Demagogues Win as Europes Populist Tide Sweeps Italy.
'The Italian elections on Sunday were the latest powerful wave in a tidal turn of anti-immigrant, anti-European Union and antidemocratic fervor that has ravaged European politics. The vote was a stinging rejection of traditional parties, and of national leadership that has been frustrated by a flood of migrants from Africa and the Middle East and stymied by years of stagnation.
While the populist parties that were the two biggest vote-getters were different in many ways, both want to abandon the euro and support for migrants, and shared conspiracy theories about bankers, vaccines and the 9/11 attacks.
The lack of an outright winner or obvious coalition promises a long and wobbly slog before a government, most likely unstable, takes shape. . .
Whatever government emerges will have a tough time satisfying voters’ expectations while coping with Italy’s real economic problems, including the largest public debt in the European Union and high youth unemployment. As Greece learned earlier, it’s one thing to rage against European rules; it’s a far different thing to try to buck them.
Italy now poses a major challenge to the European project, already badly battered by the Brexit vote in Britain and the illiberal drift of Poland, Hungary and other East and Central European countries. That promise of instability and uncertainty is no doubt being celebrated in the Kremlin. (Both the Five Star Movement and the League have argued against union sanctions on Russia.) Italy is not likely to quit the union or drop the euro, but a government hostile to both is a headache to Brussels and the deeper integration championed by President Emmanuel Macron of France and Chancellor Angela Merkel of Germany. They will now need to decide whether to press ahead or hold off a while.'
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/03/05/opinion/italy-election-populist.html?
Italy’s Surging Populists Run Into a Political Muddle. But for How Long?
'Another European election, another scene of political carnage. The stunning showing by the Five Star Movement and other populist parties in Italy’s election on Sunday shattered the establishment and suggested that the country was at the cusp of a political revolution.
Except Italy is Italy. A complicated law passed last year — and aimed at Five Star — made it difficult for any single party to win the election. Now, in typical Italian fashion, there is a muddle: No party, or coalition, has won enough support in parliament to form a government, thrusting the country into protracted negotiations over who will govern.
Which is to say, things were going according to plan.'>>>
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/03/05/world/europe/italy-election-muddle.html?
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