rise of the new right: all articles

The lack of a serious opposition is a political lifeline for Italy’s scandal-drenched prime minister

A shattered Italian town is the site of citizens’ protest against Silvio Berlusconi and for justice

The tide is rising around Italy's premier. But he is prepared to drag the country down with him

The political use of a medical tragedy is the latest episode in Italy's alarming regression

After his death, the appeal of Austria's rightwing populist leader will find new channels

The far-right advance in Austria’s election is a test for the polity but a burden for the country

The real story of Austria's general election is that the country's democracy has been taken hostage by the extreme right. Anton Pelinka, Austria's leading political analyst, explains.

The success of Italy's football team in the world cup could inspire a renaissance in the country's public life, says Geoff Andrews.

The centre-left revival in Italy has not extended to Sicily's regional election, but Rita Borsellino's campaign has highlighted a larger campaign for ethics and justice in Italian politics, reports Geoff Andrews.

An election without a decisive result leaves Italian politics in limbo, report Sarah Pozzoli & Mario Rossi.

Italy's knife-edge election result leaves its political future, and Silvio Berlusconi’s legacy, unresolved. Geoff Andrews reports.

The worst of old Sicily – corruption, patronage, entropy – has become endemic in Italy itself under Silvio Berlusconi, veteran anti-mafia campaigner and centre-left candidate Leoluca Orlando tells Geoff Andrews.

Italy's showman-leader has lost his touch, but have his centre-left opponents found the way to defeat him? Geoff Andrews reports on an unpredictable Italian election.

The United States president is preparing to welcome Italy's prime minister, Silvio Berlusconi, to address a joint meeting of Congress. A bad move, says George W Bush's fellow Harvard Business School alumnus, Pierleone Ottolenghi.

Silvio Berlusconi hopes that an intense media blitz will help sustain him in power, but Geoff Andrews finds that Italy's comedians and artists have other ideas.

The career and achievement of the filmmaker Pier Paolo Pasolini is being celebrated thirty years after his brutal murder, but the political controversy surrounding his death haunts Italy still, says Geoff Andrews.

Silvio Berlusconi began April an election loser but ends it as head of a reformed centre-right coalition. Sarah Pozzoli & Mario Rossi on the great survivor of Italian politics.

Roma in the Czech Republic have been hit hard by post-communist industrial decline and social prejudice. In the eastern city of Ostrava, they display a survivalist spirit amidst grinding poverty. But how can Roma children succeed in an educational system based on institutional exclusion and contempt?

The search for equality and respect by Roma people in Romania has produced a new generation of activists using creative, confident methods of expressing their identity. The leader of a Bucharest-based NGO, Florin Botonogu, talks to Julian Kramer of openDemocracy about the impact of social activism on Roma’s sense of their direction in modern Romania.

The arrival of Roma on the political stage is often heralded as a mark of enlightenment and social progress. But the search for Roma nationalism and political representation is better understood as part of the regressive empowerment of ethnic and nationalist cleavages as an organising principle in European politics. Rather than top-down leadership, the Roma need grassroots campaigning for equality with their fellow-citizens.