Regionalism, Right-wing Extremism, Populism: The Elusive Nature of the Lega Nord

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1 5 REGIONALISM, RIGHT-WING EXTREMISM, POPULISM

The elusive nature of the Lega Nord 1

Giorgia Bulli and Filippo Tronconi

The question about the ‘real’ nature of the Lega Nord (LN) has always triggered disputes among international scholars. The LN has actually been classifi ed according to two major criteria: a) systemic and b) territorial.

The systemic interpretation of the party has underlined its ideological component of right-wing extremism (Eatwell and Mudde 2004 ), or right-wing radicalism (Minkenberg 1998 ; Norris 2005 ) on issues such as immigration, law and order and on the authoritarian traits of the party members’ personalities. The regionalist interpretation takes into account the peculiar territorial roots of the LN and its ‘obsession’ with its heartland (Taggart 2000 ), the so-called Padania.

A further label – a sort of cross-assessment of the style and the means used by the party to exploit its most popular issues – refers to the populist nature of the LN (Betz 1994 ; Tarchi 2003 ) and to a general anti (political)-establishment character shared by a substantial number of European parties (Schedler 1996 ).

In this chapter, we aim to contribute to the discussion about the nature of the LN by looking at it from different perspectives. As stated by Cento Bull and Gilbert, ‘there are three aspects that need to be taken into consideration when studying the LN: structural factors, the party’s programme and its evolving world view, and the nature of its electorate’ (Cento Bull and Gilbert 2001 : 65).

Following the suggestion of these authors we will try to defi ne the LN’s nature through: 1) a description of the historical evolution of the party since its fi rst appearance in the late 1970s; 2) an investigation of the evolution of the party’s political platform, with particular attention to the elements that contributed to its electoral success: federalism, immigration, law and order, the European Union; 3) an analysis of attitudes shown by LN’s voters on a number of issues in the last avail-able post-electoral survey, carried out by the ITANES research group in 2006. 2

Our conclusion will then be that the LN is best understood as a multifaceted party, where elements of localism and regionalism are present alongside traits of

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Not For Distribution


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1 populism and characteristics common to other European far-right parties, especially as far as immigration policy is concerned. Indeed, we believe that any attempt to characterize this party on the basis of just one of these defi nitions, inevitably leads to a weak and partial understanding.

The historical evolution of the Lega Nord

The fi rst successful regionalist league of northern Italy was the Liga Veneta (LV), ‘the mother of all Leagues’, which originally presented itself as a protector of the cultural traditions and dialect of the Veneto region. Though ethno-regionalism represented at that time the most visible ideological platform of the party, the LV also claimed that a new form of taxation should apply to northern regions, stopping the fl ow of money from the wealthier areas of Italy to the central government in Rome. The success of the LV in presenting itself as a defender of regional interests opened up the fi rst rifts in the traditional stronghold and attracted for the fi rst time substantial numbers of voters who were dissatisfi ed with the politics and policies of traditional parties. In a short time, these issues would rapidly spread to other northern regions.

With the birth of the Lega Autonomista Lombarda ( then Lega Lombarda, LL ) in 198 2 , promoted by the action of Umberto Bossi, the issues at the centre of the success of the LV gained more and more support , while i nsistence on the use of dialect was soon abandoned .

The reasons for the rise of the LV as the fi rst expression of the phenomenon of leghismo lay in the crisis of the catholic subculture, in the secularization process of Italian society that had started in the 1960s, and in the growing distance between the changing needs of north-east regions – reshaped by an unprecedented industrial development – and the central administration in Rome.

The politicization of the centre-periphery cleavage was the distinctive feature of this party from its fi rst appearance. To be sure, the strong socio-economic imbal-ances along the North-South divide were not something new, as they have always been a concern for the ruling class ever since the unifi cation of Italy in 1861. The novelty was the perspective from which the centre-periphery cleavage was seen and the claim to protect the wealthy industrial North against the Italian State.

From the very fi rst years, the defence of the northern periphery took the form of cultural protection, through a rediscovery of the dialects which later on became a real ‘invention of traditions’. All the mythology about the Celtic origins of the Padanian peoples must be read from this angle. The notion of Padania itself as a historical and geographical entity fi nds no confi rmation in historical records (Machiavelli 2001 : 131).

The regionalist and localist claim of the LN was also soon defi ned on economic grounds. In this respect, the protection of the peripheral community assumes a negative trait: not just setting off the values of the community’s culture, but defend-ing it against outsiders. It is at this point that the political discourse of the LN incor-porates populist traits into its original regionalist ideas. The enemy, from now on,



80 Giorgia Bulli and Filippo Tronconi

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1 is fi rst and foremost the Italian State, perceived as a corrupt and ineffi cient bureauc-racy pouring the wealth of industrious northern workers into the pockets of southern parasites. According to this view, the territorial dimension (the North against the South) mirrors the anti-establishment one (the people against the State machinery).

The LV succeeded in getting parliamentary representation (winning one seat) for the fi rst time in 1983. Subsequent years have witnessed a constant increase in popular support for the Leghe , while the centre of gravity of the movement progressively moved from Veneto to Lombardy, under the growing infl uence of Umberto Bossi’s charismatic leadership.

A decisive push for the electoral consolidation of the party (8.7 per cent of votes nation-wide in the 1992 general elections) must be found in the turmoil of the beginning of the 1990s that led to the disappearance of the post-war party system and to the birth of the so-called Second Republic . The shock of Tangentopoli (kick-back city) and the discovery of a widespread system of corruption involving – in different measures – all governing and opposition parties and the consequent crisis made the LN a legitimate political actor . The political vacuum produced by the crisis of the elder parties opened new possibilities for the LN.

The entrance into politics of Silvio Berlusconi and the birth of Forza Italia (1994) contributed to changing the situation. On the one hand, the new party launched by the television tycoon represented a competitive alternative for the disillusioned and frustrated Italian electorate, not only in the centre and southern Italian regions, but also in the northern cities where the Lega had its strongholds. On the other hand , the success of Forza Italia obliged the Lega to open a political dialogue with it. This is why, notwithstanding its inherent scepticism towards cen-tralistic parties, the party entered a coalition with Forza Italia in the 1994 general elections. The campaign strategy of the new party led by Berlusconi was centred on the idea of a variable coalition: in the North Forza Italia was allied with the LN, in the South with the successor of the MSI, the Italian post-fascist and strongly nationalist party Alleanza Nazionale (AN).

Having obtained a very favourable distribution of candidates in pre-electoral negotiations with Forza Italia, the LN, with a stable 8.4 per cent of the votes, got an unprecedented 19 per cent of the seats and highly visible positions in the follow-ing Berlusconi cabinet.

The wide governing coalition in which the LN was included – Forza Italia, CCD (Centro Cristiano Democratico, which had split from the Christian Democrats) and AN, which in principle disagreed with federalism – was a short-lived one. In fact, the cohabitation with Forza Italia and AN soon proved to be very diffi cult for a party that had always presented itself as the real incarnation of opposition to the traditional party system. The tensions among the allies in the government became so deep that, after only eight months, LN announced its withdrawal, condemning the fi rst Berlusconi government to failure.

The general elections in April 1996, with the LN deciding to run alone after the troubled coexistence in the centre-right coalition, represented the best result ever




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1 (10.1 per cent), though this success had no infl uence in determining the composi-tion of the centre-left government coalition.

The years between 1996 and 1998 were also important for the strengthening of the party as an organization, with the birth of the main instruments of propaganda: the party newspaper ( La Padania ) and the party television and radio stations ( Telepadania and Radio Padania ). Beyond this, a number of initiatives were under-taken aiming to reinforce the linkage between the leadership and militants. Among these, the establishment of the ‘parliament of the North’ in Mantova, the annual rallies in Venice each September since 1996 and a self-organized referendum on secession in May 1997.

The exclusion from government, and the possibility of presenting itself once again as the only alternative to centralized power, put the LN in a favourable position to exploit issues ranging from immigration and law and order to territorial claims.

As a matter of fact, immigration and security represented at this point core issues for the party. In 1999 the LN organized a referendum against the centre-left gov-ernment Law on immigration, which, in the opinion of the party, opened up Italian frontiers to an ‘invasion’ of illegal immigrants. It is these hard-line campaigns on immigration, along with occasional contacts with representatives of the European radical right, that convince scholars and observers of the extremist nature of the party.

On the other hand, the LN expressed in the years 1996–2000 the strongest ever opposition to the Italian State. Not only did the party focus its initiatives on the issue of secession, but, in order to give substance to this utopian exit, it set much store by the creation of a sort of paramilitary force designed to protect the territory of Padania.

The insistence on secession proved to be unsuccessful. Although the party had tried to exploit this ultimate aim, secession did not represent a real option for a large part of the northern population (Cento Bull and Gilbert 2001 : 116–17). Padania thus seemed to be an imaginary, rather than imagined community (Albertazzi 2006 : 23). In the 1999 European elections, the party received only 4.5 per cent of the votes. This result, along with other disappointing performances at the local level, showed the necessity of abandoning the secessionist strategy and forced the party to re-open cooperation with its former ally, Forza Italia.

The LN accepted the alliance in the regional elections 2000 and in the general elections 2001. Here, the 3.9 per cent of votes represented the lowest result ever for the Lega. But this time ‘the Lega did not only manage to survive in the second Berlusconi government, but it also succeeded in presenting itself simultaneously as both the opposition in government and a driving force behind high profi le areas of government policy’ (Albertazzi and McDonnell 2005 : 953).

During fi ve years of government (2001–6) the LN was not able to realize the federal reform the party had always aimed at. The constitutional revision that was supposed to modify the previous federal reform of the centre-left government (with the opposition of the LN) did not pass the confi rmative referendum to which it had been submitted in October 2006.




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1 Despite this, the party succeeded in being perceived by the electorate (even through the framing action of the media) as the main proponent of severe legislation on immigration and law and order. The approval of the new law on immigration (the so-called Bossi-Fini law, after the two party leaders most interested in the restriction of immigration fl ows) was presented as a step forward in the fi ght against illegal immigration.

The end of the centre-right legislature left the LN with an unclear balance. Despite this, after the short and troubled experience of the centre-left government led by Romano Prodi, the general elections of 2008 represented a real electoral triumph for the party. With 8.3 per cent of votes at the Chamber of Deputies and 8.7 per cent at the Senate, the LN almost doubled its previous electoral result (4.6 per cent, 2006), confi rming itself to be essential for the centre-right to win the northern constituencies. In the XVI legislative term, the party was thus back in government. A federal reform of the fi scal system was again the fl agship of the government’s programme. This was fi nally achieved in 2011, but its full implemen-tation would certainly require many years, making it unlikely that the LN would obtain immediate electoral returns on this issue. In the meantime, in 2010, regional elections were held in thirteen of the twenty Italian regions. The result was once again an excellent one for Bossi’s party, and to a certain extent even an historic one. The LN overcame the already brilliant performances of 2008, becoming the most voted-for party in Veneto and consolidating its presence in the other northern regions and in the leftist strongholds of Emilia-Romagna and Toscana. More importantly, and for the fi rst time, its representatives won the executive leadership in two infl uential northern regions (Piedmont with Roberto Cota, and Veneto with Luca Zaia). By virtue of these results, a re-balance in the rightist alliance in favour of the ‘minor’ coalition partner was thus evident: while in 2008 there were 3.9 PDL voters for each LN one, in 2010 this ratio decreased to 2.2 to 1. If we consider only the three main northern regions, the two parties are more or less equal : there are 1.1 PDL voters for each LN voter.

Highs and lows are frequent in the electoral history of this party, and even this time no one would bet that these levels of support will be confi rmed in the near future. However, the 2001–10 decade will certainly be remembered as a golden age of the LN, in which it moved from a situation of possible decline (surviving the ill-ness of its charismatic leader in 2004, which took him away from politics for about one year) into one of unprecedented relevance in the Italian political system.

We can now turn our attention to the main issues covered in the manifestos of the party, before looking at some characteristics of its electorate.

Party platforms

The most striking feature of the party’s manifestos 3 is their territorial dimension. Most of the proposals contained in the party programmes refer to a sub-national level composed of the northern regions (sometimes indicated as Padania, some others actually lacking any territorial identifi cation).




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1 The introduction of the 1996 party manifesto underlines its regionalist and anti-systemic attitude. It comprises six paragraphs, 4 which directly or indirectly refer to the northern economic situation and to possible ways to improve it. However, the party is not just interested in the economic scenario. Immigration is the next fun-damental topic.

What stands out in the programme is the LN attempt not to be perceived as a racist party. In the party’s interpretation, the northern regions have a limited capac-ity to absorb immigrants. Furthermore, immigrants must have ‘normal access to our cultural forms’. 5 This formulation reveals a form of anxiety related to the preservation of the cultural traits of the northern community, namely Padania. Such anxiety is more evident in the 2001 party programme, where the party affi rms that ‘the crisis of the family ( … ) has weakened our societies, over which immigra-tion waves can have a destructive effect until its defi nitive transformation and destruction’. 6

Immigration is interpreted as the cause for the collapse of the traditional values of family and marriage. 7 The same perspective is evident in the 2001 party programme, where the centre-left government law on immigration is severely criticized.

Immigrants are described as lazy people living on the back of the State. This particular description underlines a welfare chauvinist attitude, which is a typical feature of 1990s right-wing populism.

With regard to immigration, the 2008 party manifesto has two pillars. The fi rst is the refusal of the idea that immigrants should be given a right to vote in the administrative elections. The second is strong opposition to the amendment of the law on citizenship, which would allow immigrants to be granted citizenship after fi ve years of residence.

Moreover, the manifesto opposes the possibility of turning the right to citizen-ship from ius sanguinis to ius soli . The LN actually proposes to maintain the ius sanguinis principle and the ten-year-term citizenship request. In order to highlight the necessity of preserving a homogeneous community in the northern regions, the party stands for the introduction of the so-called citizenship test, which would verify the basic knowledge of immigrants on subjects such as the Italian language, culture, history and institutions.

In keeping with its anxiety to preserve Western values, the LN totally rejects the entry of Turkey into the European Union, underlining the necessity of introducing a specifi c reference to ‘Christian roots’ in the European Treaty, 8 and strongly opposes the building of mosques on Italian territory.

Immigration is not only perceived as a threat to the integrity of the community (Padania), but as a vehicle of criminality and disorder. In the 2008 party manifesto, the LN states its fi rm opposition to the ‘pardon law’ allowing the liberation of pris-oners for specifi c crimes or a reduction of their sentences. In the party’s opinion, this decree does not represent a solution to overcrowded Italian jails. It is actually perceived as the parties’ traditional refusal to listen to the ‘chorus of the honest people victim of criminality’. 9 There is no doubt, in the LN’s view, as to the




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1 sources of such criminality. Since 38 per cent of detainees are immigrants, the LN asks for their repatriation into prisons in their own countries. 10

An ambivalent position emerges from the study of the LN manifestos in relation to the European Union. In the years prior to the introduction of the Euro, the position of the party towards the EU was not negative, though the LN was mainly interested in the economic development that could have been promoted through regional integration. At this time, the party defi ned itself as the ‘most pro-European among all the parties’ (Tarchi 2007 : 190). In the 1996 party manifesto, the party speaks of a ‘Europe of the peoples’ as an antidote to the emer-gence of a European bureaucratic state. The EU should promote the right to self-determination for all peoples and the defence of local autonomies. The creation of a ‘Senate of Regions’ as the second Chamber of the European Parliament is also suggested.

When Italy made its entrance into the Euro-zone, the situation changed dra-matically. LN scepticism towards Europe became evident. The European Union is now described as the seat of a parasitic bureaucracy. The 2004 party manifesto for the European elections goes further as the party asks for the protection of the northern community from the threat deriving from the European Union: the economic enlargement to Eastern countries, the Euro, the opening of a dialogue with Turkey.

The party refuses the idea of a ‘super neo-centralistic State, led by politically irresponsible technocrats’. The party’s populist nature clearly emerges from the statement that

the People must consciously express the will of their own destiny: an imposition of choices such as the institution of the Euro is not tolerable. A European Union that does not consider how to protect its people from external attacks (be they terrorism or forms of commerce leading to the failure of local business) is not acceptable. 11

The LN thus proposes a new European Union as the ‘Europe of the sovereign peoples, of the valorisation of territories as the inalienable seat of identities, cultures, values and traditions’ 12 .

The position of the LN on immigration and its attitude towards the European Union do not automatically make it an extreme-right party. The party’s economic platform reveals the differences more clearly. Since the 1996 party manifesto, the LN has called for reforms in terms of fi scal federalism. This is by far the most dramatic sign of their opposition to the unitary conception of the State (normally an article of faith for extreme-right parties). This fi scal federalism, sometimes vio-lently expressed, does not refer to the entire country, but exclusively to the rich and hard-working regions of the North.

The 2004 party manifesto keeps the economic interests of Padania as a crucial feature of its policy profi le. This time, though, the LN identifi es another enemy for the northern territory: the Eastern European countries and China as producers of




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1 low-cost goods (the cost being low because of disloyal ‘practices’) invading the domestic markets. The LN thus demands protectionist measures such as anti-dumping laws, a general strategy for the defence of local goods, and the introduction of custom duties. 13

The attitudes of supporters

Survey data give us a perspective on the ideological positioning of the LN that is linked to, but at the same time distinct from, the one we get from party offi cial documents. The opinion of party supporters is obviously infl uenced by the party leaders’ positions on a variety of issues, but not necessarily identical. In the follow-ing pages we will analyse some of the answers to a post-electoral survey conducted in April 2006 by the ITANES research group through a systematic comparison between LN voters and the supporters of the other two main right-of-centre par-ties, Alleanza Nazionale and Forza Italia. Through this comparison we will bring the abstract debate over the ideological positioning of the party back to a more concrete dimension, anchoring it to a comparison with the closest competitors (and allies) of the LN.

On the regionalist dimension, as one could easily predict, there are few doubts about the location of the LN. The percentage of supporters showing a strong local identity is about 12 per cent higher than the overall Italian average, and about 10 per cent higher than the two other rightist parties. These fi gures do not change dramatically when we refer to ‘local identity’ in a broader way, summing up municipal and regional identities (Table 5.1 ).

When it actually comes to the most debated dimension, the left-right one, the picture is more blurred. When asked to locate themselves on this axis, most LN voters choose the right side of the spectrum, but this fi gure is lower than the corre-sponding one for FI and AN voters (78 per cent against 87 per cent and 94 per cent respectively). Even if one considers only those who defi ne themselves as extreme-right, the LN scores halfway between FI and AN. One could look at the problem from the opposite perspective: if we accept the position of those claiming that

TABLE 5.1 Feelings of geographical belonging of Italian right-of-centre parties’ supporters (%)

My town

My region

Italy Europe The World

Don’t know/NA

Total ( N )

Lega Nord 36.6 12.2 39.0 4.9 7.3 0 100 (41) Forza Italia 26.9 16.9 42.9 3.7 9.1 0.5 100 (219) Alleanza Nazionale 25.4 11.5 46.7 9.0 6.6 0.8 100 (122) Italy 24.0 13.3 42.1 6.6 12.7 1.4 100 (1,258)

Question wording : To which of the following communities do you feel to belong most: the town where you live, the region where you live, Italy, Europe, the whole world.




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1 the LN cannot be located on this dimension, because it competes on the centre-periphery one, we should fi nd an outstanding number of party supporters refusing to position themselves as rightist or leftist. This option is in fact chosen by some 10 per cent of party supporters, signifi cantly more than for FI and AN supporters. On the other hand, the LN fi gure is strikingly close to the overall national average (Table 5.2 ).

Summing up, from the question about auto-collocation of voters on the left-right dimension, we do not fi nd any clear evidence to answer our initial question, one way or the other. LN supporters can certainly be classifi ed as right-of-centre individuals, but this positioning is, if anything, less clear than the positioning of AN and FI supporters, and certainly does not, on its own, allow us to defi ne the LN as a far-right party. 14

This technique of party positioning, though very straightforward, is not exempt from methodological shortcomings. The fi rst objection is that people attach differ-ent meanings to the terms ‘left’ and ‘right’. Thus respondents positioning them-selves in the same category might actually be referring to very different values and policy orientations. The second objection is specifi c to Italy and to the derogatory meaning that many people associate to the term ‘right’, as a long-standing legacy of the fascist dictatorship. It is, without any doubt, a decreasing phenomenon since the legitimization of the AN as a governing party, but still it is plausible to think some respondents are reluctant openly to declare themselves as rightist. This is why it is advisable to turn our attention from a general and necessarily generic left-right positioning to more specifi c issues, choosing the ones that are generally thought to characterize organizations belonging to the extreme-right party family.

In his infl uential 1995 volume, Herbert Kitschelt points out some defi ning char-acteristics of an ideal-typical ‘master case’ of a New Radical Right political party. These include a strong pro-market orientation, a paternalistic view of family and gender relations and an exclusionary defi nition of citizenship rights based on cul-tural homogeneity of the people residing in the considered territory (Kitschelt 1995 : 19–21). In Table 5.3 we look at the fi rst two dimensions. As far as the labour market is concerned, the voters of the LN show by far the most extreme position,

TABLE 5.2 Self placement on the left–right axes (%)

Left Centre-left Centre Centre-right Right None Don’t know/NA

Total ( N )

Lega Nord 0 0 12.2 43.9 34.1 9.8 0 100 (41) Forza Italia 0 1.4 4.6 66.5 20.6 5.5 1.4 100 (218) Alleanza Nazionale

1.6 0 0.8 52.5 41.8 2.5 0.8 100 (122)

Italy 14.7 30.7 9.9 22.8 11.0 9.0 2.9 100 (1,257)

Question wording : From a political point of view, how would you position yourself: on the left, on the centre-left, on the centre, on the centre-right, on the right, or none of these defi nitions fi ts you?




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1 with three respondents out of four supporting more freedom for companies to fi re their employees, while the same position is held by about two thirds of AN and even fewer FI voters. These data are even more impressive if we bear in mind that, according to many researches, a sizeable share of LN supporters are to be found among blue-collar workers and even among union members (Mannheimer 1994 ; ITANES 2006 ).

On family issues we observe a completely different picture. In this case the LN displays attitudes that are far less extreme than the other two right-of-centre parties. Only around 30 per cent of LN voters are in favour of limitations on women’s access to the labour market in conditions of labour scarcity, a percentage that is even lower than the overall national average. By contrast, 40 per cent and 48 per cent of AN and FI voters respectively support such a position. Similar fi ndings can be observed on the hypothesis of introducing legislation specifi cally targeted to the protection of non-married couples, 15 even though this time the fi gures must be read in the opposite direction: 30 per cent of LN supporters oppose more liberal legislation on family relations, a percentage that is signifi cantly lower than the other two parties, and even lower than the national average.

In Table 5.4 , where we reach the third of Kitschelt’s dimensions, the crucial issue of immigration and multiculturalism is addressed from different perspectives. The fi rst question points to opinions about immigrants as competitors on the labour market, the second and the third refer to Muslim and Roma communities, and to the issues cultural homogeneity and security. The answers however are both straightforward and nuanced. They are straightforward in the general and uncom-promising perception of immigration as a threat: in all of the three aspects consid-ered here the LN shows the highest percentages of respondents displaying negative attitudes towards immigrants. The distance separating LN values from those of

TABLE 5.3 Percentage of respondents who: (a) agree with more freedom for companies to fi re their employees; (b) agree with limitations on access of women to the labour market; (c) disagree with introducing legislation rights for non-married couples

(a) (b) (c) N

Lega Nord 75.6 32.5 30.0 41 Forza Italia 56.9 47.7 47.2 218 Alleanza Nazionale 66.1 40.1 38.0 121 Italy 36.5 36.4 35.9 1,256

Question wording : I will now read some common statements about economics and politics. For each one of them, please tell me how much you agree or disagree: (a) Companies should have more freedom in hiring and fi ring employees; (b) In conditions of scarcity, men should have more right to get an employment than women do; (c) Some couples decide not to get married and stably live together. Bills have been presented in Parliament to extend to these couples some of the rights married couples enjoy. Would you favour or oppose such a law? Note : Figures report the sum of those responding ‘agree’ and ‘strongly agree’ (columns a and b), and the sum of those responding ‘somewhat oppose’ and ‘strongly oppose’ (column c).




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1 the other two conservative parties however is not constant. On the labour market issue, the percentage of those feeling worried about immigration is some twenty points higher among LN voters than among FI and AN voters. This distance is reduced to less than ten points on the other two issues. This difference could rea-sonably be attributed to a sort of ‘ceiling effect’, namely the more fi gures approach the theoretical maximum of 100 per cent , the more they are inevitably fl attened around an average value. On the other hand, it is also possible to hypothesize that the different occupational profi le of the respective electorates plays a role here, and that a prevalence of non-specialized workers among the LN voters is more sensitive to this issue than other social strata might be.

It has been claimed in political science literature that ‘populism’ is a keyword in understanding the political discourse of the LN (Tarchi 2003 , 2007 ), and our previ-ous analysis of party offi cial documents has contributed to reinforcing this belief. In Table 5.5 , we present more evidence in the same direction.

This is not the place for a detailed discussion of the defi ning features of pop-ulism. However, most interpretations of this elusive phenomenon point more or less explicitly to the minimum denominator of a society fundamentally divided between the ruling class and the ruled. The latter are the ‘common people’, described as honest, industrious and virtuous; the former are the holders of power, inevitably corrupt, selfi sh and inept. Furthermore, populist discourse does not leave space for any distinction within the members of the ruling class; on the contrary, ideological divisions are seen as a façade behind which politicians are always ready to fi nd agreement when it comes to defending their own interests and privileges.

The questions we analyse in Table 5.5 concern the degree of agreement with respect to three beliefs about the ruling class: the distinction between left and right, corruption, and an overall judgement about political élites in the last two decades. In all three cases the result is unquestionable, the LN supporters emerging as the

TABLE 5.4 Percentage of respondents who: (a) perceive immigration as a threat to employment; (b) would prohibit the building of mosques on Italian territory; (c) would prohibit gypsies from having camps in Italian towns

(a) (b) (c) N


Question wording : I will now read some common statements about economics and politics. For each one of them, please tell me how much you agree or disagree: [ … ] (a) Immigrants are a threat to employment; (b) It is right to allow Muslims to build Mosques in Italian territory; (c) It should be forbidden for gypsies to have their camps in our towns. Note : Figures report the sum of those responding ‘agree’ and ‘strongly agree’.




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1 most resolute detractors of the whole political class. If we cannot consider this a surprising fi nding in absolute terms, the comparison with the other two parties, and especially with Berlusconi’s Forza Italia is once again remarkable.

Conclusions: the elusive nature of a multi-faceted party

What is fi nally the image, or what are the images, emerging from party manifestos and from the attitudes of LN supporters? The most immediate conclusion is that this party does not easily match up with the classical attributes of right-wing extremism.

To begin with, the regionalist nature of the party, and the paramount impor-tance of this territorial reference throughout its history, is a fact that can hardly be questioned. Our analysis confi rms, from this point of view, the claims of a wide literature (among others: Diamanti 1993 , 1996 ; Cento Bull and Gilbert 2001 ) insisting on the cultural, social and economic peculiarities of the north-eastern regions of Italy to explain the success of the leghismo . The growing distance between this area and a central government incapable of understanding its needs and meet-ing its expectations is often underlined. In this sense the LN has made its fortunes from understanding (well before the collapse of the old party system in 1992) that the Christian Democrats were losing their function of linkage between this periph-ery and the centre of the system in Rome.

On the other hand the LN shows, both in its electoral platforms and in the views of its supporters, clear traits of a xenophobic party, and this is the major single reason to assimilate it into the far-right party family.

The key words that describe the party’s position on immigration can be found in the formulation ‘Everyone must be the master in his own house’ contained in the 2001 party manifesto. These words identify in the document the relationship between the State and the northern regions, but they also underline the prevalence

TABLE 5.5 Percentage of respondents who: (a) do not see any difference between left and right governments; (b) think most politicians are corrupt; (c) think the Italian ruling class has failed in the last twenty years

(a) (b) (c) N


Question wording : Can you tell me how you would comment on each of these statements: (a) No matter who is in government between the left or the right, things do not change; (b) Most politicians are corrupt; (c) In the last twenty years, the Italian ruling class has completely failed. Note : Figures report the sum of those responding ‘it is quite true’ and ‘it is absolutely true’.




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1 of the ‘homogeneity principle’ intended as the typical protection of the heartland (Taggart 2000 ), which the party labels Padania.

Immigrants, mainly immigrants from Asia and Africa, are perceived as at the roots of unemployment, of the breakdown of traditional values, and of criminality. The main interest of the party lies indeed in the protection of the traditional values of community and of its prosperity. From this point of view it is interesting to note that it is exactly in those regions where small and medium business thrives and the LN has its own strongholds that the necessity of immigrant labour is strongest. This somewhat paradoxical situation refl ects what has been called the hysterical attitude of Italy towards immigrants: it needs them in order to make industry and other economic sectors work, but it does not want to see them walking around.

Bossi’s party strategy clearly refl ects this attitude. With the rejection of any kind of multicultural society and the proposal of the introduction of a citizenship test, the LN stresses its selective exclusion principle. Integrated, or rather, assimi-lated immigrants can become part of the productive community. Other forms of immigration, on the contrary, are not tolerated.

Populism – or identity populism (Tarchi 2008 : 89), an expression underlying the relentless reference to its geographical and cultural roots – is another inescapable perspective for understanding the nature of the LN. The survey data we have pre-sented are clear enough on this point. Appeals to the ‘people’ (as an idealized community of honest and virtuous individuals, opposed to the vices contaminating the ruling class) are frequent and likely to take root in a fertile soil of generalized distrust in institutions and politicians. A distrust, to be sure, that is not unique to the LN voters. On the contrary, negative sentiments towards democratic institutions and the way democracy works are widely diffused and long lasting in Italy’s ‘dissatisfi ed society’ (Morlino and Tarchi 1996 ), but they reach their peak in the northern areas of the country and, as shown, among the followers of the Lega. For its part, since the mid-nineties Bossi’s party has continuously invested in the issue of defending the interests and values of the ‘peoples of Padania’ against internal and external aggressors, at different times identifi ed with southern immigrants, Muslims, European Union bureaucrats, the Italian state and its Roman cliques .

For these reasons, taking sides in the never-ending ‘war of words’ (Mudde 1996 ) about the labelling of the LN and its position in the constellation of European party families, does not appear to be the most urgent concern. Searching for the most perfect label might have defl ected attention from the object itself. And this is much more likely if the object, as in this case, is characterized by contradictory features, complexity and frequent shifts, or real u-turns, in policy positions and alliance strategies.

Notes

1 This chapter is the result of a joint effort of the two authors. For bureaucratic purposes only, the fi nal draft of sections 1 and 2 may be attributed to Giorgia Bulli, and the fi nal draft of section 3 to Filippo Tronconi. The Introduction and Conclusion have been written jointly.




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1 2 ITANES (Italian National Election Studies) is a network of scholars promoting a research programme on voting behaviour in Italy since the early 1990s. We thank the coordinators of the research group for kindly allowing us to use the ITANES dataset. ITANES data are available upon request through the website http://www.itanes.org .

3 We will analyse the party manifestos for the 1996, 2001 and 2008 general elections, as well as the 2004 European elections. In the 2006 elections, the LN did not issue a real manifesto, but only a document containing generic indications of the themes (defence of Christian roots of Europe, fi scal federalism, fi scal bonus for traditional families, fi ght against illegal immigration, explicit commitment to the support of the referendum on constitutional territorial reform) which should be incorporated in the wider programme of the Casa delle Libertà (the coalition in which the party was included). It is important to underline that these documents differ from each other in terms of length, specifi city and “radicalism”. The 1996 manifesto is the longest and most articulate one, while the 2001 programme represents, in the party’s words, only a “guide for candidates”. The 2004 manifesto is the short programme for the European elections and the 2008 programme is called “The ideas of the Lega Nord”.

4 1) Mantova (referring to the “Parliament of the North” that is based there); 2) Economics and debit balance: the North can do it; 3) The enterprise in the economics; 4) Federalism; 5) Immigration: the Lega is not racist; 6) Occupation and old age pension.

5 Lega Nord party manifesto 1996. 6 Lega Nord party manifesto 2001. 7 “Multi-cultural and multi-religious society generates cases which seriously damage the

institutions of family and marriage”, Lega Nord party manifesto 1996. 8 Lega Nord party manifesto 2008, “Le idee della Lega. Le nostre radici cristiane”. In the

same document, the LN asks for a binding referendum to decide upon the acceptance of Turkey in the EU, wishing to “give voice to the people”.

9 Lega Nord party manifesto 2008, “Le idee della Lega. Certezze della pena e atti di clemenza”.

10 Lega Nord party manifesto 2008, “Le idee della Lega. Penitenziari”. 11 Lega Nord party manifesto 2004. 12 Ibid. 13 Lega Nord party manifesto 2008, “Le idee della Lega. Le misure anti-dumping”. 14 Other comparative studies adopt a different research strategy to position parties on the

left-right continuum, by means of surveys among “experts”, which normally means political science scholars. The most recent “expert surveys” were conducted by Marcel Lubbers in 2000 and by Kenneth Benoit and Michael Laver in 2004. In the fi rst case the LN got an average score of 7.5 in a scale ranging from 0 to 10 (Lubbers 2000 ). In the second case it was scored 16.9 in a 0–20 scale (Benoit and Laver 2006 ). From this evidence it is equally diffi cult to label the LN as an unquestionably extreme-right party.

15 During the past legislature this issue has been at the centre of vehement debates for months, after the Prodi cabinet had passed a bill (which was in turn the result of endless negotiations between the catholic and secular components of the majority coalition) introducing some benefi ts for non-married couples, following the model of the French Pacte civil de solidarité .

Bibliography

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Albertazzi , D. and McDonnell D . 2005 . ‘The Lega Nord in the second Berlusconi Government: in a League of its own’ , West European Politics , 28 ( 5 ): 952 – 2 .

Benoit , K. and Laver , M . 2006. Party Policy in Modern Democracies . London : Routledge .




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Michigan Press . Lubbers , M . 2000 . Expert Judgement Survey of Western European Political Parties 2000 .

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Italy’ , European Journal of Political Research , 30 ( 1 ): 41 – 63 . Mudde , C . 1996 . ‘The war of words defi ning the Extreme Right party family’ , West European

Politics , 19 ( 2 ): 225 – 48 . Norris , P . 2005 . Radical right: voters and parties in the electoral market . Cambridge : Cambridge

University Press . Schedler , A . 1996 . ‘Anti-Political-Establishment Parties’ , Party Politics , 2 ( 3 ): 291 – 312 . Taggart , P . 2000 . Populism , Milton Keynes : Open University Press . Tarchi , M . 2003 . L’Italia populista. Dal qualunquismo ai girotondi . Il Mulino : Bologna . —— . 2007 . ‘ The confl icting foreign agenda of the Alleanza Nazionale and the Lega Nord ’,

in C. Schori Liang (ed.), Europe for the Europeans. The Foreign and Security Policy of the Populist Radical Right . Burlington : Ashgate , 187 – 208 .

—— . 2008 . ‘ Italy, A country of many populisms ’, in D. Albertazzi and D. McDonnell, D. (eds.), Twenty-fi rst century populism. The spectre of Western European Democracy . Houndmills : Palgrave Macmillan , pp. 84 – 99 .



Documents

Regionalism, Right-wing Extremism, Populism: The Elusive Nature of the Lega Nord