The Lega Nord

From a comparative perspective, the Lega Nord (LN) can be situated at the intersection of two distinct historical processes. The first is the so-called “ethnic revival” (Smith 1981), which in the 1960s and the 1970s gave new voice to a number of actors representing the peripheries of states and allowed many autonomist parties to gain political representation. The second is the “silent counter-revolution” (Ignazi 1992), leading to the rise of new political parties (variously labelled as new right, new radical right or neo-populist) that articulated anti-establishment discourses and raised issues that were previously absent from political debate. These included opposition to immigration and, more recently, strong Euroscepticism. Keeping in mind the LN’s dual profile, the following section presents a summary of the LN’s evolution through the achievement of several thresholds, as introduced in the Introduction to this volume. The chapter then turns to examine how passing different thresholds has impacted upon the LN’s organisation and its pursuit of goals.