Atlantic Sentinel

Tag: Matteo Renzi

  • Renzi Picks the Wrong Fight — Again

    Matteo Renzi
    Italian prime minister Matteo Renzi answers questions from reporters in Rome, December 10, 2015 (Palazzo Chigi)

    Former Italian prime minister Matteo Renzi has pulled the plug on the country’s ruling center-left coalition.

    Renzi, now a senator, has withdrawn his 48 lawmakers and three ministers (one junior) from the coalition ostensibly over a spending dispute. He wants to use Italy’s €200+ billion share of the European Union’s €750 billion coronavirus recovery fund to invest in infrastructure and the green economy. The other ruling parties prefer to use the bulk of the money for short-term stimulus.

    Renzi has also proposed to tap into the European Stability Mechanism (ESM), set up in the wake of the euro crisis, to help pay for Italy’s increased health-care spending, something Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte has resisted. ESM funding would come with strings attached. Countries are free to spend their share of the coronavirus recovery fund however they see fit.

    Renzi’s proposals have merit. Italy is failing its next generation. It needs structural reforms — which ESM support would require — to catch up with the rest of Europe. Spending €200 billion to prop up the Italian economy in the short term is a wasted opportunity.

    But expecting the other ruling parties to meet his terms, when Renzi’s is by far the smallest of the three, is unreasonable. Throwing Italy into a political crisis when it is still suffering one of the worst outbreaks of coronavirus disease in the world is irresponsible.

    Conte must now find a new majority in parliament, perhaps with members of former prime minister Silvio Berlusconi’s Forza Italia, or call early elections. (more…)

  • Renzi Won’t Become the Italian Macron

    Matteo Renzi
    Italian prime minister Matteo Renzi answers questions from reporters in Berlin, Germany, July 1, 2015 (Palazzo Chigi)

    Former Italian prime minister Matteo Renzi is leaving the Democrats to form his own new centrist party. Some thirty lawmakers are reportedly ready to go with him.

    Renzi, a social democrat, is hoping to do for Italy what Emmanuel Macron did for France.

    Don’t bet on it. (more…)

  • Renzi Resigns, Italy Split Down the Middle, War on the Spanish Right

    Italy’s center-left leader, Matteo Renzi, has stepped down after his Democratic Party fell from first to fourth place in the election on Sunday.

    I argued here in January that Renzi had two challenges: uniting the left and convincing voters he could still deliver reforms.

    He failed at both. He watered down labor reforms in an attempt to appease the left wing of his party, but they walked out anyway. He didn’t secure a supermajority for constitutional reforms, necessitating a referendum to which he then foolishly tied his own political career.

    Renzi did get important things right, not in the least recognizing that the future of the Democratic Party lies not with old working-class voters but with the young and college graduates. Yet he failed to dissuade them from supporting the Five Star Movement. (more…)

  • Italy’s Renzi Has Failed on Two Counts

    Matteo Renzi
    Italian prime minister Matteo Renzi answers questions from reporters in Modena, September 17, 2015 (Palazzo Chigi)

    When Matteo Renzi won back control of Italy’s Democratic Party a year ago, I argued he had two challenges:

    1. Uniting the left.
    2. Convincing voters who are desperate for reform that he could still deliver.

    He has failed on both counts. (more…)

  • Italy’s Renzi Calls for German-Style Voting System

    Italy’s Democratic Party leader, Matteo Renzi, has called for a German-style voting system in his country that could pave the way for a left-right coalition government.

    Italy must have voting reform before elections can be held this year or next. (more…)

  • After Winning Back Party Control, Renzi Faces Two Challenges

    Matteo Renzi
    Italian prime minister Matteo Renzi answers questions from reporters in Berlin, Germany, July 1, 2015 (Palazzo Chigi)

    Italy’s Matteo Renzi has won a convincing mandate for his center-left agenda, winning over 70 percent support in the Democratic Party’s leadership contest.

    The former premier, who stepped down in December after losing a referendum on constitutional reform, is believed to be plotting a comeback.

    After prevailing in this weekend’s primary, he can comfortably brush off criticism that he governed too much from the center.

    Renzi campaigned on the same reformist, pro-European platform as Emmanuel Macron in France, going so far as to adopt his slogan, En marche, in Italian: In cammino.

    Macron congratulated Renzi in a tweet: “Together let’s change Europe with all progressives.” (more…)

  • Renzi Picks Side in Italy’s Blue-Red Culture War

    David Cameron Matteo Renzi Justin Trudeau
    Prime Ministers David Cameron of the United Kingdom and Justin Trudeau of Canada listen to Italy’s Matteo Renzi at the G7 in Shima, Japan, May 26, 2016 (Palazzo Chigi)

    Italy’s Democratic Party leader, Matteo Renzi, launched his candidacy for reelection this week by presenting himself as the alternative to nationalist leaders in his own country as well as America and France.

    “Some people wanted a party congress to find an alternative to Renzi-ism. It needs to be done as an alternative to Trumpism, Le Penism and even Grilloism,” the former prime minister said, referring to the new president of the United States, the leader of France’s National Front and the founder of Italy’s anti-establishment Five Star Movement. (more…)

  • Italy’s Renzi Plots Return to Power After Referendum Defeat

    Matteo Renzi
    Italian prime minister Matteo Renzi answers questions from reporters in Rome, December 10, 2015 (Palazzo Chigi)

    Matteo Renzi is being replaced as Italy’s prime minister this week, but the center-left party leader is already plotting his return to the Palazzo Chigi.

    President Sergio Mattarella asked Paolo Gentiloni, Renzi’s foreign minister, to form a government on Sunday, which is expected to stay in power until elections can be held.

    Italian media report that the outgoing prime minister is keen to call elections in early 2017 in order to stage a comeback. (more…)

  • Renzi Steps Down After Italy Rejects Constitutional Reforms

    Italian prime minister Matteo Renzi announced his resignation in the early hours of Monday morning after the country rejected constitutional changes he had put to a referendum.

    With nearly half the votes counted, the “no” side was leading with close to 60 percent.

    Speaking from the Palazzo Chigi in Rome, Renzi said he took “full responsibility” for the reforms’ defeat.

    He had earlier vowed to step down if the referendum didn’t go his way. (more…)

  • Italy’s Renzi Brought Referendum Mess on Himself

    Matteo Renzi
    Italian prime minister Matteo Renzi answers questions from reporters in Modena, September 17, 2015 (Palazzo Chigi)

    After Brexit, the Dutch “no” to the European Union’s association agreement with Ukraine and the election of Donald Trump, Italy’s constitutional referendum in December is being portrayed as the next battle in the war between populists and the powers that be.

    There is something to this. The Italian referendum campaign pits a center-left leader, Matteo Renzi, who is very much in line with the European consensus against an assortment of insurgents, from the populist Five Star Movement on the left to the anti-immigrant Northern League on the right and some of Renzi’s nemeses in the ruling Democratic Party in between for good measure.

    But the story of the plebiscite, and how it could end in Renzi’s downfall, is more about a young prime minister’s hubris than it is about transnational political trends. (more…)

  • Italy’s Referendum Is Giving Matteo Renzi Sleepless Nights

    European democracy is in a state of crisis. The British referendum on EU membership has just backfired spectacularly on its promoters, Austria’s far-right Freedom Party recently came within a hair’s breadth of capturing the presidency and in France, Marine Le Pen’s Front national looks set to make it through to the second round of voting in the French presidential elections next year.

    Now Italy is facing its own moment of reckoning with a referendum on constitutional reform, likely to go ahead this autumn. Like Brexit, the decision to hold this vote might end up destroying the man who sponsored it — Prime Minister Matteo Renzi.

    The reform is a package aimed at reducing the fragmentation that causes so many problems in Italian politics. The idea is to increase executive stability and the efficiency of the whole system. But Renzi has staked his political future on the outcome having said, earlier in the year, he would resign if the vote went against him. (more…)

  • Renzi Wins Confidence Vote Despite Policy Uncertainties

    Late Monday night, Italy’s new prime minister, Matteo Renzi, cleared his first parliamentary hurdle by winning a confidence vote in the Senate.

    The outgoing mayor of Florenco succeeds Enrico Letta, who resigned earlier this month under pressure from Renzi and his supporters in the Democratic Party.

    The handover came with a partial cabinet reshuffle. Half the ministers are now women while Angelino Alfano, the leader of the junior center-right party, is no longer deputy prime minister. (more…)

  • Letta’s Resignation Clears Way for Florence Mayor

    Italian prime minister Enrico Letta’s irrevocable resignation on Friday has opened the door for Matteo Renzi, the mayor of Florence and leader of the ruling Democratic Party, to form a new government.

    The shuffle had not been expected. After he was elected party leader in December, Renzi repeatedly insisted that he would not compromise the stability of Letta’s government. But the overwhelming support he had received in a party leadership contest resulted in a complicated cohabitation with the prime minister. Outside the government, Renzi could take strong initiatives on his own, such as striking a deal with former prime minister Silvio Berlusconi, who leads the opposition Forza Italia party, to reform Italy’s electoral system. (more…)

  • Small Parties Wary of Renzi-Berlusconi Electoral Reforms

    Italy’s politics may soon be reshaped fundamentally if Silvio Berlusconi and Matteo Renzi, the leaders of the country’s two biggest parties, get their way.

    The two have agreed to reform Italy’s electoral system, which left neither the left nor the right with a governing majority last year, resulting in months of bickering before a “grand coalition” was formed that has since been unable to pass major reforms.

    The deal also aims to change the balance of power between the two legislative branches that has often led to weak majorities in the Senate. (more…)