"The Lega Nord has arguably been the most important new force in Italian politics in the last two decades. This book is the first attempt to study the Lega as a phenomenon which arose in the industrial areas of Northern Italy in the 1980s and which succeeded in mobilizing the entrepreneurial class in a campaign against the Italian state." "The Lega was instrumental in bringing down the Italian political system at the beginning of the 1990s and is still today a force to be reckoned with on the national scene. The authors recount the Lega's bold attempt to create a new nation called Padania in Northern Italy and chart its descent into a party of the extreme right. Above all the book underlines that the demands of the rich North present a major challenge to Italy's political class and institutions. The Lega put this challenge on the national agenda and introduced the themes that dominate Italian politics today."--Jacket.