European countries are increasingly allowing far-right parties to participate in government, repeating the path of Italy, where this process began in the 1990s. The New York Times (NYT) journalist Jason Horowitz wrote about this in an article about the "Italianization" of European politics.
The author associates the beginning of this process with former Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi. In 1994, he included far-right forces in the ruling coalition, breaking the post-war taboo on their participation in governing the country. Berlusconi explained his decision by the need to gather the support of these parties to form a government. He later admitted that by doing so he gave them legitimacy.
"We put them in the government in 1994 and gave them legitimacy," Horowitz quotes Berlusconi.