Since the election victory of the Fratelli d'Italia (FdI) under Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, a party has become politically leading in Italy whose organizational pedigree can be traced back to historical fascism. At the same time, the FdI and related parties and movements such as the Lega figure in the research literature as prominent players of a so-called "New Right". The current Italian right-wing extremism can therefore be used as a paradigm to analyze peculiarities, but also continuities in the discourse, political style and performance of the ‘new’ and ‘old’ right, the study of which can also productively inform studies of right-wing movements in other European countries.

In this text-based workshop, Anna Migliorini, philosopher at the University of Florence working on political philosophy and aesthetics, will present her research on contemporary far-right movements in Italy, particularly focusing on the questions of how they do or do not form exceptional phenomenona in the history of European far-right movements and how their strategic relationship to the "state of exception", famously theorized by Walter Benjamin and Carl Schmitt, might serve as the distinguishing factor in this regard.

The event is organized by the project C04 "Between Opening and Closing: Political Movements and Artistic Intervention".