We could discuss topography and Roman “philology”, and underline that neither Garbatella nor Torrino are comparable to the villages. But this is not the crux, because the card with which the Prime Minister declares herself “proud” to be a “village” marks a further escalation in her communication.
A few days ago, at the FdI event in Pescara, he had clearly explained the paradigm of the “politician like one of us” with the appeal to the people of the right to write his first name directly on the ballot paper. A coup de theatre, in the name of the disintermediation-neoplebiscitarism combo. A decisive leap that makes the Brothers of Italy the hyper-personal party of the prime minister.
However, not even “nominalistic” hyperpersonalization and neo-Bonapartism are enough in this climate of permanent electoral campaigning in which competition on the electoral market has moved markedly to the right. And where, in fact, personalization is such a current currency that it appears inflated.
Thus, here is the card of “Giorgia borgatara”, to be honest it can be classified as the reinvention of a tradition in terms of the prime minister’s residential geography, but this is precisely not what matters for the electorate to whom it is addressed.
In the wake of a political-propaganda model increasingly inspired by “directism”, Meloni has chosen to break through all hesitation, aiming for a communication that could not be more immediate. In which the eternal format of the friend/enemy couple finds its place, revisited in terms of “residential polarization”: she in (or, better to say, icon of) the suburb, the leaders of the left locked up in the good neighborhoods. A communication that accredits itself as “popular”, and in reality turns out to be graphically very accurate and linguistically sophisticated, complete with legitimizing evocation of the authority of the dictionary.
A transposition of the fundamental political fracture, which has become current again for some time, between center and periphery, with respect to which, it goes without saying, “Giorgia da Roma sud” embodies the AntiZtl. The “woman of the people” who often resorts to the Roman dialect, sold as synonymous with truthfulness, sincerity and authenticity, and accompanied by a theatricalization (often Gascon) of the voice and gestures – as Stefano Bartezzaghi said in the recent interview with Annalisa Cuzzocrea – what a hole the screen and arouses identification in his people. To which she, performing as a direct testimonial of the company, envisages the coming advent of “popolocracy” (copyright by Ilvo Diamanti and Marc Lazar) which will be achieved with the premiership.
According to the scheme of that anti-system narrative – while you sit in Palazzo Chigi… – which is invariably dusted off at every electoral appointment. This is the constitutive ambiguity of all populism, both “of struggle and of government”.
But with her latest communicative acts, the catch-all leader obsessed with the idea of having no enemies on her right has made yet another leap in scale. Call it, if you want, hyperpopulism.
