Italian Elections and Politics 2018: Yellow Tide

[Andrea]

It does seem that the center-left did pick up Verona from the center-right

centre-left didn't reach second round in Verona.

FI-Lega-FdI candidate wins over Tosi's wife/girlfriend (Tosi is the former Verona Lega Nord mayor)

Oh.  I misread the results.  My fault. BTW, it seems that M5S did not do that well in the first round.  Is M5S weaker in these cities or are M5S just weaker in these local races and stronger in national races.

No problem.

I would say M5S is generally weaker in local elections because they have few credible local candidates with a strong base on the territory

[jaichind]

Does not these results show that M5S will tactically vote for Berlusconi bloc if confronted with Berlusconi bloc vs the Center-Left ?

[Antonio the Sixth]

Well this is bad.

[jaichind]

Result of Abruzzo is very impressive.  The Center-Right bloc overcame a 47.1 to 35.8 first round lead to win in the second round. 

[Antonio the Sixth]

Result of Abruzzo is very impressive.  The Center-Right bloc overcame a 47.1 to 35.8 first round lead to win in the second round. 

Votes for the center-left candidate decreased between the two rounds. This is an obvious case of massive abstention screwing up the results.

[SPQR]

Big win for the center-right, bad defeat for PD.
What's especially worrying is the number of defeats in Lombardia (which was one of the places where Renzi had improved PD's results the most), Liguria, Toscana, Emilia Romagna, Lazio, Marche. Areas which all lean center-left.
At the same time, PD gained in many places near Naples and in Puglia (such as Lecce). Surprising.

In the few second rounds which it had reached, M5S gained most of the times. Still, these local elections are far from a victory for them.

[palandio]

It seems to me that in Genoa there has been huge discontent with the local administration for some time. From 2007 to 2012 the mayor was Marta Vincenzi, a professor from the PD left. She became unpopular due to her crisis management during a disastrous flood and due to a general feeling of stagnancy. The 2012 center-left primary was between Vincenzi, centrist Pinotti and non-PD left-wing Marco Doria. Doria won the primary and also the general election (first round 48.3%, second round 59.7%), but he turned out to be a weak mayor inable to overcome the administration's gridlock and didn't even seek reelection in 2017. The 2015 Ligurian regional elections became a debacle for the divided center-left, with the Five Stars Movement getting the most votes in the city and the center-right winning the position of governor. The constitutional referendum also foreshadowed bad things to come with traditionally left-wing Genoa voting like the national average.

In some sense this didn't come completely unexpected. Discontent with the center-left administration, Genoa turned to a left-wing outsider in 2012. After the next disappointment, Genoa threw the center-left out in 2017. The more fitting choice for Genoa giving its inclinations would have been a Five Stars Politician, but the disastrous Five Stars administration of Rome and Grillo behaving like a dictator and throwing out the primary winner among other things prevented this.

Having said all this it is not necessarily the same people who voted Doria in 2012, Five Stars in 2015, no at the referendum and center-right in 2017. In fact the center-left candidate (Crivello) won (not by much, though) in the city's working-class West, an area with a high 2015 Five Stars vote and a high no vote. On the other hand the center-right candidate (Bucci) won by the highest margins in the city's bourgeois quarters, the same areas that were the only ones to support Renzi's referendum and where Five Stars support has always been low.

[jaichind]

Does this election success mean that Berlusconi might pull together a center-right alliance that can rival M5S and the Renzi bloc ?  It seems FI-LN is not a problem, it seem harder to rope in Fdl and AP.  Did either FdL or AP join up with Berlusconi in this past local election ?

And what about MDP? Did they go along with PD in this election ?

[Antonio the Sixth]

The right will patch up ties and run together. They always do.

The left will splinter in a thousand pieces. They always do.

[jaichind]

The right will patch up ties and run together. They always do.

The left will splinter in a thousand pieces. They always do.

What about 1996?  If FI-AN continued their alliance with LN they would have won just like in 1994 but they did not and lost.

[Zuza]

And what about MDP? Did they go along with PD in this election ?

In Wikipedia they are listed as a part of the centre-left coalition.

I don't know about Campo Progressista, did they run in this elections at all?

[SPQR]

And what about MDP? Did they go along with PD in this election ?

In Wikipedia they are listed as a part of the centre-left coalition.

I don't know about Campo Progressista, did they run in this elections at all?

Nope, Campo Progressista at the moment is still non-existant.
As for MDP, in some places it ran in coalition with PD, in others it ran alone. In many others it didn't run at all.

[rob in cal]

  I've been reading about the big drop-off in African migration from Libya to Italy in the last two months, with Italy interior minister Marco Minniti getting involved in organizing Libyan groups to discourage this migration.  If this proves effective and long-lasting could this bolster the Italian Left in the upcoming elections?

[Dr. MB]

I'm hoping M5S can pull it off.

[TheSaint250]

I'm hoping M5S can pull it off.

[Polkergeist]

So what is this Rosatellum system?

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-italy-politics-election/italy-calls-confidence-votes-in-senate-on-new-electoral-law-idUSKBN1CT289

Is it just as the article says;

The proposed election law would distribute almost two-thirds of the seats in parliament on a proportional basis, while a third would be decided in a first-past-the-post vote on specific candidates.

Sounds like a version of the Japanese system except with less FPTP MPs?

[palandio]

So what is this Rosatellum system?

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-italy-politics-election/italy-calls-confidence-votes-in-senate-on-new-electoral-law-idUSKBN1CT289

Is it just as the article says;

The proposed election law would distribute almost two-thirds of the seats in parliament on a proportional basis, while a third would be decided in a first-past-the-post vote on specific candidates.

Sounds like a version of the Japanese system except with less FPTP MPs?

Parties/lists can join national alliances. Alliances can run at most one candidate in each FPTP seat, but can run more than one PR list. The law explicitly forbids the so-called disjoint vote. That means that your FPTP vote and your PR vote must always go to the same alliance.

[mileslunn]

So what is this Rosatellum system?

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-italy-politics-election/italy-calls-confidence-votes-in-senate-on-new-electoral-law-idUSKBN1CT289

Is it just as the article says;

The proposed election law would distribute almost two-thirds of the seats in parliament on a proportional basis, while a third would be decided in a first-past-the-post vote on specific candidates.

Sounds like a version of the Japanese system except with less FPTP MPs?

Parties/lists can join national alliances. Alliances can run at most one candidate in each FPTP seat, but can run more than one PR list. The law explicitly forbids the so-called disjoint vote. That means that your FPTP vote and your PR vote must always go to the same alliance.

Interesting, one of the arguments we've been hearing from PR supporters here in Canada is no country that has ever adopted PR has ditched it but it seems Italy is heading that way although not to a complete FTFP system although I think AV is the best system followed by FTFP, but doubt you will see any European country that uses PR going to either despite the advantages.

[🦀🎂🦀🎂]

? Italy has tinkered with its electoral system since the beginning of the Second Republic.

[rob in cal]

  France has had PR for National Assembly elections off and on (last time in the 1986 elections), going back to runoff by districts as it is now, but the fabulous beautiful Macron supports bringing PR back.  Not holding my breath on that one though.

[parochial boy]

  France has had PR for National Assembly elections off and on (last time in the 1986 elections), going back to runoff by districts as it is now, but the fabulous beautiful Macron supports bringing PR back.  Not holding my breath on that one though.

Funny how people always support electoral reform, right up until they win a stonking majority under FPTP.

Arguably though, France doesn't have pure FPTP due to the two round nature of the vote.

Italy, of course though, has always been held up by supporters of FPTP as "proof" that PR will just lead to unstable coalitions - which conveniently ignores all the countries where coalition governments work just fine.

[🦀🎂🦀🎂]

I'm a hundred percent sure Italy would be just as shaky with a FPTP system. I think people overstate the importance of electoral systems tbh compared to the ingrained culture.

[Sestak]

So what is this Rosatellum system?

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-italy-politics-election/italy-calls-confidence-votes-in-senate-on-new-electoral-law-idUSKBN1CT289

Is it just as the article says;

The proposed election law would distribute almost two-thirds of the seats in parliament on a proportional basis, while a third would be decided in a first-past-the-post vote on specific candidates.

Sounds like a version of the Japanese system except with less FPTP MPs?

Wait, is that just MMP? Or are the proportional represenation alloted independently of the FPTP seats?

[Soonerdem]

I'm a hundred percent sure Italy would be just as shaky with a FPTP system. I think people overstate the importance of electoral systems tbh compared to the ingrained culture.

THIS! A nations history and culture matters 10x as much as the system. That’s why even in PR systems you have massive differences in the amount of parties. Even if the US had PR the two parties would still be dominant and the creation of a multi party system would be slow. Italy would also change slowly with a new system

[palandio]

So what is this Rosatellum system?

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-italy-politics-election/italy-calls-confidence-votes-in-senate-on-new-electoral-law-idUSKBN1CT289

Is it just as the article says;

The proposed election law would distribute almost two-thirds of the seats in parliament on a proportional basis, while a third would be decided in a first-past-the-post vote on specific candidates.

Sounds like a version of the Japanese system except with less FPTP MPs?

Wait, is that just MMP? Or are the proportional represenation alloted independently of the FPTP seats?

No, it's not MMP but some kind of MMM where your PR vote already determines your FPTP vote (or the other way round: Your FPTP vote forces you to give your PR vote to one of the supporting lists).