Matteo Renzi (born 11 January 1975) was Prime Minister of Italy from 22 February 2014 to 12 December 2016, succeeding Enrico Letta and preceding Paolo Gentiloni. At the age of 39, he was the youngest prime minister in Italian history (just 52 days younger than Benito Mussolini), and he became known for his wide-ranging reforms as the leader of the liberal-centrist faction of the Democratic Party of Italy.
Biography[]
Matteo Renzi was born in Florence, Tuscany, Italy on 11 January 1975, the son of a Christian Democracy municipal councillor. In 1999, he graduated from the University of Florence with a law degree, and he was affiliated with the Popolari until 2001, when he joined Democracy is Freedom - The Daisy. In 2004, he became President of Florence, becoming the youngest person to serve as a provincial president; he was only 29 years old. Renzi opposed the political caste, and he reduced taxes and decreased the number of the province's employees and managers. In 2009 Renzi, by now a member of the Democratic Party of Italy, won the mayoral elections in Florence with 60% of the vote. He installed 500 free WiFi access posts across the city, reduced kindergarten waiting lists by 90%, and increased welfare and school spending. He remained Mayor until 2014; in 2013, he was elected Secretary of the Democratic Party, remaining in that position until 19 February 2017; he resumed holding that post after 7 May 2017. In 2014, he called for a new government, a new phase, and a radical programme of reform, and 136 of the 152 Democratic Party leaders supported Renzi's platform. In February 2014, Prime Minister Enrico Letta decided to resign, and President Giorgio Napolitano tasked Renzi with forming a new government. Renzi's appointment as Prime Minister was a sign of much-needed generational change, and he became Italy's youngest prime minister when he assumed office at the age of 39.
During his tenure as Prime Minister of Italy, Renzi relaxed labor and employment laws with the goal of boosting economic growth, reformed public administration and the electoral process, simplified civil trials, introduced same-sex civil unions, and abolished many small taxes. Subscribing to Tony Blair's "Third Way", Renzi became the de facto leader of the European center-left, opposing the Christian democratic European People's Party, which was led by Angela Merkel. After the failure of a 4 December 2016 referendum that would decrease the number of seats in the Parliament, Renzi announced his resignation, and Paolo Gentiloni succeeded him as Prime Minister. On 18 September 2019, he founded Italia Viva, a liberal splintergroup of the Democratic Party.