The Five Star Movement is a political party in Italy. Its leader and president is Giuseppe Conte, Prime Minister of Italy from 2018 until 2021. The M5S was founded on 4 October 2009 by Beppe Grillo, a political activist and comedian, and Gianroberto Casaleggio, a web strategist. The party is primarily described as populist, of the syncretic kind, due to its members' insistence that it has no place in the left–right political spectrum. The party is a proponent of green politics, direct democracy and broadly, progressivism.
V-Day in Bologna, 2007
Beppe Grillo in Trento during the 2013 electoral campaign
Grillo addressing the crowd in Rome, 2014
Giuseppe Conte at the Quirinal Palace
Giuseppe Conte is an Italian jurist, academic, and politician who served as prime minister of Italy from June 2018 to February 2021. He has been the president of the Five Star Movement (M5S) since August 2021.
Conte in 2018
Conte with President Sergio Mattarella at the Quirinal Palace
Conte during a press conference at the Quirinal Palace after accepting the task of forming a new cabinet
Conte speaks to the European Parliament in February 2019