Italy has many inconsequential separatist movements. However, only one has ever had any significant electoral success: Italy's Lega Nord (Northern League). A regionalist party founded in 1991 by Umberto Bossi, it campaigns for the secession of Northern Italy to form a region known as Padania, comprising Emilia-Romagna, Veneto, Lombardy, Piedmont and Liguria.
The Lega Nord is inexorably linked to the far right. Its new Federal Secretary, Matteo Salvini, an MEP, will lead the Lega into the 2014 European elections. He…