"The government of change? Migration and defence policy under Giuseppe Conte’s first cabinet"

Glad to see my latest paper (with M.Ceccorulli and S.Gianfreda) published on Contemporary Italian Politics. The paper focuses on (populist) political parties and foreign policy change in Italy. The abstract of the manuscript (titled: The government of change? Migration and defence policy under Giuseppe Conte’s first cabinet) is here below:
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In 2018, a fully populist government, without any mainstream parties, was formed in Italy. Some authors expected to see a considerable degree of policy change, while others predicted a limited – and mainly symbolic – transformation. However, few studies have investigated the impact of the new government on migration and on defence policy. To what extent did the ‘Yellow-Green’ government foster policy change with respect to traditional approaches in these policy domains? This article aims to gauge the extent of policy change in the fields of migration and defence under Giuseppe Conte’s (first) cabinet (June 2018-August 2019). Relying upon secondary and primary sources (semi-structured interviews with ministers, MPs, diplomats, experts, etc.), we contribute to the literature on the impact of populist parties on migration and defence policies once in office, advancing the hypothesis of a ‘salience-constraints’ balance.