Alessandro Chiaramonte

Comparing and Contrasting the Uses of Two Graphical Tools for Displaying Patterns of Multiparty Competition Nagayama Diagrams and Simplex Representations

We compare two tools for displaying, in graphical form, information about vote outcomes in multiparty elections at the constituency level. One was recently proposed by Nagayama and introduced to the English-speaking world by Reed, who applied this method to Japanese and Italian election data. Reed labels the method Nagayama diagrams. Recently, Taagepera has shown how the domain of potential uses of Nagayama diagrams can be expanded significantly. A second graphical device has been used by a number of authors for various types of election analyses, but is not that well known in the comparative parties literature. This method, which uses barycentric coordinates (i.e. triangular) rather than the more familiar rectangular coordinates, has gone under a variety of names (e.g. trilinear plot, toroidal diagram and simplex representation), but we have chosen to use the last of these labels. We make use of both methods to visually present election data (by constituency) for the Italian national elections of 1994, 1996 and 2001. We show how different types of information may be readily gleaned from the two types of graph, and, perhaps most importantly, illustrate how we may improve the ready intuitive interpretability of each type of graph by specifying boundary constraints to define particular regions of the graph – a technique we call ‘segmentation’.

Party system volatility, regeneration and de-institutionalization in Western Europe (1945–2015)

Despite a great flourishing of studies about Latin America and Central and Eastern Europe, the issue of party system institutionalization has been widely neglected in Western Europe, where the presence of stable and predictable patterns of interactions among political actors has been generally taken for granted for a long time. Nevertheless, party system institutionalization is not something that can be gained once and for all. This article proposes a theoretical reconceptualization and a new empirical operationalization of party system (de-)institutionalization. Furthermore, it tests the presence of patterns of de-institutionalization in Western Europe from 1945 to (March) 2015 (336 elections in 19 countries) by using an original database of electoral volatility and of its internal components (regeneration and alteration). Data analysis shows that Western Europe is facing great electoral instability and party system regeneration and that many countries have experienced sequences of party system de-institutionalization, especially in the last two decades.

A growing impact of new parties: myth or reality? Party system innovation in Western Europe after 1945

Despite the large body of literature on the emergence and success of new political parties in Western Europe, few, if any, attention has been paid to investigate new parties from a systemic perspective, therefore exploring their potential effects on party systems. This article focuses on party system innovation (PSInn), defined as the aggregate level of ‘newness’ recorded in a party system at a given election. After having reviewed the extant literature on the topic, the article discusses what a new party is and provides a new index to measure PSInn. The article analyses the evolution of PSInn across 324 elections held in 19 West European countries from 1945 to 2015 and its cumulative effects over time. Although in most countries the party landscape today is still very similar to the one appearing after World War II, data offer clear evidence of a sharp increase of innovation in the last few years.

The Twilight of the Berlusconi Era: Local Elections and National Referendums in Italy, May and June 2011

Following its victory in the spring 2008 general elections, the centre-right coalition led by Silvio Berlusconi formed a government that appeared to be the most cohesive in the history of the Second Republic. Three-and-a-half years later, in November 2011, Berlusconi was forced to resign, ending a long period in which he had dominated Italian politics. By analysing the 2008–11 political–economic cycle, with special attention to the local elections and the referendums of May and June 2011, we argue that the downfall of Berlusconis government can be explained by the interplay of the international economic crisis, the scandals related to the prime ministers private life, the divisions of the parties of the centre-right and the shrinking of its parliamentary base.

Italian Voters: Berlusconi’S Victory and the ‘New’ Italian Party System

The traumatic breakdown of the centre-left coalition supporting the Prodi government, and the consequent early dissolution of Parliament, left no doubts about who would be the winner of the new elections. Silvio Berlusconi, and with him the alliance of the centre right, would present themselves once again as the stable alternative to the hotchpotch of parties of the left and centre left, which had demonstrated, if ever there had been any need, that they were incapable of governing together. The echo of the conflicts between the parties forming the Prodi government was, besides, already highly audible and was reflected in popularity ratings that were at minimum levels both for the coalition as a whole and for its leader and outgoing Prime Minister. In this situation, Berlusconi would have an easy time getting the better of a battered opponent and, therefore, overturning the election result of just two years previously – which had, however, essentially been a tie.

The unfinished story of electoral reforms in Italy

Over the course of past twenty years during Italy’s Second Republic, three electoral reforms have taken place and a fourth one is underway. The first reform occurred in 1993, providing for the abandonment of the First Republic’s long-established proportional representation (PR) system and the introduction of a mixed electoral system. The second reform was approved in 2005, when the previous mixed electoral system was replaced with a new, mixed electoral system. The third electoral reform was introduced at the beginning of 2014, when the Constitutional Court ruled out the constitutionality of a number of provisions of the 2005 electoral system (while leaving others intact) and introduced de facto a PR system. A fourth electoral reform is now making its way through Parliament, and if approved, will reinstate a mixed electoral system similar to the one of 2005, but (hopefully) in a constitutionally compatible form. In this article, I analyse the reasons why, and under what circumstances, these electoral reforms have taken place and account for their relevant features and effects. The main goal is to assess the extent to which each of them has contributed, or has the potential to contribute, to reshaping the party system and the process of government formation into a more majoritarian ‘pattern’ or ‘vision’ of democracy.

Populist Success in a Hung Parliament: The 2018 General Election in Italy

ABSTRACT The 2018 Italian general elections were a crucial test to assess the resilience of mainstream parties vis-à-vis the challenge provided by populist forces and the stabilisation of the tripolar party system emerged in 2013. The article analyses the outcome of the election, whose most remarkable result was the unprecedented success of two populist parties, the M5S and the Lega, by focusing on key aspects such as the new electoral system, the coalition-building process, the electoral campaign, the evolution of the Italian party system, and the analysis of vote shifts between parties.