Italian politics is like a game of musical chairs. One government resigns or collapses, another takes its place, until that government is either rendered irrelevant a year later or voted out during the next election. Italy has had 68 governments in the last 74 years and 10 prime ministers in the last 20.
Italians will get another prime minister sworn in relatively soon, and the new one is the same as the old. Guissspe Conte, a quiet law professor only 15 months ago, will stay on as Italy’s premier after surviving an attempt by his hardline interior minister Matteo Salvini to force an early election. Salvini’s desire for power, propelled by his love of politicking, his boisterous personality, and his desire to move Italy far to the right, convinced him to pull the plug on the short-lived populist coalition government to which he was a part. What Salvini didn’t envision, however, was two long-time political enemies teaming up in order to keep him out of the prime minister’s office.
The new ruling coalition between the Five Star Movement (5SM) and the Democratic Party (PD) is a case of two entities with competing interests, history, and ideology trying to make it work in order to prevent Italy from becoming Salvini’s playground.
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