Italy’s Populists Are Picking a Fight With Brussels Over Austerity

Italy’s populists are getting ready to uncork the prosecco. Only four months after taking power, unlikely allies Luigi Di Maio of the anti-Establishment Five Star Movement and Matteo Salvini of the anti-migrant League have picked a fight with Brussels that they could well win.

Italy and the 18 other countries that use the euro as their currency have until Oct. 15 to submit their 2019 spending plans to the European Commission for approval. The “people’s budget” Di Maio and Salvini are drafting seeks to make good on costly election promises, while flying in the face of European Union rules that set limits on government deficits and debt. If the EC blinks, Rome gets away with new-style Keynesian stimulus, defying the prevailing austerity. If it’s thumbs down, the Italians get a reprimand, which they can exploit to cement their hold on power by rallying their base and revving up their offensive against the Brussels elite. “For the populist government, it’s a win-win,” says Giovanni Orsina, head of the School of Government at Rome’s Luiss-Guido Carli University. “If the EU says no to the budget, that’s a godsend—they’ll fight their campaign for the European Parliament elections next May on that.”