Salvini Puts Italy on a Collision Course With Europe
It was always a matter of time before Italy’s government—the first populist coalition in the heart of Europe—ran out of steam.
The liaison between the anti-establishment Five Star Movement and the right-wing populist League party has been less a marriage of convenience than a rather transactional fling that’s kept on flinging for 15 months in spite of many ideological differences. Power is a strong aphrodisiac.
But even though the League’s Matteo Salvini—Italy’s interior minister and deputy prime minister, the brightest star in European right-wing populism—has been de facto running the country for quite some time, it was still a jolt, and more than mere political theater, when he decided to pull the plug yesterday evening, paving the way for snap elections. A jolt because no one—not even Salvini—has any clue how this will play out. “He’s playing with fire,” Stefano Folli, a columnist, told me.
