The Italian political system

(upbeat music) - Hi, welcome to this new episode of Comparative Politics One of the Universitat of Donoma Barcelona. My name is Margarita Leon, and in this episode, I will be introducing the Italian political system. I will talk to Professor Mateo Gessula, Professor of Political Science at the University of Milan. (upbeat music) After the Second World War, a constitutional referendum together with elections to the Constitutive Assembly was held on June 2, 1946. Women voted for the first time. Italy became a democratic republic, and the Italian royal family had to go on exile. The new constitution, which took effect on January 1948, established that the sovereignty belonged to the Italian people. Where does the Italian political system stand? It is very difficult to classify the Italian political regime because there have been substantial reforms over time. Some very basic features. So the parliament is a bicameral, and it's symmetric. So the Camarader di Puthati and the Senate, they both chambers are elected by direct universal suffrage. You need to be 25 to vote for the Senate, though. Candidates must have at least 25 years of age for the low, chamber, and 40 for the Senate. Until the very recent reform approved by referendum, the Chamber of Deputies had 630 members, and the Senate had 400. The two chambers of eco-powers recognized in the constitution. This is why it is symmetrical. Both have the responsibility to approve the investiture of the executive and members of both chambers have legislative initiative. They hold sessions together, and this is how they elect, for instance, the head of the state. The reason for this powerful role of parliament is to control the executive and avoid the rise of a second Mussolini, so to speak. But as a result, governments very rarely finish the mandates. The electoral system has gone through many different reforms. Let's very briefly look at these changes. Until 1993, deputies were elected by proportional representation in 32 plurinominal districts. In '93, Italy adopted a new electrosystem, and this was followed by a partial renovation of Italian polities. Most of the parties that had marked Italian post-war political life actually disappeared. In the last two decades, several physicians have resulted in a shift in the organization. I won't say that, I won't say that. Also, brand new parties, which were quite successful in the elections, actually. The Matarella Law of 1992 replaced the open-list PR system that had been used in Italy since 1948 by a mixed electoral system, 75% duality, and 25% proportional representation. In 2005, there was another electoral reform that introduced a PR system with closely with a majority bonus. Like in Spain, the new electrosystem led to a radical change in the party system, too, with a bipolar, qualitional configuration, no major center party, and the emergence of new parties to the political scene. The reforms of the early '90s were not just about the electrosystem. There were changes in other aspects, too, that were so profound that some nominated the period that followed the process today. Thank you very much. Even in the absence-- Hopefully, see you next such a stage. What about the government? The process of formation of government is the product of agreements between political parties that need then to be ratified by the president of the Republic. When he or she, again, only he, so far, nominates the Prime Minister. The government needs to have the confidence of parliament and the confidence of both channels. This is obtained by simple majority of one of them, and this allows the formation of government. This is each chamber can put forward a motion of censored to the government with the support of one-tenth of its members. [MUSIC PLAYING] We are looking into the Italian political system this time and to help us understand how the system works. We have prepared a few questions to Professor Mateo Gesula, Professor of Political Science in University of Milan. Hola, Mateo. Hola. Good morning. So good morning. So the first question is, in the four political systems with study, Italy is a bit of a paradigmatic case, since it has had an exceptional number of governments of very short duration. There are historical reasons for this, and there has been several attempts of constitutional reform to reduce this very high political instability. Do you think this is just a question of how political institutions are designed in Italy? So for instance, a very strong role of parliament. Or is there something else? Is there perhaps an issue of political culture too? I would say it's always a matter of interaction between how institutions are designed and these interacts with political culture, especially, I would say, elite political culture. Anyway, actually several factors may lead to government instability. And in any case, I would distinguish between two different periods corresponding to the first and the second Italian republic. So in the so-called first republic that is between 1948 and 1993, cabinet instability was mainly driven by party system fragmentation and the condition of what we call block democracy, which is democracy without alternation in government. In that phase, party system fragmentation was mainly due to multiple cleavages. So in the Italian political system, you have to consider that we are talking about at least three main cleavages that are the pro-anti-system cleavage, the state church, and capital labor. And this was coupled with extremely high ideological polarization. This combined with the proportional electoral system, which did not reduce fragmentation. So these are basically the main drivers of cabinet instability during the first republic. Importantly, however, we have to consider that the meaning of government instability during the first republic should not be over-emphasized. It is sure that cabinet duration was short, but there was no proper alternation in government. So basically, cabinet instability did not have the same meaning of cabinet instability in other political system, like, for example, in the UK, or France, or Germany. Because the Christian Democrats remain in power, and ministries after remain in government position, also after changing government. So there was changing government of short duration, but this cabinet instability did not properly mean, I would say, political change. When the shift to the Second Republic occurred in 1993, the new mostly majoritarian electoral rule came along with promises of both alternation in power, which actually materialized after 1993, and increased cabinet stability, which was only partly achieved anyway. And continued government instability in the Second Republic can be attributed to a combination of different factors if you want to come back to your original questions. I've just mentioned a few which interact between them. First, persistent party system fragmentation, despite ideological depolarization. So the number of political parties in Italy is still very high. Second, I would mention the absence of constitutional rules favoring cabinet stability, such as, for example, the German constructive vote of no confidence. And on the other hand, rather the existence of constitutional rules, which favor the formation of a new government, without recurring to new elections. Here we have to mention a couple of these constitutional rules. The centrality of parliament, which was mentioned in your question, but also the role of the president of the Republic, who must try finding a new parliamentary majority before calling new election. Third, political elite's culture has played systematically against the institutionalization of a majority and democracy since the '90s. So there was a change in electoral rule, but the culture of political elites basically ran against this change. And finally, I would respect to the Maurice in Kierz. I would also mention the return to a predominantly proportional electoral rule in the last decades. So all these factors contributed to the persistence of this Italian peculiarity, which relates to a short duration of government. Thank you very much, Matteo. So it's a complex question, and you've provided a complex answer. It's mixed factors we have to look at the overall picture. Thank you very much. So changing topic onto a more recent event. What is your opinion over the very recent reform to reduce the number of MPs, both in the low chamber and the Senate? So the Tinku Estelle, the proposing party, claim that with this reformed the efficiency of the legislative procedures will be improved. And the functioning of parliament will be better. And they also claim that there were a lot of money that would be saved by reducing the number of members in both chambers. What is your opinion on this? Yeah, this is a much easier question, I would say. First of all, no, I do not believe that the adopted reform will improve parliamentary efficiency. Actually, there is no evidence in political science that smaller chambers are more efficient. So it's numbers matter. But in this case, they do not matter that much. I would say anyway, in order to contextualize the proposal by the movement of Tinku Estelle properly, that efficiency gains were not the main aim of the five-star movements proposal. The this proposal was actually a mere political competition move by the movement. When it aimed to present itself as an anti-establishment, or as we say in Italian anti-Casta, political force, which supported direct democracy against representative democracy and thus parliamentary representation. So that was the main rational of that proposal and much more than achieving efficiency gains. Secondly, I have to also specify an issue related to the savings because basically the net savings entailed by the reforms are negligible. We are talking about net savings of around 57 million per year, corresponding to 0.007% of public expenditure. Or if you want to say in other words, just 57 million size flats in the center of Milan. So it's basically really an negligible for the public budget. On the other hand, anyway, I would say that I do not think that the reduced number of parliament members is detrimental for the functioning of the Italian democracy. So I will say I was relatively agnostic with respect to the effects of these reforms. I do not think that we might expect major gains, but also on the other hand, I would not expect major shortcomings and problems coming from the adoption of the reform. For sure, I mean, it was a typical anti-Casta political priority for the five-star movement and the savings which are entailed by the reform are really very, very low. So if I understood correctly, you're saying that the reform has to be analyzed more from the perspective of, with a populist lens, more than from the motive of actually improving the functioning of the democratic system. Absolutely. It was much more a matter of powering and political competition than puzzling and possibly solving or taking some problems of functioning of the Italian democracy and especially parliamentary work. And that proposal was also, let's say, important in order to create a link. And it worked, in that sense, between the two populist forces in Italy that are five-star movement and the league basically, especially after the change of the link from a territorial party to a nationalist party in 2013. So basically, this was a proposal that held cementing and structuring the governmental alliance. So moving now to a different question. So Italy and Spain have many things in common. The comparison between the two countries are always very interesting. But one thing they have in common is that they do have both countries quite a strong territorial fragmentation. So there is great disparity between the regions in its country. But Italy is much more a unitary state. It has moved towards increasing decentralization, but perhaps not to the same extent as Spain with the communist autonomous. The historic divide between the north and the south in Italy, which goes back to the formation of the Italian Republic, it's still today. It seems that still today is a strong political cleavage, perhaps much stronger than in Spain. Do you think that democratic consolidation and the welfare state have helped to narrow this north-south gap? OK. That's a complex and interesting question, and again, especially if we look at Italy in comparison with Spain. And again, in order to answer this question, I was pleated by looking at two different periods. So in the first phase, which corresponds to the three post-war decades, which was also actually the phase of democratic consolidation and welfare state expansion, I would say that fast industrialization of the country sustained economic growth and the reinforcement of redistributive mechanism through robust welfare state expansion contribute to reducing north-south differences substantially. Already in 1960, for instance, the unemployment rate was just 1.5 points higher in the south, which was around 6.5% than in the north. So a low unemployment rate, for example, and all these slightly higher in the south. Since the mid-70s and even more after the mid-90s, economic growth was extremely uneven across the Italian territory. That's the starting point that we have to keep in mind when we reflected about the north-south cleavage and gaps. With the north, especially Lombardi, Veneto, and Emilia Romagna, presenting relatively good, also in comparative terms, economic growth rates, in contrast with long-lasting stagnation in the south and also part of the center and several internal areas. As consequence, employment and social indicators have dramatically deteriorated in the south and the gap with the north as wide and in the last two decades. Accordingly, whereas the overall employment rate has increased by eight points in the north, from 57% to 65% in roughly three decades after the mid-70s, and the same increase was registered in the center part of the country, the employment rate has diminished in the south, from 49% to 43%. So, summarizing on unemployment issues, the gap in employment rates between some northern and southern regions has reached 30 to 35 points, which are unprecedented levels and also not comparable with the gaps that you can find across Spanish regions. Also, the gap in unemployment rates between the north and the south as a large in the last four decades. It was just above two percentage points in the mid-70s. It has now reached 11 points between the north and the south. And the picture is similar with respect to poverty and social exclusion rates with some south regions, especially Campania and Sicily, presenting the highest figures in the EU, which are above 50% of the population is at risk of poverty and social exclusion, compared to level below around 10%, for example, in Lombardy and in some other north regions. Importantly, however, I have to mention also the fact that after the Great Recession, which was particularly long in Italy, lasting from 2008 to 2014, absolute poverty rates have also started to increase dramatically in some northern regions. To sum up on the issue, I would say that welfare state is a key factor of territorial redistribution, but it cannot fully compensate structural divergencies and inequalities generated by capitalist markets when the latter produce extremely unbalanced economic employment and social outcomes. Certainly, in this respect, the recent introduction for the first time in Italy, of a generous national minimum income schemes in 2019, against poverty, might at least contribute, taking the most acute social challenges, especially in the southern part of the country. Nevertheless, we cannot expect that the welfare state is fully effective in compensating and mitigating massively the imbalances which are produced by very different economic growth rates. Let's move to the last question. You mentioned the Great Recession, so which also in Spain was very long, so 2008 until 2014, especially since the Euro crisis, it's quite clear that the anti-European sentiment is growing in many southern European countries, and we see this in Italy, I don't know if you agree. So to what extent is this anti-European sentiment, a consequence of the austerity politics, as far as we can know, of course, imposed by the European institutions, or are there domestic dynamics that have also triggered the support for anti-European populism? - Okay, let me start with a couple of premises to this. First, it is true that Italy is quite similar to Spain, but there are also some quite important differences. I will argue about this in a minute. Secondly, in order to give a short answer to your question, I will say that there are often, if not always, domestic reasons and dynamics, behind growing anti-EU sentiments. With respect to the differences between Italy and Spain, it's also in this relative to the issue of the anti-EU sentiments and attitudes. We have to consider that in Italy, the anti-EU sentiment started to increase at an earlier stage, because anti-EU sentiment in Italy has actually been on the decline since 1992, and it started to increase more rapidly after 2001. I will also provide some reasons for this increase of EU anti-EU sentiment later on. And in 2009, that is before the adoptions of EU's conditionality imposing austerity policies, the percentage of Italians supporting new membership was already below 50%. So the majority of the population was already, I mean, skeptical about, or again, if not fully against the new membership already before the austerity policies implemented during the Euro crisis especially. So why so? The key point is that since 2002, such decline of pro-EU support was triggered by the politicization of anti-EU stances by the Northern League, which is currently the League, which exploited resentment against right-transgment welfare reform requested by the EU already in the '90s, as well as deteriorating economic and social conditions in contrast with the promised benefit of entering the Euro area. So in this respect, we have to consider that basically, while Spain has showed relatively high growth traits since the '90s until the crisis, actually Italy is experiencing a very long and persisting phase of economic stagnation with repercussion on the social conditions of the people. And basically, the League already in 2002, from before the crisis, started to argue against, let's say, the EU-imposed policies and belonging to the Euro area. Certainly, after the new wave of harsh austerity reforms dictated by the EU against the back row, we have to remember of the speculative attacks on the financial markets. So the reforms which were implemented between 2009 and 2012, anti-EU positions have grown stronger, promoted by both the Northern League and the then rising five-star movement. So after the crisis, these issues were even more politicized by, let's say, populist parties against the more pro-establishment and pro-EU parties, such as, for example, the Democratic parties, but also the more left-wing parties and to some extent, the liberal right. So we have to consider in this respect that anti-European sentiments started at an earlier stage in Italy, they were related to the deteriorating economic social conditions, and in that respect, they could be exploited by anti-U and populist forces in order to, I mean, for political competition purposes. - So again, quite a complex phenomenon that cannot be explained by simply congenital explanations. Thank you, thank you very much Mateo. Thank you for this very comprehensive and detailed explanations of very important political dilemmas and issues in the Italian political system. Thank you very much. - Thank you, Marga. Thanks for inviting me and I'll see you soon. - See you soon. (laughs) (upbeat music) - This is it from us today. Thank you very much for listening and Margarita León and hopefully see you in our next episode of Comparative Politics One. (upbeat music)