CEU Electronic Theses and Dissertations, 2023
| Author | Bottura, Beatrice |
|---|---|
| Title | Ethnopopulists' Reactions to Crises: the Case of Fratelli D'Italia |
| Summary | TThe expansion of ethnopopulism within Europe at a time of increasingly unstable political and international orders raises questions on how ethnopopulist parties react to crises. This thesis explores the question by investigating ethnopopulist discursive changes as a reaction to recent and current crises, namely the Covid-19 pandemic and the war in Ukraine. The thesis looks at Italy as a case study, focusing on its current governing party – Fratelli D’Italia (FDI) – and speeches of its leader – Giorgia Meloni – from the formation of the party in 2012 until its victory in the 2022 general elections. To evaluate the discourse, the thesis employs a qualitative content analysis of the selected documents and speeches along the main conceptual elements of ethnopopulism, namely populism, nationalism, and conservatism. This analysis unveils shifts in FDI’s populism and nationalism, but less so in its conservatism, with a change in the party’s definition of the ‘other’. In practice, this manifests as a moderation in FDI’s Euroscepticism and xenophobia, with an augmentation of its antagonism towards the Italian left and the previous technocratic government elite. |
| Supervisor | Sata, Robert |
| Department | Undergraduate Studies BA |
| Full text | https://www.etd.ceu.edu/2023/bottura_beatrice.pdf |
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