I grew up in northern Italy in the 1970s and my memories are of an incomprehensible mixture of complete inertia – Nothing. Ever. Changed. – and permanent upheaval. Food was predictable, Sundays were predictable, church was predictable, school was stultifying. But what was also predictable were bombings, assassinations and kidnappings. I remember General Dalla Chiesa coming to dinner and landing by helicopter on the roof of our building (and believe me, there was no helipad up there), surrounded by carabinieri to protect him from the Red Brigades – which he eventually vanquished, only to be murdered along with his young wife by the mafia in Parlermo in 1982. In 1992 it was the turn of Judge Falcone, and then a few short months later, Judge Borsellino was also murdered. And in between, there was the kidnapping and killing of Aldo Moro. This mix of predictability and, often violent, turmoil, is the backdrop against which contemporary Italian populism arises.

Deep roots

Getting to the roots of Italian populism sometimes feels like a problem of infinite regress. From today’s coalition government between the right-wing populist Lega and the left-wing populist Five Star Movement (M5S), you take a step back to Silvio Berlusconi and the 1990s; which takes you remarkably quickly back to the immediate postwar moment and the “uomo qualunque” movement (“movement of the ordinary man”); which then takes you back to fascism (and its inescapable populist component). At which point someone stops you and says that you really need to go back to the “southern question”. What about 1860 and unification then? Much further back, comes the answer.

First, the so-called southern question and the disparity of wealth between the North of Italy and the poorer South, which became even starker after unification (in the 1860s) as more efficient northern manufacturers and their less efficient southern counterparts came into direct competition, is undoubtedly significant. All current regionalist debates have their origins in this period, and regionalist debates underpin Italian politics; they continue to be an ever-present and structuring set of dynamics.

Second, fascism and its legacy are important. Italian fascism and Mussolini’s regime play a role in the entrenchment of populism on the Italian political landscape.