What Meloni's triumph could mean for Europe

Exactly one hundred years ago, in October 1922, Benito Mussolini and his National Fascist Party seized power through the March on Rome (Marcia su Roma) and became Italy's youngest prime minister.

- ATANU BISWAS

A dark period of totalitarian evolution emerged which eventually would spread wings in some other parts of Europe as well. And the rest is part of some of the darkest history of mankind.

A century on, Italy elected its first far-right leader since Mussolini in the form of Giorgia Meloni, the leader of Fratelli d'Italia, or Brothers of Italy party, who incidentally would be the first woman prime minister of the country. And, understandably, a spectre is haunting Europe - the spectre of far-right ideologies blended with neo-fascism.

There is no denying that the far right is riding on popularity in Europe. Actually, everywhere. The reasons, of course, differ across countries. For example, just before Giorgia Meloni's ascent to power in the southern part of Europe - north of the Mediterranean sea, the far-right Sweden Democrats got more than one-fifth - the second-largest - vote share and are expected to play an important role in the next government in the Scandinavian country. Understandably, Italy and Sweden are geographically far apart, and their social dynamics and politics are widely different. Thus, the roots of the emergence of far rights in these two countries should be traced and analyzed differently.

But they certainly share some common features across Europe and elsewhere in terms of the anti-immigration and anti-Muslim rhetoric, and on security issues, which certainly succeed in garnering huge public support. The recent wave - of far-right movements in Europe is largely due to their success in capitalising on the social turmoil generated by waves of refugees, mostly around 2015. The issues of ethnic diversity and the religious nature of Christian Europe are thus seemingly interrelated to this resurgence of farright ideology.