Contesting the Green Deal: An Investigation of the Populist Discourse of Discontent Towards EU Climate Policies in Italy.

This research examines how populist political narratives in Italy construct dissatisfaction with EU climate policies, with particular attention to the period before and after the launch of the European Green Deal. As a country simultaneously vulnerable to climate risks and central to the rise of populism, Italy provides a crucial context for understanding how political discourse shapes environmental governance. The study addresses two main questions: (1) How do Italian populist actors frame EU climate legislation? (2) How do these narratives differ across parties: (a) in relation to their core ideologies, and (b) during moments of heightened issue salience or participation in government? Focusing on the three mainstream populist parties - League (Lega), Brothers of Italy (Fratelli d’Italia), and the Five-Star Movement (Movimento Cinque Stelle) - the analysis draws on theories of populist ideology, party positioning on climate change, and the effects of populism on climate discourse and policy. To capture a pre- and post-Green Deal timeframe, while also accounting for the major shift experienced by the Italian party system in 2013, the dataset covers the period from 2013 to the present. Using Qualitative Content Analysis (MAXQDA) on party communications and parliamentary speeches (from the ItaParlCorpus dataset and manual scraping), the study employs a dictionary-based approach to examine how populist elements such as people-centrism and anti-elitism interact with left–right ideologies. Whether these “thin” ideologies anchor themselves to the “thick” left–right ones in shaping parties’ climate positions remains a debated question. A diachronic and cross-party analysis tests existing hypotheses on the relationship between populism and environmental positions, examining the discursive constructions employed by prominent populist actors. Whereas earlier research has focused mainly on right-wing parties or quantitative correlations between populism and climate attitudes, this study offers an in-depth examination of three parties - and particularly of the Five-Star Movement’s discourse since 2013. As a non-right-wing party that has alternated between opposition, government with right-wing parties, government with left-wing parties, and opposition again, it provides an ideal case for observing not only ideological but also strategic drivers of climate discourse. While in opposition, parties often criticize the government’s insufficient climate action, as the Five-Star Movement did during its early years. However, once in office, processes of institutionalization typically occur, and climate positions may shift - especially when a party enters coalition government with a right-wing partner, as the Five-Star Movement did in 2018 with the League. These dynamics relate to theoretical expectations that government-opposition status shape parties’ climate stances. Semi-structured interviews with political representatives complement the textual analysis, helping to identify plausible explanations for discursive shifts. Findings aim to clarify how left- and right-wing populist ideologies, alongside strategic evaluations, shape party responses to EU climate action, thereby contributing to the development of communicatively sensitive climate policymaking.