Stefano Rombi

Selecting Candidates Online in Europe: A Comparison Among the Cases of M5S, Podemos and European Green Party

The chapter explores a recent trend in primary elections: the use of online platforms by new parties. In particular, it considers three cases in a comparative perspective: the Italian Five Star Movement (M5S), the Spanish Podemos and the European Green Party (EPG). As a way to emphasise its participatory purpose, in December 2012, the M5S organized for the first time an online primary to select parliamentary candidates. Since 2012, the M5S continues to promote the using of web platform among party members with a lot of consequences. In 2014, in the run-up to the European Elections, the EPG organized the first European-wide online primary proposed by a transnational party. More recently, in 2015, the Spanish Podemos employed an online platform called “participa.podemos.info” to select national candidates. So the main aim of this chapter is to analyse procedures and rules employed in online primaries by M5S, EPG and Podemos, in order to underline analogies and differences between these main cases. In general, the three cases underline a low participation level combined with a risk of manipulation by party central office. However, the EGP online primaries are, in all, the most inclusive, followed by those of Podemos and, finally, the case of the M5S.

The Selection of Candidates and Its Impact on Parliamentary Behaviour: Insights from the Italian Case

MPs elected in 2013 Italian general election were selected through three main procedures: open primaries, closed primaries and exclusive methods, meaning that they were appointed directly by the party elites or party leaders. This peculiar feature of the Italian Parliament offers the opportunity to analyse the impact of different selection methods within the same political context. Drawing from a large and original data set including parliamentary behaviour of all the Italian MPs elected in the 2013 general election, this article addresses the impact of candidate selection methods by focusing on the dimension of party unity. Our hypothesis is that inclusive procedures for selecting candidates may entail a low degree of party unity, namely a higher propensity for MPs to rebel against the party line. The analysis shows that the selection methods only marginally affect MPs’ parliamentary behaviour and not always in the expected direction.

The regional primary elections in Italy: a general overview

ABSTRACT Primary elections are frequently used by Italian parties, particularly those of the centre-left. Primaries are used not only at the local and national levels, but also at the regional level. Until 2013, primary elections had been held in a limited number of regions where there were presidential and legislative-assembly elections. The 2014–15 period, however, has seen an explosion in the use of primaries with eight taking place in a few months, almost as many as in the previous 8 years. To these should be added the closed and online primaries of the Five Star Movement. These, given their characteristics, can hardly be compared with the primaries of the centre-left. This article will look at the 17 regional primaries organised by the Italian centre–left parties. We analyse the level of participation of the selectors, the results and the level of competitiveness. Finally, particular attention will be paid to the performances of the primary-election candidates and those of the selected candidates in the subsequent elections. This will help us to understand whether the primaries affected the outcome of the regional elections.

La Repubblica di Sartori, edited by Gianfranco Pasquino, Roma, Paradoxa, 2014, 166 pp., € 14.00 (paperback), ISBN 977-19-716-3100-5

never took the leap to identifying the replacement of party democracy by, for example, plutocratic pseudo-democracy. This was left to more deductively minded, perhaps more radical observers of contemporary politics. In sum, this is an outstanding collection of some of the great writings on political parties, party government, party systems and party democracy written over the past quarter century – all by one outstandingly distinguished scholar. The introduction by van Biezen and the intellectual portrait by Bartolini and Daalder are valuable in their own right, too. This volume should, then, be in all libraries where comparative politics is taught as well as on the bookshelves – or digital devices – of scholars and ambitious students.

Fuorigioco. La sinistra contro i suoi leader, by Mauro Calise

whole, as it appeared from the announcement that the primaries would be held to the general election result of February 2013, covering an analysis of the general political context in which the primaries took place through to the post-primaries debate about the effects of this new candidate selection procedure. The book is based on a large and original dataset, put together by the research team C&LS (Candidate and Leader Selection) from the results of questionnaires used to interview the primaries’ participants by adopting the method of the exit poll. The survey was carried out during the two rounds of the primaries on 25 November 2012 and 1 December 2012. The data collected offer deep insights into the (s)electorate’s opinions and also enable us to come to some conclusions – albeit temporary – about the controversial relationship between parties and voters, and about the contentious consequences of the primary elections – including the internal consequences for the candidates and the parties’ organisational structures, as well as the external consequences for the electors and citizens in general. In the end, this volume is not only a book about the primaries for ‘academic insiders’, but is also a useful instrument for those who wish to try to pick their way through the present complex political situation: a situation that has today become even more contentious. In fact, since the uncertain result of February 2013, Italy has recently faced a controversial governmental change, one that originated not from the results of an election, and one that is being upheld by an uncertain and heterogeneous parliamentary majority. This is a context in which not even the ‘rules of the game’ (for example, the electoral law) remain certain, but it is also one in which, at the same time, parties (the old, the new and the re-organised) are using primaries to select their leaders and their candidates, in order (hopefully) to regain their lost relationship with citizens and, in particular, with their voters.