Comic-turned-politician Beppe Grillo, center, is photographed as he arrives at his polling station to cast his vote, in Genoa, Italy, Monday, Feb. 25, 2013. (AP Photo/Fabio Palli, Lapresse)
If populist insurgent Beppe Grillo stunned Europe’s financial elites when his new anti-austerity party hauled in more votes than any other in Italy’s February 25 parliamentary election, don’t expect him to stop there.
The fiery public speaker and former comedian may get the chance to build on that success and really start shaking up the Italian political system if a new round of elections is held to break the gridlock (caused in part by his surprise showing) as soon as this summer. That center-left Democratic Party leader — and overall majority winner in the lower house of parliament thanks to his coalition partners — Pier Luigi Bersani used a Sunday state TV appearance to essentially dare Grillo to either join his bloc in a new government or get ready for more elections suggests that at least some of the nation’s political elites think the newcomer is merely a one-hit wonder who could be swatted away.
And it is certainly plausible that the popularity of this nontraditional politician — one who can’t enter parliament himself because of a 1980 vehicular manslaughter conviction — might fade as voters begin to pay more attention to the depressing state of Europe’s financial markets (and subsequent panic on the part of European Union leaders.) But the generally robust showing of anti-E.U. candidates who oppose the austerity regime of technocratic incumbent P.M. Mario Monti, including notably center-right fixture Silvio Berlusconi, suggests there is a large (and growing) constituency open to hardcore populist appeals in the Eurozone’s third-largest economy.
Grillo connected with an electorate that has been battered by painful spending cuts and is increasingly frustrated with the usual suspects running the show in Rome. Italian pollsters are suggesting that to join a government — with the progressive Bersani, for instance — would sully Grillo’s brand as a post-partisan reformer who can’t be co-opted by Italy’s bankrupt political class. The fact that the recent contest produced gridlock might be useful to this outsider, then, who can now argue that corrupt politicians have once again failed to govern. What’s more, voting for a fresh party that recently snagged 25 percent of the popular vote (but has yet to make any polarizing compromises in government) is a significantly more appealing option than embracing a nascent political movement that has yet to prove its electoral potency. And millions of Italians did just that when they backed Grillo’s slate the other day.
It’s safe to say that Grillo is just fine with the prospect of the current coalition-wrangling failing and a new round of elections being used to settle the score. The momentum is on his side and the powers that be are running scared. Why not go back to the people for guidance — and more seats in parliament — rather than risk getting outmaneuvered by veteran politicians behind the scenes?
Should Grillo’s party inch closer to a majority in another round of elections, he might find himself with the clout to muscle through some of the fundamental reforms Italy’s broken political system so desperately needs. In that sense, the uncertainty and chaos brought on by his emergence is best understood as the last gasp of the old order, one that Italians, apparently — if not all of their fellow Europeans — have had just about enough of.
