On the one hand there is Matteo Salvini who is preparing to live his Roman Saturday with a rally in a Piazza del Popolo, which will be filled for the most part by Northern League supporters descending from the North with trains and coaches, to which will be added a bit of Roman Fascism starting with House Pound. Maybe he will be on stage too Giorgia Meloni, the most expendable, also in terms of age, of what remains of the Alemannic era. On the other side it wanders Silvio Berlusconi, increasingly annoyed by politics, starting with the debate (but perhaps it would be better to speak of brawl) within Forza Italy and increasingly attentive to other events. For the good the vicissitudes of his companies, for the bad those concerning his legal situation. In short, the Italian right appears more and more Salvini and less and less Berlusconi.
I confirm it national surveys, who see the Alloy almeno a couple of points ahead of Forza Italia and the absolute incapacity shown so far by Berlusconi to know how to keep together (he who has always considered himself a great unifier) the too many organizational souls of the centre-right, from the Ncd to the Carroccio. It is therefore reasonable that in this context Salvini wants to count himself without confusing himself with either Alfano or Berlusconi. Sure, even there Alloy has its own problems Veneto. There is Tosi who also threatens to appear against the governor Zaia, but the mayor of Verona himself knows that in Berlusconi he would find too weak a support to beat the current governor.
After all, Salvini has changed his League. He managed to put aside the abused Bossian-style slogans all centered on the North robbed by Rome and on secessionist hypotheses. He is making the League a strongly nationalist party. No longer the regions of the North against those of the South, but the Italians of the north and the south against those who pave the way for the "illegals" who take away bread and work from our unemployed. Populism? Certainly, but at a time when inequalities and the difficulties of the weakest categories increase, this is the type of right that can be successful. This was once the case in the South. Think of the Naples laurina, or the Reggio Calabria of Ciccio Franco who rose up to the cry of "executioner who quits". Now the same is happening in the North, where social anxieties grow and are discharged towards the new poor: immigrants, refugees, those who, precisely, the League and Salvini indicate as illegal immigrants.
After all, these phenomena do not only concern Italy. In France there is Marine Le Pen, in the United Kingdom there is Nigel Farage. Many observers believe that in the upcoming British elections, the new parties could, if not overwhelm, certainly attenuate the consolidated bipartisanship between Conservatives and Labour. The more moderate centre-right forces could pay the highest price: the Gaullists in France, the Conservatives in England.
Berlusconi, who however has not always managed to find a good feeling with the moderate Europeans, thus always finds himself in great difficulty. With Renzism (and therefore the Democratic Party) increasingly attracting what should have been its liberal democratic electorate and the new right wing of Salvini and Meloni breaking through among those who were its most anti-system supporters.
And so a scholar like Giovanni Orsina who understands Berlusconism did not hesitate in the "Stampa" to wonder if Berlusconi is not by now a former politician. This thesis is confirmed by the increasing attention that the founder of Forza Italia dedicates to his entrepreneurial activity: whether it is Mondadori or televisions. The takeover bid on Rai antennas will also be just a market offer. But in a market that is usually quite protected, to be successful in which a good relationship with Renzi is more useful than keeping up with Salvini's crude slogans.
Everything is in motion in the Italian right, which is increasingly moving away from liberal havens.
