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| The Rise of a Protest Movement Shows the Depth of Italy’s Disillusionment | The Rise of a Protest Movement Shows the Depth of Italy’s Disillusionment |
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| ROME — For months, he has been shouting his way from piazza to piazza, drawing tens of thousands as he rails against tax collectors, corrupt politicians and financial speculation. And when he arrives in Rome on Friday for the final campaign rally of his “Tsunami tour,” Beppe Grillo, the Internet-savvy comedian turned populist rabble-rouser, may lead Italy’s third-most popular party. | ROME — For months, he has been shouting his way from piazza to piazza, drawing tens of thousands as he rails against tax collectors, corrupt politicians and financial speculation. And when he arrives in Rome on Friday for the final campaign rally of his “Tsunami tour,” Beppe Grillo, the Internet-savvy comedian turned populist rabble-rouser, may lead Italy’s third-most popular party. |
| In the final weeks of a campaign marked by widespread voter disillusionment and growing economic distress, and after Pope Benedict XVI’s decision to step down on Feb. 28 upended once-solid assumptions, Mr. Grillo’s Five Star Movement has surged ahead, surprising the experts almost as much as Pope Benedict did. Ahead of national elections on Feb. 24 and 25, the party’s “antisystem” message has drawn strong support from both right and left, buoyed by corruption scandals that have undermined voters’ faith in government. | In the final weeks of a campaign marked by widespread voter disillusionment and growing economic distress, and after Pope Benedict XVI’s decision to step down on Feb. 28 upended once-solid assumptions, Mr. Grillo’s Five Star Movement has surged ahead, surprising the experts almost as much as Pope Benedict did. Ahead of national elections on Feb. 24 and 25, the party’s “antisystem” message has drawn strong support from both right and left, buoyed by corruption scandals that have undermined voters’ faith in government. |
| With his fiery language, mop of gray curls, grass-roots campaigning and calls for a referendum on Italy’s staying in the euro zone, Mr. Grillo, 64, has helped blunt the gains made by Silvio Berlusconi, the former prime minister. Mr. Berlusconi’s People of Liberty party is now in second place in opinion polls but lacks potential coalition partners, making it all but impossible that Mr. Berlusconi, the ultimate campaigner, will ever govern Italy again, political experts say. | With his fiery language, mop of gray curls, grass-roots campaigning and calls for a referendum on Italy’s staying in the euro zone, Mr. Grillo, 64, has helped blunt the gains made by Silvio Berlusconi, the former prime minister. Mr. Berlusconi’s People of Liberty party is now in second place in opinion polls but lacks potential coalition partners, making it all but impossible that Mr. Berlusconi, the ultimate campaigner, will ever govern Italy again, political experts say. |
| The center-left Democratic Party, led by Pier Luigi Bersani, a subdued former industry minister, is expected to place first, but it may not win enough seats to govern without help from an ally, probably the civic movement started by Mario Monti, the caretaker prime minister who stepped down before the elections after leading a technocratic government for the past year. Mr. Monti is respected by world leaders but has fumbled into fourth place as a candidate, seriously tarnishing both his image and the agenda of change he promoted. | The center-left Democratic Party, led by Pier Luigi Bersani, a subdued former industry minister, is expected to place first, but it may not win enough seats to govern without help from an ally, probably the civic movement started by Mario Monti, the caretaker prime minister who stepped down before the elections after leading a technocratic government for the past year. Mr. Monti is respected by world leaders but has fumbled into fourth place as a candidate, seriously tarnishing both his image and the agenda of change he promoted. |
| With no official polls allowed in the two weeks before elections — and with turnout expected to be at a record low — the outcome of the race remains uncertain. If the results fail to yield a government, the political uncertainty could set off a new round of market turmoil. But more worrisome in the longer term, political commentators say, is that the success of Mr. Grillo’s Five Star Movement, an opposition party, could make Parliament ungovernable. | With no official polls allowed in the two weeks before elections — and with turnout expected to be at a record low — the outcome of the race remains uncertain. If the results fail to yield a government, the political uncertainty could set off a new round of market turmoil. But more worrisome in the longer term, political commentators say, is that the success of Mr. Grillo’s Five Star Movement, an opposition party, could make Parliament ungovernable. |
| “In my view, we will have a majority,” said Stefano Folli, a political columnist for the business daily Il Sole 24 Ore, speaking of a possible alliance of the Bersani and Monti forces. “But the second question is: Will the majority be enough to govern a Parliament where 20 percent of the M.P.’s come from Grillo’s party? That does not have a simple answer.” | “In my view, we will have a majority,” said Stefano Folli, a political columnist for the business daily Il Sole 24 Ore, speaking of a possible alliance of the Bersani and Monti forces. “But the second question is: Will the majority be enough to govern a Parliament where 20 percent of the M.P.’s come from Grillo’s party? That does not have a simple answer.” |
| What worries critics most about Mr. Grillo’s Five Star Movement is that it is an assemblage of first-time candidates with no shared vision except an opposition to politics as usual. That, combined with its consensus-driven approach, makes it hard to predict how its members will vote. | What worries critics most about Mr. Grillo’s Five Star Movement is that it is an assemblage of first-time candidates with no shared vision except an opposition to politics as usual. That, combined with its consensus-driven approach, makes it hard to predict how its members will vote. |
| In speeches, Mr. Grillo has criticized Italy’s participation in the NATO-led mission in Afghanistan, questioned the need for mandatory vaccines for children and opposed some local plans to privatize Italy’s water supply. But on other issues, the party leans right. It is opposed to changing Italy’s laws to grant citizenship to the children of legal immigrants born in Italy, a move the Democratic Party supports. | In speeches, Mr. Grillo has criticized Italy’s participation in the NATO-led mission in Afghanistan, questioned the need for mandatory vaccines for children and opposed some local plans to privatize Italy’s water supply. But on other issues, the party leans right. It is opposed to changing Italy’s laws to grant citizenship to the children of legal immigrants born in Italy, a move the Democratic Party supports. |
| “Theirs is a project of destruction, not of creation,” said Federico Fornaro, a candidate for the Democratic Party in the northern Piedmont region. “Their goal is chaos, the destruction of the old system. But there’s no concrete plan for a new system, not in the political, economic or social realms.” | “Theirs is a project of destruction, not of creation,” said Federico Fornaro, a candidate for the Democratic Party in the northern Piedmont region. “Their goal is chaos, the destruction of the old system. But there’s no concrete plan for a new system, not in the political, economic or social realms.” |
| The success of the Five Star Movement is not hard to explain. Taking cues from the themes of the Occupy Wall Street movement, it has tapped into voter disgust with the political establishment: the excesses and corruption scandals involving Mr. Berlusconi’s party, the tax increases of Mr. Monti’s government, and the ossification of the Democratic Party, which has also been hit by a widening scandal at the Monte dei Paschi of Siena bank. | The success of the Five Star Movement is not hard to explain. Taking cues from the themes of the Occupy Wall Street movement, it has tapped into voter disgust with the political establishment: the excesses and corruption scandals involving Mr. Berlusconi’s party, the tax increases of Mr. Monti’s government, and the ossification of the Democratic Party, which has also been hit by a widening scandal at the Monte dei Paschi of Siena bank. |
| The Five Star Movement has been gaining momentum since regional elections last spring, when it won the mayor’s race in Parma in the north and became the leading party in Sicily, after record low turnout. | The Five Star Movement has been gaining momentum since regional elections last spring, when it won the mayor’s race in Parma in the north and became the leading party in Sicily, after record low turnout. |
| As he took to the stage in Piazza del Duomo in Milan this week, Mr. Grillo was greeted by a huge crowd shouting: “Send them home! Send them home!” referring to the current Parliament. He began a tirade, saying that no one would have expected his party to win in Sicily, “where they pay for votes.” He added that Italy’s tax collection agency should be closed, and he criticized the country’s high youth unemployment rates. | As he took to the stage in Piazza del Duomo in Milan this week, Mr. Grillo was greeted by a huge crowd shouting: “Send them home! Send them home!” referring to the current Parliament. He began a tirade, saying that no one would have expected his party to win in Sicily, “where they pay for votes.” He added that Italy’s tax collection agency should be closed, and he criticized the country’s high youth unemployment rates. |
| Mr. Grillo, who under his party’s bylaws cannot serve in Parliament because he has a conviction for manslaughter in a car accident in which three people died, has shied away from taking journalists’ questions. | |
| In a rare television interview on Thursday, Mr. Grillo said that bond spreads — the difference in yields between Italian and benchmark German bonds — were a “hallucination,” and that financial markets had become dangerously disconnected from the real economy. | In a rare television interview on Thursday, Mr. Grillo said that bond spreads — the difference in yields between Italian and benchmark German bonds — were a “hallucination,” and that financial markets had become dangerously disconnected from the real economy. |
| As he sat outside his shop in Rome, Stefano Anidori, 52, said he had voted for the left in the past, but was considering supporting Mr. Grillo. “I am undecided, but I am so angry that I think I’ll vote for Grillo,” he said. But he also worried that the movement was too new in politics. | As he sat outside his shop in Rome, Stefano Anidori, 52, said he had voted for the left in the past, but was considering supporting Mr. Grillo. “I am undecided, but I am so angry that I think I’ll vote for Grillo,” he said. But he also worried that the movement was too new in politics. |
| “How can they propose laws or understand the system quickly enough for a country in such deep trouble?” he asked. “But I voted for the left for 20 years. I am tired of losing and tired of seeing the same faces over and over again.” | “How can they propose laws or understand the system quickly enough for a country in such deep trouble?” he asked. “But I voted for the left for 20 years. I am tired of losing and tired of seeing the same faces over and over again.” |
| With such divergent supporters and candidates, it remains to be seen how the Five Star Movement will vote in Parliament. | With such divergent supporters and candidates, it remains to be seen how the Five Star Movement will vote in Parliament. |
| Roberto D’Alimonte, a political scientist and a pollster at Luiss Guido Carli University in Rome, called Mr. Grillo a “uniquely Italian invention.” | Roberto D’Alimonte, a political scientist and a pollster at Luiss Guido Carli University in Rome, called Mr. Grillo a “uniquely Italian invention.” |
| “We invented fascism, the Christian Democrats, Berlusconi, and now we’ve even invented Grillo.” | “We invented fascism, the Christian Democrats, Berlusconi, and now we’ve even invented Grillo.” |
Gaia Pianigiani and Elisabetta Povoledo contributed reporting. | Gaia Pianigiani and Elisabetta Povoledo contributed reporting. |
| This article has been revised to reflect the following correction: | |
| Correction: February 26, 2013 | |
An earlier version of this article referred incompletely to the reason that Beppe Grillo, who has a conviction for manslaughter, cannot serve in Parliament. He is barred under his party’s bylaws; Italian law does not bar convicted criminals from serving in Parliament. |