams within them.

But there’s no doubt also that on many social issues, she’s conservative when it comes to immigration and the idea of Europe as an, essentially, a western civilisation where, you know, national identity needs to be protected. And I think that’s something that chimes very well with the original, you know, ideals of the Italian Social Movement back when she joined it. So you have had an influx of people from a much more mainstream political background. But there’s no doubt also that on certain key issues, Giorgia Meloni is really incredibly conservative, even though her own personal life doesn’t always match up with the, you know, her idealised conservative worldview. But she certainly espouses very conservative and traditional family values. She often talks about the importance of a child having a father and a mother, and she’s seen as hostile to non-traditional families with same-sex parents.

But the interesting thing is that, of course, in her own life, Giorgia Meloni is not at all following such values. She was herself the child of a single mother, and now she is a single mother. She had a long-term partner, but recently parted ways with him very publicly. He was a TV presenter and out-takes of his harassment of female colleagues at the television station where he worked were leaked into the public domain. It was obviously very embarrassing, and a day or two later, Giorgia Meloni publicly announced that she was separating from him and that their relationship was effectively over.

And interestingly, again speaking to her political talent, rather than having people sort of say, oh, what a hypocrite, she’s espousing all these conservative values, but in fact, look at her own personal life, she got a lot of sympathy from feminists, from women’s activists who said that, in fact, she had provided a masterclass in how to dump a man that was misbehaving, and especially in a thing where she really had no reason why she had to stay with him. So she has even been able to turn her own unique circumstances into a political strength. 

Gideon Rachman
In domestic terms, an issue that she has made very much her own is migration. Italy is perhaps the main entry point for migrants crossing the Mediterranean, claiming asylum and then very frequently very difficult to return to where they came from, even if their asylum claims are not approved. And the numbers are pretty huge. And Meloni promised, like so many others, like Rishi Sunak in Britain and so on, that she would get on top of this and somehow turn the tide. But it’s proven very difficult. 

Amy Kazmin
Yes. That’s true. Immigration has been a huge issue in Italy since back in 2015 and 2016. And Giorgia Meloni’s great political frenemy Matteo Salvini, her coalition partner and the leader of the League, practically made his reputation mainly by bashing illegal immigrants, illegal immigration, vowing really strong measures to conquer it. And Giorgia Meloni did also adopt some of that rhetoric in her rise to power. The thing is that, of course, as you say, she’s found out that, you know, it’s a problem, you know, more easily yelled about than solved because, in fact, last year, illegal immigrant arrivals in Italy were a magnitude higher, maybe 50 per cent higher, if I remember correctly, than they have been the year before.

But then one of the things that’s really so disarming about Giorgia Meloni and probably contributes to her political success, is the fact that she is able to stand up in front of a podium and admit very frankly and level with her audience and say, yeah, I’m sorry I wasn’t able to deliver on this and live up to expectations. And my God, it’s so much harder than I thought that it would be. But I’m still working on it and we’re still trying. And so I think she’s been able to show her electorate that she has been able to try. She has been able to bring Ursula von der Leyen to Lampedusa, the island where many migrants land up when they first arrive, having crossed the Mediterranean illegally. She has a deal with Albania to build two migrant holding centres. She really is working on trying to develop a multipronged approach, and part of which involves more engagement for Europe to stand together and try to come up with, as a bloc, solutions to try to tackle the illegal migration problem. So I think she’s able to show her electorate that she’s trying hard to deliver. 

Gideon Rachman
Now, as you say, a lot of her critics have been mollified. But a lot happened. And particularly in the media there’s, I believe, this week this strike in the Italian state media saying that, you know, they’re losing their journalistic independence, that the state is taking over and that there are threats to press freedom in Italy. So what’s the issue there and how widespread are those fears? 

Amy Kazmin
Look, the state-owned broadcaster has always been, to a certain extent, a tool of, you know, political power. It is a state broadcaster. It’s an interesting one because they have multiple channels. And in the past, each channel was kind of left to the supporters of one of the major parties or another. But the journalists of Rai are very angry and upset and complain that they have been subjected to unbearable political pressure. So there have been allegations of censorship, that critics of Meloni haven’t been given a platform. So there is a lot of discontent. And this week journalists of Rai took the first of what they say is gonna be five days of strike. They accused Giorgia Meloni of trying to turn Rai into a megaphone of the ruling party and using it for essentially propaganda and really soft, flattering coverage of the government and its actions. There have also been a lot of criticisms about the way Giorgia Meloni and members of her government are using defamation lawsuits to stifle critical coverage or retaliate against journalists that are asking too many questions or digging into things. So there is a sense that the government is using tools at its disposal to try to keep the conversation about its performance light and avoid too much criticism. 

Gideon Rachman
Yeah, well, it’ll be interesting to see if those issues begin to cut through with the Italian public and, you know, maybe as in the case of Viktor Orbán again, with the European parliament in due course. But it seemed to me that, so you know, looking at the span of Italian prime ministers over decades, that traditionally they’ve been undermined in the end by a weak economy and by the instability of domestic politics. So, to conclude, do you think there are any signs that Meloni can break that pattern? Or we’ll she, like most Italian prime ministers, founder on those very fundamental economic and political weaknesses in the system? 

Amy Kazmin
So it’s interesting. I often wonder whether Giorgia Meloni will in fact kind of outlast and end up as one of Italy’s long-serving prime ministers. She is certainly an immense political talent and her ability to communicate with voters . . . She makes use of social media very effectively. She does these very, very chatty videos that are reminiscent of Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s kind of radio chats, where she talks to the, you know, electorate. This is my week. This is what we’ve been doing. Oh, yeah, I know people are thinking this, but here’s what I have to say about that.

At the moment, she is enjoying a bit of a political sweet spot. Her opposition is divided. Those who oppose her are also squabbling so much among themselves that they barely have time to attack her. The economy is in a good spot because of a big influx of European cash through the Covid recovery program. Until now, Italy hasn’t been under so much pressure from Brussels over the size of its deficit because the growth and stability pact had been suspended for a while after Covid.

But there are concerns that, you know, looking forward, the pressure could mount. There isn’t really a feeling that Giorgia Meloni is tackling some of the deep structural problems that afflict the Italian economy, and maybe doesn’t really have a vision for where to move the economy to. Growth is maybe better than in other parts of Europe, but still not outstanding. The debt burden remains very heavy. And if the EU starts to come down harder and pressure Italy to rein in its deficit, things could get more uncomfortable. That could complicate Meloni’s relations with Brussels. She’s towering over her own, you know, right, centre-right coalition partners, one of whom himself looks terribly vulnerable. So it’s possible that things could get more difficult. But at the moment she does seem to be in a very sweet spot. And I guess she will respond to challenges if and when pressure starts to mount. 

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Gideon Rachman
That was Amy Kazmin, the FT’s Rome bureau chief, ending this edition of the Rachman Review. Thanks for listening and please join me again next week. 

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