At the European level, Fratelli d’Italia is part of the European Conservatives and Reformists (ECR) parliamentary group but maintains strong links with both the European People’s Party (through Forza Italia) and the Patriots group (through Lega and close-ally Vox). This positioning places Giorgia Meloni in a uniquely advantageous role, allowing her to bridge the centre-right and far-right blocs in the EU parliament.
Overall, Meloni has capitalised on the legitimacy that figures like Fini and Berlusconi once secured for the Italian right, using it to normalise increasingly hard-line positions. While many EU observers were initially reassured by her moderate foreign policy stance and pro-Atlantic alignment, these gestures concealed a consistent ideological continuity. Her rhetoric, alliances, and domestic agenda have all revealed the true contours of her politics. Her strategy differs from that of her ally, Orban. Instead of open confrontation with Brussels, she has pursued a quieter consolidation of power, seeking to rally the three right-wing groups within the European Parliament to marginalise the left and shift the EU’s ideological centre of gravity further right.15
By quietly rallying Europe’s right-wing groups and isolating the left, Meloni is reshaping both Italian and European conservatism from within. Beneath the language of tradition, identity, and sovereignty runs an unbroken current of authoritarian thought, as shown from FdI’s domestic network. Its forms have changed; its roots have not. As the old MSI nostalgics and neo-fascists often recall, quoting J. R. R. Tolkien: “Deep roots are not reached by the frost.” The endurance of this political culture shows how Italy’s fascist legacy continues to nourish the politics of the present, making it a relevant contribution to the reactionary international.