Politics of Italy
Politics of Italy Sistema politico italiano | |
---|---|
Palazzo Chigi | |
Ministries | 21 |
Judicial branch | |
Name | Judiciary |
Supreme Court of Cassation | |
Chief judge | Giovanni Mammone |
Constitutional Court | |
Chief judge | Silvana Sciarra |
Part of the Politics series |
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The politics of Italy are conducted through a parliamentary republic with a multi-party system. Italy has been a democratic republic since 2 June 1946, when the monarchy was abolished by popular referendum and a constituent assembly was elected to draft a constitution, which was promulgated on 1 January 1948.
The
Government
The
Italy is a democratic Republic, founded on labour. Sovereignty belongs to the people and is exercised by the people in the forms and within the limits of the Constitution
— Article 1 of the Constitution of Italy
By stating that Italy is a
The people who are called to temporarily administer the republic are not owners, but servants; and the governed are not
Head of state
As the head of state, the President of Italy, officially denoted as President of the Italian Republic, represents national unity, and guarantees that Italian politics comply with the Constitution. These duties previously were given to the King of Italy. The President of Italy is the commander-in-chief of the Italian Armed Forces and chairs the High Council of the Judiciary. A president's term of office lasts for seven years.[7]
The President of Italy is elected by an electoral college of about 1,000 members (1,009 in the 2022 election). It comprises both chambers of the Italian Parliament—the Chamber of Deputies and the Senate of the Republic—meeting in joint session, combined with 58 special electors appointed by the regional councils of the 20 regions of Italy. Three representatives come from each region (save for the Aosta Valley, which due to its small size only appoints one), so as to guarantee representation for localities and minorities.
Legislative branch
With article 48 of the
The Chamber of Deputies, the lower house of the bicameral Italian Parliament, has 400 members, of which 392 are elected from Italian constituencies and 8 from Italian citizens living abroad. Members of the Chamber of Deputies are styled The Honourable (Italian: Onorevole)[9] and meet at Palazzo Montecitorio in Rome.
The
Executive branch
The
The
The Council of Ministers is the principal executive organ of the Government of Italy. It comprises the President of the council (the Prime Minister of Italy), all the ministers, and the undersecretary to the President of the council. Deputy ministers (Italian: viceministri) and junior ministers (Italian: sottosegretari) are part of the government, but are not members of the Council of Ministers.
Judicial branch
The law of Italy has a plurality of sources of production. These are arranged in a hierarchical scale, under which the rule of a lower source cannot conflict with the rule of an upper source (hierarchy of sources).[12] The Constitution of 1948 is the main source.[13]
The Constitution states that justice is administered in the name of the people and that judges are subject only to the law.[7] So the judiciary is a branch that is completely autonomous and independent of all other branches of power, even though the Minister of Justice is responsible for the organization and functioning of those services involved with justice and has the power to originate disciplinary actions against judges, which are then administered by the High Council of the Judiciary, presided over by the President.[7]
The
In November 2014, Italy accepted the compulsory jurisdiction of the International Court of Justice.[15]
Political parties and elections
Before 2021, the minimum voting age for all elections was 18 years old, aside for Senate elections, where the minimum voting age was 25 years old. Following the approval of Constitutional Law No. 1/2021, the minimum voting age for the Senate of the Republic became the same as for the Chamber of Deputies (18 years old and no longer 25). The 2022 Italian general election was the first one in which both chambers had identical electoral bodies.[16]
Chamber of Deputies
Coalition | Party | Seats | % | ||
---|---|---|---|---|---|
Centre-right coalition | Brothers of Italy | 119 | 29.7 | ||
League
|
66 | 16.5 | |||
Forza Italia | 45 | 11.2 | |||
Us Moderates | 7 | 1.7 | |||
Total seats | 237 | 59.2 | |||
Centre-left coalition | Democratic Party-IDP
|
57 | 14.4 | ||
Greens and Left Alliance | 12 | 3.0 | |||
More Europe | 2 | 0.5 | |||
Civic Commitment | 1 | 0.5 | |||
Aosta Valley | 1 | 0.5 | |||
Total seats | 68 | 17.0 | |||
Five Star Movement | 52 | 13.0 | |||
Action - Italia Viva
|
21 | 5.2 | |||
South Tyrolean People's Party | 3 | 0.7 | |||
South Calls North
|
1 | 0.25 | |||
Associative Movement of Italians Abroad | 1 | 0.25 | |||
Total | 400 | 100 |
Senate of the Republic
Coalition | Party | Seats | % | ||
---|---|---|---|---|---|
Centre-right coalition | Brothers of Italy | 65 | 32.5 | ||
League
|
30 | 15.0 | |||
Forza Italia | 18 | 9.0 | |||
Us Moderates | 2 | 1.0 | |||
Total seats | 115 | 57.5 | |||
Centre-left coalition | Democratic Party-IDP
|
40 | 20.0 | ||
Greens and Left Alliance | 4 | 2.0 | |||
Total seats | 44 | 22.0 | |||
Five Star Movement | 28 | 14.0 | |||
Action - Italia Viva
|
9 | 4.5 | |||
South Tyrolean People's Party | 2 | 1.0 | |||
South Calls North
|
1 | 0.5 | |||
Associative Movement of Italians Abroad | 1 | 0.5 | |||
Total | 200 | 100 |
Political parties
Italy's dramatic self-renewal transformed the political landscape between 1992 and 1997. Scandal investigations touched thousands of politicians, administrators and businessmen; the shift from a proportional to an
This emerging bipolarity represents a major break from the fragmented, multi-party political landscape of the postwar era, although it appears to have reached a plateau since efforts via referendums to further curtail the influence of small parties were defeated in 1999, 2000 and 2009.[18]
Regional governments
Five regions (Aosta Valley, Friuli-Venezia Giulia, Sardinia, Sicily and Trentino-Alto Adige/Südtirol) have special charters granting them varying degrees of autonomy. The raisons d'être of these charters is in most cases the presence of significant linguistic and cultural minorities,[19] but in the case of Sicily it was to calm down separatist movements.[20] The other 15 regions were in practice established in 1970, even if their ideation had been a much earlier idea.
Regions | |||||||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Region | Name | Portrait | Since | Term | Party | Coalition | Last election | ||
Renzo Testolin (1968–) |
2 March 2023 | 2020–2025 | UV | Centre-left | 2020 | ||||
Alberto Cirio (1972–) |
6 June 2019 | 2019–2024 | FI | Centre-right | 2019 | ||||
Attilio Fontana (1962–) |
26 March 2018 | 2023–2028 | Lega–LL | Centre-right | 2023 | ||||
Arno Kompatscher (1972–) |
13 March 2024 | 2024–2026 (rotational presidency) |
SVP | Centre-right | 2023 | ||||
Luca Zaia (1968–) |
30 March 2010 | 2020–2025 | Lega–LV | Centre-right | 2020 | ||||
Massimiliano Fedriga (1980–) |
30 April 2018 | 2023–2028 | Lega–LFVG | Centre-right | 2023 | ||||
Stefano Bonaccini (1967–) |
24 November 2014 | 2020–2025 | PD | Centre-left | 2020 | ||||
Giovanni Toti (1968–) |
1 June 2015 | 2020–2025 | C!–IaC–NM | Centre-right | 2020 | ||||
Eugenio Giani (1959–) |
8 October 2020 | 2020–2025 | PD | Centre-left | 2020 | ||||
Francesco Acquaroli (1974–) |
30 September 2020 | 2020–2025 | FdI | Centre-right | 2020 | ||||
Donatella Tesei (1958–) |
28 October 2019 | 2019–2024 | Lega–LU | Centre-right | 2019 | ||||
Francesco Rocca (1965–) |
2 March 2023 | 2023–2028 | Indep–FdI | Centre-right | 2023 | ||||
Marco Marsilio (1968–) |
11 February 2019 | 2024–2029 | FdI | Centre-right | 2024 | ||||
Francesco Roberti (1967–) |
6 July 2023 | 2023–2028 | FI | Centre-right | 2023 | ||||
Vincenzo De Luca (1949–) |
1 June 2015 | 2020–2025 | PD | Centre-left | 2020 | ||||
Michele Emiliano (1959–) |
1 June 2015 | 2020–2025 | Indep–PD | Centre-left | 2020 | ||||
Vito Bardi (1951–) |
25 March 2019 | 2024–2029 | FI | Centre-right | 2024 | ||||
Roberto Occhiuto (1969–) |
29 October 2021 | 2021–2026 | FI | Centre-right | 2021 | ||||
Renato Schifani (1950–) |
13 October 2022 | 2022–2027 | FI | Centre-right | 2022 | ||||
Alessandra Todde (1969–) |
20 March 2024 | 2024–2029 | M5S | Centre-left | 2024 |
History of the post-war political landscape
First Republic: 1946–1994
There have been frequent government turnovers since 1945, indeed there have been 66 governments in this time.
The Italian Communists were in the government only in the national unity governments before 1948, in which their party's secretary Palmiro Togliatti was minister of Justice. After the first democratic elections with universal suffrage in 1948 in which the Christian Democracy and their allies won against the popular front of the Italian Communist and Socialist (PSI) parties, the Italian Communist Party never returned in the government.
The system had been nicknamed the "imperfect bipolarism", referring to more proper bipolarism in other
Entrance of the Socialists to the government
The main event in the First Republic in the 1960s was the inclusion of the Italian Socialist Party in the government after the reducing edge of the
Aldo Moro, a relatively left-leaning Christian Democrat, inspired the alliance between the Christian Democracy and the Italian Socialist Party. He would later try to include the Italian Communist Party as well with a deal called the "historic compromise". However, this attempt at compromise was stopped by the kidnapping and murder of Aldo Moro in 1978 by the Red Brigades (BR), an extremist left-wing terrorist organization.[30]
The Italian Communist Party was at this point the largest communist party in Western Europe, and remained such for the rest of its existence. Their ability to attract members was largely due to their pragmatic stance, especially their rejection of political extremism and to their growing independence from the Soviet Union (see Eurocommunism). The Italian Communist Party was especially strong in regions like Emilia-Romagna and Tuscany, where communists had been elected to stable government positions.[22] This practical political experience may have contributed to their taking a more pragmatic approach to politics.[31]
Years of Lead
On 12 December 1969, a roughly decade-long period of extremist left- and right-wing political terrorism, known as The Years of Lead (as in the metal of bullets,
The strategy of tension attempted to blame the left for bombings carried out by right-wing terrorists. Fascist "black terrorists", such as
The last and largest of the bombings, known as the
1980s
With the end of the lead years, the Communist Party gradually increased their votes under the leadership of Enrico Berlinguer. The Italian Socialist Party, led by Bettino Craxi, became more and more critical of the communists and of the Soviet Union; Craxi himself pushed in favor of Ronald Reagan's positioning of Pershing II missiles in Italy, a move many communists strongly disapproved of.
As the Socialist Party moved to more moderate positions, it attracted many reformists, some of whom were irritated by the failure of the communists to modernize. Increasingly, many on the left began to see the communists as old and out of fashion while Craxi and the socialists seemed to represent a new liberal socialism. The Communist Party surpassed the Christian Democrats only in the European elections of 1984, held barely two days after Berlinguer's death, a passing that likely drew sympathy from many voters. The election of 1984 was to be the only time the Christian Democrats did not emerge as the largest party in a nationwide election in which they participated.
In 1987, one year after the
In these years,
Second Republic: 1994–present
From 1992 to 1997, Italy faced significant challenges as voters, disenchanted with past political paralysis, massive government debt, extensive corruption and organized crime's considerable influence, collectively called Tangentopoli after being uncovered by mani pulite, demanded political, economic and ethical reforms.
In the
Major political parties, beset by scandal and loss of voter confidence, underwent far-reaching changes. New political forces and new alignments of power emerged in the March 1994 national elections. This election saw a major turnover in the new parliament, with 452 out of 630 deputies and 213 out of 315 senators elected for the first time.
The 1994 elections also swept media magnate
A series of center-left coalitions dominated Italy's political landscape between 1996 and 2001. In April 1996, national elections led to the victory of a center-left coalition, The Olive Tree, under the leadership of Romano Prodi. Prodi's government became the third-longest to stay in power before he narrowly lost a vote of confidence, by three votes, in October 1998.
In May 1999, the Parliament selected
A new government was formed by the Democrats of the Left leader and former communist Massimo D'Alema, but in April 2000 he resigned following poor performance by his coalition in regional elections.
The succeeding center-left government, including most of the same parties, was headed by Giuliano Amato, a social democrat, who had previously served as prime minister in 1992–1993 and had at the time sworn never to return to active politics.
National elections held on 13 May 2001 returned Berlusconi to power at the head of the five-party center-right House of Freedoms coalition, comprising the Prime Minister's own party, Forza Italia, the National Alliance, the Northern League, the Christian Democratic Centre and the United Christian Democrats.
Between 17 May 2006 and 21 February 2007, Romano Prodi served as prime minister of Italy following the narrow victory of his The Union coalition over the House of Freedoms led by Silvio Berlusconi in the April 2006 Italian elections. Following a government crisis, Prodi submitted his resignation on 21 February 2007. Three days later, he was asked by President
On 24 January 2008, the
The election set against two new parties, the
The Monti government had the highest average age in the western world (64 years), with its youngest members being 57. The previous Italian Prime Minister Mario Monti is 70, his predecessor Silvio Berlusconi was 75 at the time of resignation (2011), the previous head of the government Romano Prodi was 70 when he stepped down (2008), the Italian President Giorgio Napolitano is 88 and his predecessor Carlo Azeglio Ciampi was 86. In 2013, the youngest among the candidates for prime minister (Pier Luigi Bersani) is 62, the others being 70 and 78. The current average age of Italian university professors is 63, of bank directors and CEOs 67, of members of parliament 56 and of labor union representatives 59.[37][38][39][40]
The new Italian government headed by Enrico Letta took two months to form and made international news when Luigi Preiti shot at policemen near the building where they were swearing in the new government on Sunday 28 April 2013.
Former Prime Minister Matteo Renzi became the youngest prime minister at 39 years and his government had the youngest average age in Europe.
Grand coalition governments
At different times since his entering the Italian Parliament, Silvio Berlusconi, leader of the centre-right, had repeatedly vowed to stop the "communists", while leftist parties had insisted that they would oust Berlusconi. Thus, despite the fact that the executive branch bears responsibility toward the Parliament, the governments led by Mario Monti (since 2011) and by Enrico Letta (since 2013) were called "unelected governments"[41][42][43] because they won a vote of confidence by a Parliament coalition formed by centre-right and left-right parties that had in turn obtained parliamentary seats by taking part in the elections as competitors, rather than allies. While formally complying with law and procedures, the creation of these governments did not comply with the decision made by people through the election.
Meanwhile, in 2013, a ruling by the Constitutional Court of Italy established that the Italian electoral system employed to elect the Parliament breached a number of Constitutional requirements.[44] Notably, the Court observed the following four facts:[45] 1) "such a legislation deprives the elector of any margin of choice of its representatives"; 2) "all of the elected parliamentarians, with no exception, lack the support of a personal designation by the citizens"; 3) the electoral law has regulations which "exclude any ability on the part of the elector to have an influence on the election of his/her representatives"; 4) and contains conditions such that "they alter the representative relationship between electors and elected people...they coerce the electors' freedom of choice in the election of their representatives to the Parliament...and consequently they are at odds with the democratic principle, by affecting the very freedom of vote provided for by art. 48 of the Constitution". This implies that, despite being called – and acting as – a legitimate "parliament",[46] the legislative assembly of Italy was chosen with a vote system by which the right to vote was not exercised according to the Italian fundamental chart of citizen's rights and duties. The issue was a major one, to the extent that the Constitutional Court itself ruled that the Italian Parliament should remain in charge only to reform the electoral system and then should be dissolved.[45]
The new government led by
Since 2016
Renzi resigned after losing a
The
In 2020, Italy was severely hit by the
On 21 July 2022, following a government crisis which ended with FI, League and the M5S deciding to withdraw their support to the government, Prime Minister Draghi resigned. President Sergio Mattarella consequently dissolved the Parliament[63] and called a snap election, which resulted in the centre-right coalition, led by Giorgia Meloni, gaining an absolute majority of seats.[64] Meloni was formally sworn in as Italy's first female prime minister on 22 October 2022.[65]
See also
- Elections in Italy
- History of Italy
- List of political parties in Italy
- List of presidents of Italy
- List of prime ministers of Italy
- Political history
References
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- far right movement, and an upsurge in the use of politically motivated violence and state repressive measures. The increasing militarization and the use of political violence, from sabotage and damage to property, to kidnappings and targeted assassinations, were justified by left-wing groups both as necessary means to achieve a revolutionary project and as defences against the threat of a neo-fascist coup.
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- ^ David Moss, The Politics of Left-Wing Violence in Italy, 1969-85 (1989)
- ^ Robert C. Meade Jr.. Red Brigades: The Story of Italian Terrorism (1989)
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Further reading
- Diermeier, Daniel; Eraslan, Hülya; Merlo, Antonio (August 2007). "Bicameralism and government formation". hdl:10419/117965.
- Pasquino, Gianfranco (July 2009). "Political history in Italy". S2CID 154060795.
- Discusses political historians such as Silvio Lanaro, Aurelio Lepre, and Nicola Tranfaglia, and studies of Fascism, the Italian Communist party, the role of the Christian Democrats in Italian society, and the development of the Italian parliamentary Republic. excerpt