Web communication entre politique et marché : le cas du Mouvement 5 étoiles

• Main Author: Francesca Veltri
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: Les Éditions de la Maison des Sciences de l’Homme 2018-10-01
• Series: Socio
• Subjects: political mobilization; Italian politics; web-communication; political parties; 5 star Movement
• Online Access: http://journals.openedition.org/socio/3655

The 5 star movement (M5s) appeared on the Italian political scene in 2009, thanks to the comic actor Beppe Grillo and to the entrepreneur Gianroberto Casaleggio, an expert in web communication. At the beginning, it was presented as a political organization developing itself almost completely online, with no intermediate level between the centre and the local members. Despite its almost non-existent structure, the M5s became in 2013 – and then again in 2018 – the most voted Italian party. What is the origin of its electoral success which struck everyone, and how can one describe the role of the enterprise standing in the back-office of this success? Did the M5s really revive political activism among young people, or rather it gave life to a new form of mobilization direct by the top? This article tries to give an answer to these questions, by proposing an original hypothesis on the reasons that led to the birth of the party and to the transformations which moulded it into its current form.