Meloni’s referendum defeat shows the cost of the Trump factor | Riccardo Alcaro

2026-03-26 - 05:09

The Italian PM has won plaudits for her tightrope-walking pragmatism. But have voters now had enough? Giorgia Meloni has a long history of defying expectations. She holds the record as Italy’s youngest cabinet member, at 31, and is its first female prime minister, thus overcoming two of Italian politics’ most formidable obstacles, gerontocracy and machismo. After she took office in autumn 2022, she quickly put to rest concerns that her post-fascist background would make her a foreign policy radical. Staunch support for Ukraine and a pragmatic relationship with EU leaders won her international credibility. Against this backdrop, the defeat she suffered in this week’s referendum – where Italians rejected the government’s proposed constitutional reform of the judiciary by 53.2% to 46.8% – appears all the more significant. Riccardo Alcaro is head of research at IAI, Istituto Affari Internazionali in Rome Continue reading...