Elly Schlein she had told the Corriere with impressive certainty – “I am convinced of winning” -; but few of her believed it, besides her and her mentor Franceschini («one of her like Elly is born every ten years»).
The result of the last rainy Sunday in February is a cataclysm in the Italian left. Not only did they express themselves more voters than expected; not only have they blown away polls and predictions; they also overturned the vote of the members, which had clearly rewarded Stefano Bonaccini.
Looking at Elly Schlein’s victory through the glasses of politics, one could define it a gift to Renzi and Calendawho had ended up in a corner after Moratti’s flop and are now rejoicing: the clearly anti-Renzi vote of yesterday opens up space in the center and therefore for the hated Renzi.
Not even Giorgia Meloni is sorry: the president of Emilia Romagna appeared to be a more solid and experienced opponent than a young woman with no administrative experience.
Yet never as this time looking at Schlein’s victory through the glasses of politics is there the risk of not understanding anything.
The sign of our time is the revolt against the establishment, the system, and all that is perceived as “old”.
Of course, Schlein was supported by a part of the nomenklatura of the Democratic Party, starting precisely with Franceschini. But compared to the son of the party, the “Emilian communist” Bonaccini, a young woman who until recently was not even registered with the Democratic Party represented the New.
A radical choice, which the base made instinctively rather than with reasoning, thinking they had nothing to lose.
The turning point came from the big cities , and reflects the social change of the Italian left. The Democratic Party is no longer the party of the coops, of the Tuscan-Emilian axis, of the red artisans. It is a party of the metropolitan bourgeoisie, attentive to civil rights, to the reasons of the square and of the movements, from sardines to “antifa”. Voters who the aggression of Florence motivatedand who have not forgiven Bonaccini the words with which he acknowledged Meloni’s certain ability . Voters who discovered Schlein on the eve of the elections of 25 September, when Meloni’s well-known claim to identity – “I am Giorgia, I am a woman, I am a mother, I am a Christian …” – contrasted her own identity claim : “I’m a woman, I love a woman, I’m not a mother, but I’m no less a woman for that.”.
Now anything can happen.
That the party regroups, or that the ex-Renzian centrists join their old boss. That the Democratic Party reiterates the pro-Ukrainian line or softens it. That the relationship with the Five Stars is reborn or that competition on the left increases. Whether liberal, moderate, Catholic voters look elsewhere or whether the new secretary knows how to bring a new generation closer to politics, which in part moved – for the first time – already yesterday.
The experience of the past is that there is no more precarious position than the secretariat of the Democratic Party. Nevertheless the party has never had a secretary like Elly Schlein; and not just because it has never had a female leader.
So far the Democratic Party has been run by former Christian Democrats – the founding father study programhis political son Enrico Lettathe wrecker Renzithe same Franceschini — or by men educated in the PCI but long-time navigators, well known to the public opinion, not exactly perceived as radicals, by Veltroni a Zingaretti passing through Bersani.
Elly Schlein is a novelty and an experiment.
If people perceive that behind her there are the usual, it will not be new and it will not be a long experiment. The same will happen if the strong ideal that animates her will take on an ideological character distant from reality, if the new leader will address the country as she would like it to be, not as it is.
Nevertheless it is also possible that Elly Schlein is destined to surprise once again.