Italian Elections and Politics 2018: Yellow Tide

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Things seem pretty bad for PD in FPTP seats.  In Tuscany where it is the strongest, out of the 7 Senate seats, it is only ahead in 2 of them.  And one of seats that it is ahead is Renzi's seat.

In Emilia-Romagna where PD is also very strong it seems to be Center-Right 6 PD 2 in terms of Senate FPTP leads.

PD is losing Emilia-Romagna and Umbria against the center-right with Lega at 20%.
That alone summarizes this election.

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Just as a reminder:
LeU ran the most classic left-wing, Corbyn-like campaign (even stealing his motto and proposal on abolishing taxes on university) and got a whopping 3.3%.

So any analysis simply stating that "PD is not left anymore!1!1!!!1" might miss the point on what the Italian society is at the moment.

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Renzi is only staying in charge for the next few weeks in order to avoid a government with M5S.
Some amongst PD leaders would want that, quite foolishly.

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I should apologize to PittsburghSteel since it turns out that M5S-PD is in fact, a conceivable outcome (though it still probably won't happen).

In all likelihood, no one will agree with anyone and they'll go back to elections.

It's not conceivable, even though all of the Italian media and former left-wing intellectuals turned M5S activists are pushing for it (Repubblica and Corriere della Sera amongst newspapers, Zagrebelsky and his group, etc.)

As a local PD party chief (I guess that's the translation for dirigente?) I can assure you that 95% of those who are still in PD would revolt over this, and are already doing so.
There is a personal element of course - M5S and their supporters have insulted us in any possible way over the last 5 years.
But much more importantly, PD now needs to redefine its identity. Renzi has finally resigned, and hopefully now the internal discussion will not be "love him or hate him", but rather over what new course to take.
In the middle of all this, an alliance with a party with which we have no single common ground, as a minority partner, would simply annihilate us, as we would be seen as the "party of power", ready to drop any principle just to be in government.
We've already been responsible in 2011 when joining the Monti technical government and not asking for a snap election.
We've then been responsible from 2013 until today, with a grand coalition under Letta and then governing with Verdini and Alfano since we did not have a majority.
Now, after 7 years in which we could not govern by ourselves, we should AGAIN go in government, and now as a minority partner of a populist party, after voters have clearly told us to  off?
Pure madness.

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Looks like Meloni's personal popularity played a role in Rome.

The far-right has always been very strong in Rome, especially in the Northern part of the city (as confirmed by the map).

For the rest, the strongholds recall those of MSI: a few places in the South and in the North, especially Friuli (Tito's old memories...), but for the rest the bulk of its force is in Lazio.

It must be said that this time Lega also did extremely well amongst the same kind of electorate, even though it clearly fared much better.
For instance, in my municipality (southern part of Rome, which includes the uninominal seat won by PD that is the furthest south...quite sad) Lega and FdI were almost par in the more peripheric and right-wing areas, which FdI (and before then, AN) previously won comfortably in the center-right coalition.

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Also, ayy lmao at the left gaining in Milan.

I don't quite understand. Is this due to Berlusconi's disgrace, or is it sort of like if the Democrats made big gains in well to do suburbs while losing to Trump in a landslide?

PD won in the affluent city centres in all the cities in Center-Northern Italy, while losing, to various degrees, in the more impoverished suburbs.
Also, Milan's the more internationally integrated city in Italy, with the economy going well. PD has elected the last two mayors and even Gori, the losing candidate for Lombardia's governor by 25 points, managed to win in Milan.

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Quick update: media continues to push PD towards an alliance with M5S, while the M5S has started to hold informal talks about who will be Speaker of the House. Apparently they want that seat for themselves, leaving the Senate to Lega or PD (as a way to push them towards an alliance).
Franceschini, former Culture Minister and PD Secretary and amongst the main power holders in the party thanks to its subtle underground game, is apparently the main one in favour of PD joining (any) government, mostly because all of his power relies on him having anything to bargain from within the government.
Oh, there's also Emiliano, governor of Puglia, who goes on television every day saying that PD should ally with M5S. But he's completely nuts.

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Part of the center-right coalition (Lega, FdI, candidate governor Parisi with his minuscule centrist party, and the far-right Amatrice mayor Pirozzi who had run on his own) want their newly-elected Lazio regional councillors to resign, in order for Zingaretti to be forced down.
This is because he is one short of a majority, so that if all of the opposition councillors were to resign, he would automatically forfeit. Pirozzi was supposed to be the one giving Zingaretti a majority in exchange for some assessorate, but he's now back in Salvini's field. After all, he only ran on his own and not with the center-right coalition because Berlusconi didn't want to leave the regional candidate to Salvini et al.
Pretty cheap tactic, but I am not sure that Zingaretti would be against it, given how badly he wants to become PD secretary.

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Lower taxes, more public expenditures, blame Europe when the inevitable crisis comes and then propose an anti-euro referendum.
The path's there to be walked...

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Anyhow I fully agree with Filuwaúrdjan on M5S.
Their program counts for nothing, they are ready to flip-flop from one day to the other on pretty much any issue (again, just think of the whole direct democracy farce. When is the last time a M5S leadership meeting was on online streaming?). So it's just a waste of time to study it in detail, it's a list of empty promises. I mean, a few articles came out showing how it was mostly the result of plagiarizing..it's only something they had to present but it's worthless.

What counts is the general attitude: we are like you, dear angry citizens, and we won't betray you like previous politicians have done. Trust us, and we'll protect you with the universal minimum income (the one M5S policy which sticks at all) and against the corrupted politicians and european technocrats, those scary immigrants, the technological revolution, globalization, eveything.


And since on the 4th of March those who chose Lega and M5S did so not because of this or that policy, but because of feelings (in particular, anger and fear), a M5S-Lega government would be the most natural outcome.

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Speaker of Lower House goes to M5S
Speaker of Upper House goes to Forza Italia

PD voted for its own candidates and refused to join these agreements.
Funny thing is that M5S ended up voting for one of Berlusconi's closest allies at the Senate...

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This is why we need a M5S-Lega government right now. Preventing it means only delaying the inevitable.

That's what I never understood about using a cordon sanitaire. Making one's enemies into junior coalition partners seems far more effective at killing them than keeping them out of power.

I mean, the issue is usually what sorts of policy concessions you have to give them in order for them to join coalitions. Those often tend to be hard to swallow.

Also, you have Denmark as a major counterexample.

Not to be too snarky, but I'd suggest a large part of the centre left's decline was due to finding immigration harder to compromise on than selling out the working class.

That's probably true, but I'd argue that the Third-Wayite left is also pretty happy to sell out immigrants when it has to. Look at Flamby's immigration policies, which were basically a continuation of Sarko's status quo (although still probably better than what Sarko himself had in store had he been reelected, since the French right is suffering a heavy case of cumulative radicalization on this). Or look at how the Gentiloni government has eventually done a 180 on the Letta-Renzi policies and basically criminalized the NGOs that rescued people in the Mediterranean, while breaking their campaign promise to offer a path to citizenship to even long-time legal migrants, as soon as they realized this was a losing issue with the Italian public. Obviously this sort of pusillanimity on the left's side only emboldens the far-right, just as their selling out of the working class has emboldened radical neoliberals.

I guess the American third-wayers are something of an exception in this context, but then again, remember that Obama deported more people than any President before him.

Erm...there wasn't any parliamentary support for it.
PD was the only party in favour. Oh, and the few deputies to its left. But not enough to get a majority at the House or Senate, since M5S was against it and Alfano would not support it.

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Di Maio a few moments ago: "Talks with League are over; still deep differences with Democrats. Any discussion with Lega ends here. Salvini has condemned himself to irrelevance. Government with the CentreRight is no longer viable. I ask the PD to come to the table, not immediately to sign the contract but to check if there are the conditions to put it on its feet. If talks with PD fail, only alternative is a new election.

C'mon PD, take the deal

Agreed, an M5S-PD-(LeU) deal would probably be really good and it wouldn't do much harm to PD. Definitely less than some sort of grand coalition with the right.

If they fear the far left coming for them, try to get LeU to join as well. If they fear that they'll be tied to all the government's mistakes, make it a minority government with support for the budget and stuff.

Why wouldn't PD go for that? What would they have to concede to M5S? Harsher inmigration laws? Good, that's a losing cause for the left. A slightly less pro EU stance? Still a lot better than what Lega would have offered.

At the very least if they don't want to join a government they should at least push for an M5S minority government.

M5S cannot be trusted, that's the simple truth.
They are a movement with no internal rules whatsover, whose program has been changed overnight after being voted by its members, in order to facilitate forming a government.
For years they've built on anti-establishment politics, and now they're trying to form a government with PD (my party) only in order to go to power and have somebody to give to the crowd when things go wrong (and they will go wrong, with M5S in power).

PD has lost the elections and the voters have clearly rejected its message, based mostly on what it has done in government in these last years.
Why should it join a government with M5S? To cancel the laws that PD itself passed recently, such as the Jobs Act or the education reform?
Or based on some contract citing points such as "reducing poverty", "sustainable growth", etc etc, which mean nothing at all.


PD now needs to reconstruct itself and it can only do that by opposing all populist governments. Voters have given M5S and Lega more than 50% of votes and deputies, that's it. It would be foolish to "limit the damage caused by the voters", not allowing for those who won to actually show what they can do once in power.

It's better to get 15% at the next snap elections than be completely annihilated after one year of government with M5S.

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I hope PD voters see sense and jump ship for M5S. Stop Salvini!

They're not that different.
Don't be fooled by labels.

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When PD is going to elect its new leader? Are there any politicians who announced their will to participate in leader elections as a candidate?

Last Saturday's National Assembly was supposed to be the start of the new congress, but Renzi decided to make it a discussion on the current political affairs and the new government, so it will be the next one (in June/July) that will define the dates and all.
I find it hard to believe that the primaries will be before Spring '19. And it would be useless to do so, since there are few strong candidates and none with clear ideas on what to do.

Zingaretti, Lazio's governor, said he wants to run, but he is just using empty words trying to appeal to the leftist wing and to those sympathetic to M5S. His only strong point is that he (barely) won the regional elections in March on the same day that PD lost badly, but it will get weaker over time.
Ad-interim secretary Martina may also run; he is trying to make a name for himself as the candidate of unity between the various groups.
Amongst those closer to Renzi, there are no strong candidates at the moment. Serracchiani, former governor of Friuli Venezia Giulia and once considered to be a wonderkid (around 2008; she then became MEP in 2009), is now very weak and despised. Richetti is kind of a Renzist maverick but with little name recognition.
Delrio, former mayor of Reggio Emilia and Minister of Infrastructure, close to Renzi but very moderate, would be the best pick IMHO, but he keeps on refusing to run.

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Now, it looks as if Conte gives up on forming a government:

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-44275010

I don't know that much about Italian politics, but this reaction to Mattarella's veto seems weird - one must ask oneself what really is the background of this.

Mattarella argues in two ways, basically. One is the financial risks are too big, with the increasing market spread etc. The second is that "being in the Euro is fundamental for the future of our country and our young people. If we want to discuss it, we have to do it openly, as it hasn't been a salient topic of the latest elections". So he sees Savona as a way for M5S and Lega to favour an euro exit without really saying it clearly. Both parties seemed to have reeled back their Euro opposition in the election campaign, and it was not a part of the coalition agreement, but Mattarella probably interpreted Savona as a sign they would leave the euro anyway. So he wants the parties to openly commit to leaving the euro (it that is indeed the plan).

With regards future, he said "No minority government. Preference is a neutral caretaker government with elections in Dec. If parties find another solution, this govt resigns and hands over to the new political govt. If no caretaker, elections in Autumn.

Exactly.
M5S and Lega tried to impose an anti-Euro view which was nowhere in their pre-electoral programme nor in their government agreement.
It's one thing to shout against the EU as an opposition party, something else to not talk about EU during the electoral campaign and then want at all costs a minister which wrote about a "plan B": going out of the Euro all of a sudden, without talking about it, in order to minimize the damage.

Mattarella did his job of protecting the Constitution and the Italians; now it's up to the voters.
Next elections will be a referendum on Italexit. Putin is already licking his lips.

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To be clear: Mattarella said no to Savona but would have accepted one of Lega's main politicians as Finance Minister.
The point is that Lega and M5S wanted to break up from the euro while not having said it publicly one single time.

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To be clear: Mattarella said no to Savona but would have accepted one of Lega's main politicians as Finance Minister.
The point is that Lega and M5S wanted to break up from the euro while not having said it publicly one single time.

If a country aspired to create an export-oriented economy with large trade surpluses it would, in general, face the severe headwind of rising currencies that made its exports more expensive abroad while lowering the costs of imported goods. That assumes currencies float. If they didn't, the headwind would be less severe.

The Euro is a glorified fixed-exchange regime amongst the European states.

In the real world, that aspiring state is Germany,  and that export policy is succeeding spectacularly as the folks in Greece can attest.

Devaluation is the answer, and, leaving the Euro is the only path to devaluation. Otherwise, teaching German, English, and Dutch in primary school is the best hope Italian children have for a better life.

As a PhD in Economics, I am not impressed by words like "devaluation" and "floating currency" flying around for no reason, and I also strongly disagree with your view.
Also, Italy has had a floating currency for decades, and the continuous devaluations only helped the political class to accumulate deficit and deficit, building up the 130% debt/GDP that we currently have.

But that is beside the point, and the topic. Lega and M5S never mentioned the issue during the electoral campaign. And there is no way Italy can be brought outside of the EU after decades through backdoor maneuvering, and without a clear electoral mandate.

Now those clowns are back together and will possibly get to government without the controversial anti-euro minister.

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  One thing about the new government is that most of its top goals are actually pretty achievable, such as lowering the pension age, a crackdown on illegal immigration (outgoing interior minister Minniti has been working on slowing the departure rate from the Libyan route of migrants), the new welfare reform idea etc.  Of course the budget deficit side of things will probably get really ugly, especially if the flatter tax/tax cuts go through.  Also, apparently Savona wasn't acceptable as finance minister due to his anti euro feelings, but is ok as Europe minister?

Now Savona can bash the EU all he wants, but he doesn't have the power to hiddenly manage an Italexit that he would have had as Finance Minister.

Anyway, "lowering the pension age" is far from achievable: the Fornero reform may not be perfect, but given the Italian demographic crisis and its past pension system, there is no way out of it. Going back to the previous system would cost tens of billions, and without solving any of Italy's structural problems.