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Some believe Europe is more divided than ever. After years of austerity and migration, populists are on the rise in countries like Italy, framing politics as a battle between ordinary voters and a corrupt European ‘establishment’. But the continent is also divided over how to move forward in a world where rising economic powerhouses threaten to dominate. Should the 27 remaining nations of the European Union bind themselves together ever more closely, with tighter integration - monetary, economic, political and even military? Or are there insurmountable fault lines between northern Europe, and the southern nations which some say are locked in ‘permanent recession’. Will the richer half of Europe always be bailing out the poorer, stoking up resentment that feeds the rise of populism?

Zeinab Badawi and her panel Hugh Bronson from Germany’s AFD party, Marta Grande from Italy’s 5Star Movement, Anna Maria Corazza Bildt from the European People’s Party and Pauline Bock, a French journalist and political commentator take questions from a local audience.

Producer: Ben Carter

(Image: Audience and Panel in Rome, Credit: Andrea Annessi Mecci)