Italian Elections and Politics 2018: Yellow Tide

[Arkansas Yankee]

Um... why would the PD want to go back into government right now? They've just suffered an unimaginably terrible defeat, one that calls into question every single aspect of their strategy since Prodi came up with the Olive Tree idea over twenty years ago. And this from a position of such seemingly impregnable strength a couple of years ago. And every other political force - especially the ones that did well - ran vicious campaigns (often personally abusive) against them. I mean, come on now...

When will the elites and leftists in Europe and North America come to understand that average citizens do not want continuous waves of immigrants sweeping over the borders.  How many whacks across the head do they and you need?

[jaichind]

I should have sticked with my original prediction which had the Lega 4 points ahead of Berlusconi.



It was only when I looked up historical election results on Wikipedia that I decided to put Berlusconi ahead ...

Yes, but your bloc-by-bloc prediction were pretty accurate.  Congrats.  The League surge is very surprising.  What is a shock is that they can get to mid to high single digits of the PR vote in the South.  If they can pull that off they deserve to that 17+ vote share.

Is it not possible that the League surge in the south arose because many rightists did not want the aging, convicted Berlusconi, who faces further investigations, as the face of a puppeter of a center right government?

But if that is a case these voters could have voted for FDI.  But they went out of their way to vote for Lega given their history.  That the Lega could sell their vision to, to be fair, a limited set of Center-Right voters, despite what they historically stood for is impressive.

[Arkansas Yankee]

I should have sticked with my original prediction which had the Lega 4 points ahead of Berlusconi.



It was only when I looked up historical election results on Wikipedia that I decided to put Berlusconi ahead ...

Yes, but your bloc-by-bloc prediction were pretty accurate.  Congrats.  The League surge is very surprising.  What is a shock is that they can get to mid to high single digits of the PR vote in the South.  If they can pull that off they deserve to that 17+ vote share.

Is it not possible that the League surge in the south arose because many rightists did not want the aging, convicted Berlusconi, who faces further investigations, as the face of a puppeter of a center right government?

But if that is a case these voters could have voted for FDI.  But they went out of their way to vote for Lega given their history.  That the Lega could sell their vision to, to be fair, a limited set of Center-Right voters, despite what they historically stood for is impressive.

But how does the face of FDI compare to Salvini? I have little knowledge of the leaders.

[Oryxslayer]

So M5S is the party of the youth.  Center-Right bloc the bloc of the Middle aged, and Center-Left bloc the bloc of the Elderly.  

It looks more like every coalition has a pretty aged base, excepting M5S and the marginal More Europe. But given the reputation of Italian exit polls, are cross-tabulations worth taking seriously at all?

Probably not marginally, but the big picture is correct, M5S is the youth party. They have successfully positioned themselves to sweep up the large numbers of the young 'change' type voters, pertuicularly those who are within that large group of unemployed young people. As it was said earlier M5S support correlates best with economic uncertainty and poverty, while Lega support correlates with those facing migrant arrivals.

[DavidB.]

It looks more like every coalition has a pretty aged base, excepting M5S and the marginal More Europe. But given the reputation of Italian exit polls, are cross-tabulations worth taking seriously at all?

The exact numbers should be taken with some grains of salt, but the pattern is clear and seems to confirm what we thought and knew. I think an explanation could be that voters under 45, who were mostly politically "socialized" in the post-DC era, are simply more likely to be disillusioned with all "establishment" parties instead of still feeling a connection with either the right or the left despite having low expectations. In that case, M5S becomes an even more attractive option. Add to that the fact that M5S can seem like anything you want it to be...

[Leftbehind]

Imagine pushing through your electoral reform only to give clowns, Salvini and Berlusconi what would be dozens of your seats. F**king berk.

[palandio]

Also, I am presently going through all the Lower Chamber FPTP seats, heres a question. Can anyone tell me why Genoa is a M5S stronghold now? Comparatively, other northern cities still have a Left core and Right suburbs, but Genoa is yellow. This also shows up on the senate map for Genoa as well.

That's a good question. For comparisons:
Genoa city: M5S 31.4%, CDX 31.5%, CSX 27.5%, LeU 5.5%;
Milan city: M5S 18.9%, CDX 37.6%, CSX 35.6%, LeU 4.5%;
Turin city: 24.2%, CDX 33.1%, CSX 33.7%; 5.5%

As you can see, the Center-Right actually won Genoa city because the bourgeois Eastern coastline was included in the Rapallo constituency. But your point still stands of course.

The next thing is that the Milan and the Turin agglomeration are much bigger than the cities alone, which does not hold true for Genoa. And when you look at the results in detail, the working-class suburbs (e.g. Collegno for Turin) are more M5S-friendly than the core cities, except that in Genoa they are administratively part of the city. But this still does not explain everything.

Genoa is very post-industrial, Milan is not. Turin is to some degree, but it also has a M5S city government and I don't know how competent it is. Plus Grillo is from Genoa, that might count.

When reading your post I stumbled over the word "still". Traditional sociological and electoral patterns in Northern Italian cities were different from what most Americans would expect. The quarters close to the city center are usually quite bourgeois (with notable exceptions like Genoa's historic center) and right-leaning, while the working-class quarters and suburbs are more peripheral and left-leaning. And this has changed very much within a few years.

For example in Genoa until very recently much of the city delivered Center-Left super-majorities with the Eastern coastline dragging down the overall result. Now the Eastern coastline (i.e. the Genoese quarters in the Rapallo constituency) had a CSX result of 29.6%, above the city average of 27.5%.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

...but it also has a M5S city government and I don't know how competent it is. Plus Grillo is from Genoa, that might count.

These things clearly matter. Genoa was an area of notable MS5 strength in 2013 as well.

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An issue there o/c being how left is the centre 'left' under Renzi anyway?

[Filuwaúrdjan]

But given the reputation of Italian exit polls, are cross-tabulations worth taking seriously at all?

Mostly no, but the general age pattern suggested is consistent with everything else we know. It's pretty clear that the PD is to a great extent a pensioners party, for instance.

[parochial boy]

Thinking about it, i would almost expect Turin rather than Genoa to be the M5S hotspot in the North, considering it's historical association with Southern immigrants (Juventus etc...). Is that sort of thing likely to have played any role at all?

[Oryxslayer]

When reading your post I stumbled over the word "still". Traditional sociological and electoral patterns in Northern Italian cities were different from what most Americans would expect. The quarters close to the city center are usually quite bourgeois (with notable exceptions like Genoa's historic center) and right-leaning, while the working-class quarters and suburbs are more peripheral and left-leaning. And this has changed very much within a few years.

I used still in relation to 2013, not of course to the 2000s when Berlusconi was winning his home turf of Milan easily. I am not ignorant to the fact that the right in Europe still has city strongholds when compared to America, places like Kensington in the UK, and the 16th and 17th arrondissements in Paris for example. However, both of our posts touch on how these places, populated by social liberals/fiscal conservatives are slowly moving towards the left around the globe for a variety of reasons beyond a simple comparison. Its just in the Us, these types of people fled for the suburbs in the 50s, so the trend is witnessed with "hillary flipping the suburbs."

[Oryxslayer]

Thinking about it, i would almost expect Turin rather than Genoa to be the M5S hotspot in the North, considering it's historical association with Southern immigrants (Juventus etc...). Is that sort of thing likely to have played any role at all?

M5S did win one seat West of Turin in the lower chamber, and came reasonably close in the senate. But remember what jaichind and I said earlier - M5S is more correlated with economic hardship and disadvantages, while Lega was more correlated with migrants. Lega did reasonably well in Turin, particularly well in College 2, at least in the areas that were not populated with leftists.

[Diouf]

Politico writes about the possible scenarios. Apparently di Maio already presented his possible ministers before the election.

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https://www.politico.eu/article/italy-government-5-scenarios-after-messy-election/

[palandio]

When reading your post I stumbled over the word "still". Traditional sociological and electoral patterns in Northern Italian cities were different from what most Americans would expect. The quarters close to the city center are usually quite bourgeois (with notable exceptions like Genoa's historic center) and right-leaning, while the working-class quarters and suburbs are more peripheral and left-leaning. And this has changed very much within a few years.

I used still in relation to 2013, not of course to the 2000s when Berlusconi was winning his home turf of Milan easily. I am not ignorant to the fact that the right in Europe still has city strongholds when compared to America, places like Kensington in the UK, and the 16th and 17th arrondissements in Paris for example. However, both of our posts touch on how these places, populated by social liberals/fiscal conservatives are slowly moving towards the left around the globe for a variety of reasons beyond a simple comparison. Its just in the Us, these types of people fled for the suburbs in the 50s, so the trend is witnessed with "hillary flipping the suburbs."

Yes, these developments are definitely comparable. (And sorry if my answer sounded arrogant.)

An issue there o/c being how left is the centre 'left' under Renzi anyway?

And going even further, is it the voters who are moving towards new parties or the parties who are moving towards new voters? Or both?

Thinking about it, i would almost expect Turin rather than Genoa to be the M5S hotspot in the North, considering it's historical association with Southern immigrants (Juventus etc...). Is that sort of thing likely to have played any role at all?

Genoa had a lot of Southern immigrants as well, particularly from Sardinia and Calabria and Sampdoria is also more immigrant/peripheral than Genoa CFC.

[Meeker]

Anyone know why these last few polling stations are still outstanding?

[Filuwaúrdjan]

The Map is done. A few errors and rounding inconsistencies are always possible; a handful of polling districts are also outstanding (though shouldn't alter anything of significance).

[Mazda]

The Map is done. A few errors and rounding inconsistencies are always possible; a handful of polling districts are also outstanding (though shouldn't alter anything of significance).

Shouldn't Sudtirol be in red due to the SVP's membership of the Centrosinistra? Or have I missed something?

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Shouldn't Sudtirol be in red due to the SVP's membership of the Centrosinistra? Or have I missed something?

They're sort of semi-detached at present. They ran a joint candidate with the PD in the Bolzano division (see the amusing screencap above for details) but their own candidates in the two rural seats.

[Andrea]

On the Ministry website, they now list the proportional seats assigned to each list at the Senate. You have to click on the region and then on the sub-areas.

Nevermind, they have disappeared now

[jaichind]

On the Ministry website, they now list the proportional seats assigned to each list at the Senate. You have to click on the region and then on the sub-areas.

Nevermind, they have disappeared now

It is there now.  How are PR seats allocated?  Is there a separate list per region or is it a national list?  It seems it is a national list to determine how many seats each party gets but then the winners are selected from each region to get the right regional balance relative to vote share.

[TheSaint250]

Does anyone have seat numbers?

[FrancoAgo]

Does anyone have seat numbers?

http://elezioni.interno.gov.it/camera/scrutini/20180304/scrutiniCI

for the senate you need look region by region
for that miss if you look in the seats you can see that they can be called also if the count is not completed

[jaichind]

My crude calculation for Senate

           FPTP   PR     Total
MS5      44     68     112

Lega      21    37       58
FI          24    33       57
FDI        10      7      17
UDC        3      0        3

PD          8    43       51
SVP        2      1        3
UV          1      0        1
IEI          2      0        2
CP          1      0         1

LEU        0     4          4

Lega beats out FI as largest Center-Right Party in Senate.  PD in 4th place in terms of seats.

[TheSaint250]

Does anyone have seat numbers?

http://elezioni.interno.gov.it/camera/scrutini/20180304/scrutiniCI

for the senate you need look region by region
for that miss if you look in the seats you can see that they can be called also if the count is not completed

Thank you!

Also, what are the "candidati uninominali"?

[🦀🎂🦀🎂]

Why did PD win seats in Milan?