On an island in the Tiber, a stone Janus looks two ways at once, and a New York Times correspondent who has spent decades in Italy and Europe now reads that double gaze as a forecast. Writing as a columnist rather than a reporter, he argues that Italy, long considered Europe's unstable outlier, has become its template: the far right, once kept outside the postwar political wall, has been gradually admitted, tamed by the pull of power, and then embraced by the mainstream. As Spain prepares to vote and Vox appears poised to enter government, the question he raises is whether the old Italian comp
Italy's Political Laboratory: Why Europe May Be Following Rome's Path on the Far Right
The land of the past often points toward our future.
Mark
Why does a column about Italy matter for a Spanish election?
Mimi
Because the writer's claim is that Italy showed the sequence. Berlusconi let the far right into government in 1994, they slowly moderated, and Meloni now governs as a conventional conservative. Vox is looking at that and wanting the same.
Mark
What did Berlusconi get out of it?
Mimi
Votes for a winning coalition, and by the writer's account, protection for his business interests from prosecutors. He called it civic duty, but the calculus was political.
Luke
Worth saying this is opinion, not a news report. The thesis that Europe is following Italy is the writer's reading. The column offers no data showing the other countries copied Rome.
Mark
So what is actually documented?
Mimi
Meloni's tenure length, her support for Ukraine, her alignment with the E.U., and Flores's own words about Vox. Those are concrete.
Luke
And Flores's quote shows intent, not outcome. He says Vox would do part of its program and wait for more mandate. That is a hope about Meloni's playbook, not evidence of how Vox would govern.
Mark
Does the writer think Meloni's normalization worked?
Mimi
He admits he wasn't sure whether Romanization sapped neo-fascism or revived it. He says she can't credibly be called fascist in office, yet some still worry she might go further right if she wins next year.
Luke
That uncertainty is the honest part. Whether the guardrails would hold in countries without Italy's restraints is something the column asserts as a concern, not something it can show. Spain's polling is also just polling.
El Pulso
- A taboo that kept neo-fascist heirs out of power since World War II was broken in 1994, and Berlusconi himself admitted he had legitimized them.
- Spain's coming election hangs on whether Vox, with its anti-migrant and anti-E.U. agenda, will join a conservative government while Sánchez warns of regression.
- Giorgia Meloni has moved from fringe to prime minister, and the establishment that once feared her now courts her, even as critics question what she has accomplished.
- A Vox lawmaker speaks of implementing part of the program now and waiting for a larger mandate to finish the rest, signaling a deliberate, staged path.
- The column concludes that Italy's pattern is spreading across France, Germany and Britain, and that the scenario unfolding in Spain may confirm it.
On an island in the Tiber, a stone Janus looks two ways at once, and a New York Times correspondent who has spent decades in Italy and Europe now reads that double gaze as a forecast. Writing as a columnist rather than a reporter, he argues that Italy, long considered Europe's unstable outlier, has become its template: the far right, once kept outside the postwar political wall, has been gradually admitted, tamed by the pull of power, and then embraced by the mainstream. As Spain prepares to vote and Vox appears poised to enter government, the question he raises is whether the old Italian compromise, in which change was allowed precisely because nothing essential would be disturbed, is quietly becoming Europe's future.
On Tiber Island, an ancient statue of Janus stands with two faces set back to back. A New York Times correspondent who first walked past it around the turn of the century thought he was living among the past, among old women at street tables and old men playing cards. After more than 25 years covering Italy and Europe, he now believes he was living in the future. His column argues that Europe has been Italianizing: fragmented coalitions, restless voters, and a steady willingness to let the far right into the mainstream.
The argument returns again and again to Silvio Berlusconi. In 1994 he brought neo-fascists into government to build a winning coalition and shield his business interests, breaking a postwar taboo that had kept Mussolini's heirs out of power. He later said, "We let them into the government in '94 and we legitimized them." Italians called the result Romanization, the way the Roman swamp absorbs any barbarian through transactional pull. The swamp had guardrails, and the country's conservatism meant that even repeated experiments rarely changed much. The notorious instability, the writer argues, preserved stability.
The far right kept moving inward. Giorgia Meloni, shaped by neo-fascism's culture of victimhood, rose to lead her party and became Italy's most popular politician. Before her 2022 win, she described her party as mainstream conservative, and when asked whether Mussolini had been bad for Italy, she answered with a quiet "yeah." Since then her record has looked largely conventional: steady on Ukraine, aligned with the E.U., and now the longest-serving prime minister in the Republic's history. The establishment has moved from fearing her to embracing her. Critics still say she has done little and may drift further right, but the writer argues that her real significance is that she governed at all, showing hard-right parties elsewhere that they could win.
In Valencia, Vox parliamentarian Carlos Flores told him Spain would follow the same path: enact part of the program, then wait for a larger mandate. The writer, thinking of the two faces of Janus, closes with a verdict that the land of the past often points toward our future.
On Tiber Island, in the middle of the river that divides Rome, an ancient bridge carries a worn statue of Janus: two weathered faces set back to back on a square pillar, as if they could not stand each other. Janus was Rome's god of the past and future, of transitions. A New York Times correspondent who first walked past it around the turn of the century now reads it differently. He believed then that he was living in the past, among old women at tables dragged into the street and old men playing cards in caps. After more than 25 years of covering Italy and Europe, he concludes he was living in the future.
His argument, offered as a column and not as straight reporting, is that Europe has been Italianizing. Coalitions of small parties have produced instability, and fed-up voters have gone looking for new saviors. More than anything, he writes, countries such as Britain, France and Germany have followed the Italian model of letting the far right into the political mainstream. Spain, where he is now bureau chief, votes this month. Polls suggest Vox, a party that draws on anti-Muslim, anti-migrant and anti-E.U. sentiment, will likely join the mainstream conservatives in a new government. Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez, whose left-wing government is a beacon for European liberals, is trying to rally supporters by warning of Vox's regressive politics. Some of his officials invoke the Franco dictatorship.
The writer's thoughts keep returning to Silvio Berlusconi. In 1994, the media mogul brought "the fascists," his own term, into government to help him build a winning coalition and gain power, not least to shield his business interests from prosecutors. That broke a postwar taboo. Mainstream politicians had made something of a backroom pact to keep the heirs of Mussolini's movement away from power. Berlusconi knew he had violated it. "We let them into the government in '94 and we legitimized them," he said.
Berlusconi saw himself as neutering the far right, not normalizing it. Italian politicians taught the writer to call this "Romanization": the old process by which any barbarian, however fierce, is tamed by the transactional pull of the Roman swamp. The swamp also had guardrails, built after World War II to prevent another Mussolini and later reinforced by European Union restrictions. Combined with Italy's conservatism and its protectiveness toward its citizens' wealth and real estate, they produced a paradox: Italians would let a party try new ideas because nobody expected much to change. The writer cites the line from The Leopard, "Everything must change so that everything can stay the same." Italy had hosted a procession of experiments, among them a mogul turned national face, internet-native populists proud of their inexperience, and rescue technocrats. When one went wrong, elections ended it. The notorious instability, he argues, preserved stability.
The far-right experiment stuck. In the decades after Berlusconi's brief 1994 government, the neo-fascist figures who had joined it moved away from the margins. They distanced themselves from Mussolini and decried the Holocaust. Giorgia Meloni, raised in neo-fascism's culture of victimhood, rose to party leader and minister and became the country's most popular politician. Shortly before she won the 2022 election, she told the writer over spritzes in a Sardinian courtyard that she led a mainstream conservative party. Pressed on whether she shared the "historical judgment" that Mussolini was bad for Italy, she gave a quiet "yeah."
Her record since has been, in his account, largely that of a mainstream conservative. She is now the longest-serving prime minister in the Italian Republic's history and is likely to complete her five-year term before elections next year. Her fiscal and foreign policies are conventional, she has not wavered on Ukraine, and an early attempt to make Italy Europe's bridge to President Trump failed. She sided with the European Union, on which Italy depends for financial aid. The establishment has moved from fearing her to embracing her, and the E.U. has shifted closer to her positions on immigration. At a 2025 Foreign Press Association gala, she sat on a couch for over an hour while reporters mostly took selfies with her, then danced with some of them to "Billie Jean."
Critics say she has done little in office, and some worry she could move further right if she wins again. None, the writer says, can credibly call her governance fascist or authoritarian. Still, her importance lies partly in having governed at all. She has shown Europe's hard-right forces, in countries lacking Italy's restraints, that they can win, and he suggests Marine Le Pen, Alice Weidel and Santiago Abascal owe her a debt.
In Valencia, over coffee, Vox parliamentarian Carlos Flores told him that Spain would follow the same path. Vox, he said, would carry out part of its program and wait for a sufficient mandate to do the rest. The writer, picturing the Janus statues, ends with a verdict: the land of the past often points toward our future.
Citas Notables
We let them into the government in '94 and we legitimized them.— Silvio Berlusconi
We will carry out a portion of our program, and wait until people give us the sufficient mandate to carry out the rest.— Carlos Flores, Vox member of the Spanish Parliament
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