The right-wing alliance at the time of the Covid-19 pandemic: all change?

ABSTRACT

The growth of populist radical right parties at the expense of Berlusconi’s Forza Italia (FI) has recently reconfigured the right in Italy. Changes in power relations created for the Lega (League), Fratelli d’Italia (Brothers of Italy, FdI) and FI, different competitive pressures, resulting in distinctive – and often conflicting – responses to the pandemic. Based on the analysis of these parties’ Twitter accounts and on survey data, this article examines how right-wing actors positioned themselves vis à vis the government, and each other, throughout 2020. Eventually, the League became the government’s most vocal critic, forcing FdI to follow suit; meanwhile, FI reinvented itself as a moderate, pro-EU party. Despite these changes, our analysis also stresses continuity, insofar as the alliance continued to craft its message around taxation, the EU, immigration and law/order, as it had done in the past. It also continued to enjoy electoral support similar to that of recent decades.

KEYWORDS:

• Covid-19
• populism
• League
• Brothers of Italy
• Forza Italia

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1. ‘Sondaggi, Meloni scavalca Conte: è la leader preferita dagli italiani. Crescono Zaia e Bonaccini. Cala la fiducia nel governo: −1%’, https://www.ilfattoquotidiano.it, 12 November 2020, accessed on the same day.

2. For the sake of simplicity and due to space limitations, we cite tweets in the following format: author, day, month. In some cases, the selected tweets include incomplete sentences and links re-directing the reader to other social media platforms, most notably Facebook.

3. YouTrend Supermedia, Archivio Settimanale: www.youtrend.it. YouTrend Supermedia includes the following polling agencies (in alphabetical order): Demos, EMG, Euromedia, Ipsos, Ixè, Quorum, SWG and Tecnè. The weighted average takes into account differences in methodologies, samples and data collection date across polling agencies. It was considered the most suitable source of data because, by averaging different polls, it can provide more realistic indications than can a single snapshot.

4. YouTrend Supermedia 16 January 2020.

5. Tondo (2020).

6. ‘Ursula von der Leyen: “Scusateci, ora la Ue è con voi”’, www.repubblica.it, 1 April 2020, accessed 4 November 2020.

7. ‘Mes, Berlusconi: “Soldi praticamente gratis. Occorre accettare”’, www.repubblica.it, 22 May 2020, accessed 25 September 2020.

8. YouTrend Supermedia 30 April 2020.

9. ‘Sondaggio.La Lega perde consensi: 25,4%, Pd a 4 punti. Conte, gradimento a quota 66, Salvini a 31ʹ, www.corriere.it, 26 April 2020, accessed 7 November 2020.

10. ‘Il sondaggio politico di lunedì 25 maggio 2020ʹ, www.tg.la7.it, 25 May 2020, accessed 8 November 2020.

11. ‘Il Coronavirus non placa le polemiche. Salvini chiede incontro a Mattarella’, www.ansa.it, 26 February 2020, accessed 6 November 2020.

12. YouTrend Supermedia 30 July 2020.

13. At the time of writing, in December 2020, Salvini was being tried for kidnapping, illegal arrest and abuse of office. In July 2019, as the Interior Minister in the first Conte government, he prevented over a hundred people rescued at sea by the Italian navy from disembarking in Italy until other EU countries agreed to take them.

14. YouTrend Supermedia 3 December 2020.

15. ‘Berlusconi torna e attacca l’euro e la “sinistra bugiarda”’, www.repubblica.it, 23 January 2004.

16. ‘Berlusconi: “Nel 2011 la Merkel mi disse “non mi saluterai più””’, www.ilgiornale.it, 14 May 2014.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Daniele Albertazzi

Daniele Albertazzi is Reader in Politics at the Department of Political Science and International Studies of the University of Birmingham, United Kingdom.

Donatella Bonansinga

Donatella Bonansinga is a Doctoral Researcher in Politics at the Department of Political Science and International Studies of the University of Birmingham, United Kingdom.

Mattia Zulianello

Mattia Zulianello is Research Fellow at the Department of Political Science and International Studies of the University of Birmingham, United Kingdom.