On Thursday 6 October, the politics society gathered together to discuss the recent election of Giorgia Meloni as the first female Prime Minister of Italy led by an upper-sixth member of the boys school, Josh Zinkin. He started the talk by presenting on how the parliamentary system in Italy works; how Meloni got herself elected as only the second far right leader of Italy since Mussolini and how Trump’s influence on worldwide politics contributed to an increase in right wing popularity and isolationism within Europe. Josh educated his audience on the working of Italy’s proportional representation system which led to a coalition between Meloni’s party (Brothers of Italy) and other, smaller right wing parties allowing Meloni to win enough seats in the national parliament of the Italian Republic to become the Prime Minister of Italy.
This presentation led to an in-depth and continued discussion on Europe’s shift towards right wing politics that bring about isolationist policies. Regarding Italy, we explored the idea of Italexit – Italy’s exit from the EU following in the UK’s wobbling steps. Attendants were informed by the speaker that Italexit was once a promoted policy of Meloni’s that was dropped as part of many compromises she had to make to lead the coalition successfully. The factors that are pushing European nations towards isolationist policies were also discussed as one student made the point that COVID’s crippling of nation’s economies is the factor that has pushed citizens to become reluctant in helping Ukraine, instead wanting their politicians to focus on problems within their own country such as Italy’s public-debt crisis.
Overall, this week’s meeting was extremely informative and broadened the knowledge of all attendees to do with Europe and more specifically, Italy’s, shift towards right wing politics.
