Such diplomatic success has led some to suggest that Ms. Meloni is not falling in line but actually setting the agenda. In a report widely seen in Italy, Fareed Zakaria on CNN hailed “Meloni’s moment” in Europe, comparing her position with the leading role previously played by Angela Merkel, Germany’s former chancellor. On economic policy, the claim is overblown; Italy’s economy, though growing, isn’t staking out new territory. But the comparison is not without merit. In several areas, Rome is giving Brussels direction.
For one, Ms. Meloni has been at the forefront of plans to further outsource the bloc’s border policing to autocratic North African countries. In July last year, she was in Tunisia to announce a deal to curb migration across the Mediterranean; last month, she did the same in Egypt. Both times she was flanked by Europe’s top official and president of the commission, Ursula von der Leyen, who in January gave her blessing to Ms. Meloni’s broader vision for E.U.-Africa relations. Even as the bloc agrees on new rules for processing migrants once they reach the continent, Italy is working to ensure they never arrive in the first place.
Ms. Meloni has also been a thorn in the side of the bloc’s green transition. Deriding the European Green Deal, a suite of environmental legislation, as “climate fundamentalism,” she has consistently attempted to slow or stop green policies. Often, Italy has been alone or little supported in these efforts. But in February, Ms. Meloni was central to a vote opposing the bloc’s centerpiece nature restoration law, which seeks to repair damaged ecosystems across the continent.
Tellingly, Ms. Meloni was joined in that vote by the center-right European People’s Party, the largest group of parties in Brussels that includes the German Christian Democrats. The group, which had already sought to scale back the bloc’s climate commitments, called the proposal an attack on farmers, who have recently held protests across Europe. Helped by some dissident center-right parliamentarians voting in favor, the legislation passed. But center-right leaders’ hopes to derail a ban on new combustion-engine cars point to further collaboration to come.
Polls ahead of June’s elections suggest that center-to-far-right forces are on course to win around 50 percent of seats in Parliament. For many on the hard right, this offers a chance to end the grand coalition of Socialists and Christian Democrats that has historically dominated European politics — and instead create a right-wing alliance that would hold the top jobs. In practice, such cooperation is difficult: Center-right leaders say that they will ally only with pro-E.U., pro-NATO, pro-Ukraine and pro-rule-of-law parties. That rules out a decent portion of Europe’s far-right parties, at least for now. It does, however, allow for a full embrace of Ms. Meloni.
