European elections, from Malta to Sweden: who are the Italian parties with?

On Saturday 8 and Sunday 9 June, polls will also be open in Italy to renew the 720 seats in the European Parliament. The vote will affect 359 million eligible voters

ROME – On Saturday 8 and Sunday 9 June, polls will also be open in Italy to renew, for the next five years, the 720 seats of the European Parliament, the only assembly transnational organization in the world directly elected. The vote will involve 359 million eligible voters – out of 450 million citizens – and in various states (not here) people will vote as early as Thursday 6th and Friday 7th.

The renewal of the 2024-2029 legislature presents two new features: first, for the first time the United Kingdom, which left the Union in 2020, is not participating in the vote as part of the Brexit process; second, in compliance with the reform of last September, the seats went from 705 to 720 (according to the Treaties, they can reach a maximum of 751, as it was before London’s exit). The distribution of seats takes into account both the size of the population of the member states and the need to guarantee an adequate level of representation for European citizens of the smaller countries. For example, Cyprus, Estonia, Luxembourg and Malta have the least number of seats, equal to six, while Germany is the member state that has the most: 96. Italy has 76.

Every citizen who has reached the age of 18 is asked to choose between the candidates of lists belonging to the party spectrum of the country to which he or she belongs – even if residing abroad – and the number of deputies elected by a party will be proportional to the number of votes it receives. The voting system is proportional and provides for a threshold of 4%. In Italy, in addition to voting for the list, you can indicate up to three preferences. The current elections – as well as being important for the challenges that the new EU institutions will be called upon to face, such as the war in Ukraine and the Middle East, the migration issue, the fight against climate change and the green transition to name a few – are interesting from a political point of view: in addition to Italy, three states are led by right-wing governments, and another eight by the centre-right, while one, Slovakia, is led by a populist coalition. Without prejudice to the “purpose government” in Bulgaria, five executives are driven by centrist forces while in 4 states we find a center-left majority and in Spain a left-wing one.

In Italy, the European elections fall approximately halfway through the mandate of the government led by Giorgia Meloni, which thus faces a sort of testing ground for the work done so far. Voters, however, will only be able to choose between ten national political formations – within which it may happen that others have converged – keeping in mind that each of them, based on orientation and programmes, adheres and therefore it brings votes to one of the great European families, of which there are seven. We start with the European People, a historic group in the European Chamber that brings together conservative, moderate and liberal centre-right forces. In the previous legislature it was the majority group with 176 seats out of 705.

In Italy he obtained the membership of Forza Italia(Fi) with the deputy prime minister and foreign ministerAntonio Tajani as the candidate, and the name of the founder Silvio Berlusconi in the symbol. Whoever writes it on the ballot, Tajani specified, will have their vote recognised. Brothers of Italy, i.e. Giorgia Meloni’s party, has chosen the family a little further to the right than the European Conservatives and Reformists (Ecr), which also includes the right-wing movementsReconquête! by the French politician Éric Zemmour, the Spanish Vox and the Polish Law and Justice (Pis). In the five-year period just concluded, the group counted on 64 seats, as did Identity and democracy (ID), a group more to the right than the previous ones, to which Matteo Salvini’s League belongs. – which nominated General Roberto Vannacci and Senator Claudio Borghi – and Marine Le Pen’s French Rassemblement National. Id also included the Germans of Alternative für Deutschland, who were however expelled at the end of May for some statements that seemed to wink at neo-Nazi movements in Germany. As for Prime Minister Viktor Orban’s HungarianFidesz, it was expelled from the EPP in 2021 and remained among the non-members. In recent days, however, he has proposed – once the elections have concluded – an alliance with the “two women who hold the future of the sovereignist camp in their hands”, namely Meloni of ECR and Le Pen of ID. The declared objective? “Supplying the People’s Party”.

The second European group of the previous legislature, however, was the centre-left Socialists and Democrats (S&D) with 144 seats. Running with them is Elly Schlein’s Democratic Party (Pd), whileAzione! by Carlo Calenda and United States of Europe – which brings together +Europa by Emma Bonino and Italia Viva by Matteo Renzi – refer to Renew Europe, a centrist and liberal group that obtained 102 seats in the last legislature. Green and Left Alliance led by Angelo Bonelli and Nicola Fratoianni, which sees among the candidates the former mayors of Rome and Riace Ignazio Marino and Mimmo Lucano, is instead in the Green/Free Alliance group European Union (Greens/Ale).