The Five Star Movement in the European Parliament. A real Eurosceptic party?

After the 2013 political elections, a new political actor has irrupted on the Italian political scene: the Five Star Movement (FSM). The great electoral success of this populist and anti-establishment party, has changed the nature of the Italian party system which has moved from the bipolar competition of the last twenty years (centre left versus centre right), to a three polar competition. A partial confirmation of the FSM success arrived at the 2014 European elections: in this competition, the Movement occupied a Eurosceptic position, based on critical political stances against European Union (EU), its anti-democratic nature and its overwhelming attention towards banks and economic elites rather than citizens. This critical position against EU institutions has been underlined by the political alliance in the European Parliament (EP) with the Eurosceptic United Kingdom Independence Party, led by Nigel Farage. However, after almost two years of political engagement within the EP, is it possible to better define the FSM position regarding the European integration process and the EU? The aim of the paper is to enquire if the FSM could be effectively defined as a Eurosceptic party by the analysis of its political behaviour within the EP. The first part of the paper will be focused on an introduction useful to explain the birth and growth of the FSM and its main political features. After this, I will briefly present the literature on Euroscepticism and its main characteristics. The last part of the paper will be devoted to the empirical analysis of the FSM’s voting behaviour within the EP. In order to define if these votes were the result of clear Eurosceptic stances, I will compare these votes with the ones expressed by three of the main leading Eurosceptic parties within the EP: the Ukip, the National Front (NF) and the Northern League (NL). Thanks to this empirical evidence, it will be possible to define if the FSM has established Eurosceptic stances (similar to those expressed by well-established anti EU parties) or if it is acting differently from the political positions expressed during the European elections.