Christophe Bouillaud, Professor of Political Science at Sciences Po Grenoble and at the Pacte laboratory(@BouillaudC)
In these extraordinary times, the Italian regional elections took place in ordinary fashion, in keeping with the continuity of Italian political life over recent years. Voter turnout did not particularly plummet - it was over 50% in all the regions that voted to appoint their regional executives - and the usual protagonists were back in the limelight. Indeed, no new political players managed to emerge in these regional elections, whereas this has often been the case in the past for regional elections (such as the Northern League in 1990 or the M5S in 2010).
In addition, the referendum to confirm the constitutional reform voted by both houses of parliament in 2019 to reduce the number of deputies and senators by a third had the expected result of a clear "yes" vote (70% against 30% "no"), with an overall turnout of 51%. The reform had been opposed by representatives of the more traditional political forces (notably Forza Italia, Silvio Berlusconi's party) and older politicians (e.g. Romano Prodi) whose careers had begun before 1992 and had marked the period known as the "Second Republic" (1992-2011).
The 30% of voters opposed to this reduction represents a rather satisfying result for the losers, insofar as anti-parliamentarianism, which is at the root of the reform promoted by the 5-Star Movement (M5S), does not finally seem as unanimous as it might have seemed.
A push from the right
In general terms, this election saw a limited surge by the Right, which, of the four regions at stake, won only the Marche region. Overall, the Democratic Party (PD) in power with the M5S is holding up very well, while its M5S partner not only fails to win any regional presidency, but continues to collapse electorally as it has done at every poll since its great victory in 2018 that brought it to the country's affairs. On the right, the momentum of Matteo Salvini's League seems to have been halted, FI's decline is confirmed, and Giorgia Meloni's Frères d'Italie (FdI), a party born of the legalist and electoralist neo-fascist tradition, has established itself as the second largest party on the right.
According to calculations by the Cattaneo Institute, in the regional elections, PD would thus be the leading party with 19.8% of the vote, the League the second with 13.1%, FdI the third with 10.6% and the M5S - the leading party in the 2018 elections - would be only the fourth with 7.6%, and the fifth would be FI with 5.4%. All other political forces would be well below 5% of the vote.
Finally, and perhaps most remarkably, in the three out of four regions that did not change political camp, the outgoing governors seemed to win a plebiscite on their name, reflected in the breakthrough of their civic list. This is particularly true in Veneto: the outgoing governor, Luca Zaia, a member of the League, won with 77% of the vote, and his "Zaia President" list alone took 41.5% of the vote, while the list of his party, the League, was chosen by only 17% of voters.
In Campania, the same configuration, albeit very attenuated, with incumbent Vincenzo De Luca, a member of the PD, winning with 69.5% of the vote, and his "De Luca President" list at 13.3%. In Puglia, incumbent Michele Emiliano, also on the left, won with 46.8%, and two lists supported him, "Avec Emiliano" at 6.6% and "Emiliano Maire des Pouilles" at 2.6%. Finally, in Liguria, right-wing incumbent Giovanni Toti, an ex-FI member, was re-elected with 56% of the vote, also supported by his "Changeons avec Toti Président" list with 22.6% of the vote, while the League took only 17%, FdI 10.8% and his former party FI 5.7%. In the end, it was only in Tuscany, where the left won with 48.6% of the vote, and in Marche, where the left lost with 38% of the vote, that the governor's personal weight seemed negligible (with personal support lists at 2-3%).
In short, the results of these regional elections confirm the growing weight of the image of the outgoing regional governor in the choice of voters. This is not only linked to the day-to-day management of the epidemic since March 2020, but also to a positive image of these governors built up over time with the electorates of their respective regions, as neither Toti in Liguria nor Emiliano in Puglia were particularly brilliant on this point, unlike Zaia in Veneto and De Luca in Campania who were "in the coal".
A bigger vote than in France
In fact, this regional election is far more important than in France, because the Italian regions have far more prerogatives than our own. Italy is a quasi-federal state. The prerogatives and budgets of the Italian regions are therefore far removed from those of France. In particular, the Italian regions largely manage the entire healthcare system.
In Italy, on the other hand, the choice was made not to have all the regions vote in the same year, which means that, as in France, we don't have a picture of the choices made by the whole country. In this case, only five so-called ordinary-status regions (Veneto, Liguria, Tuscany, Marche and Puglia) and one special-status region (Valle d'Aosta) voted. However, their good distribution across the country means that national lessons can be drawn.
In fact, these elections represent a show of support for the main traditional force behind the government, namely the PD. Not only did it avoid losing Puglia and Tuscany, but it remained a major party wherever it was voted. The Italy Vive (IV) split led by its former leader, Matteo Renzi, did not perform well, with, for example, only 4.4% of the vote in Tuscany, where he began his political ascent. In other words, on the left, there's only one party that counts in the field: the PD.
On the other hand, the PD's partner in government, the M5S, is decidedly on the wrong track. Its results are mediocre everywhere, and the only consolation it can have is the overwhelming majority support for its anti-parliamentary reform to reduce the number of members of parliament. In practice, this means that the M5S will continue to oscillate between different lines, but that the current M5S parliamentarians can no longer have any reasonable doubts that in the event of new elections (especially with fewer parliamentarians to elect), they are destined to lose their seats.
In other words, in the event of a government crisis, many of them will be tempted to support any government rather than allow early elections in the spring of 2021. They'll know how to be "responsible", as the Italian political jargon puts it, for deputies and senators who are prepared to do anything for a very comfortable salary as a member of parliament of the Italian Republic.
The League's strategic challenges
In the south (Campania and Puglia), the incumbent left-wing party presented charismatic governors. The right therefore logically lost. In this context, the League didn't do so badly, especially if we remember that the Northern League until 2013 had results close to zero in southern Tuscany.
The League's nationalization strategy, linked to the person of Matteo Salvini, hinges on maintaining a hold of the League in traditional strongholds. It would be wrong to believe that this strategy has been abandoned. In fact, the League's elected representatives have always wanted to make their presence felt at national level, and not to be confined to a small region, hence the League's participation in successive Berlusconi governments. Even if Mr. Salvini were to be replaced at the head of his party, the same desire to make an impact would still be present, and thus to be able to exist throughout the country.
The real difficulty for Salvini's League lies not so much in its nationalization as in the fact that Matteo Salvini himself made too much of this health crisis in words, without being able to act directly. As a result, he came across as a rather muddled agitator, rather than a person responsible for the effects of his words on the behavior of his fellow citizens. We're thinking in particular of his call to be able to celebrate Easter mass in churches once again open to the public, even though the Catholic Church didn't ask for so much, showing itself to be far more sparing of the lives of its faithful than this shoddy zealot.
A vote under the influence of COVID-19
Clearly, the two outgoing governors, Luca Zaia and Vincenzo De Luca, who are reputed to have mastered the health crisis, have been rewarded by the voters in their respective regions. Interestingly, both chose so-called "suppression" strategies, either by testing and isolating as much as possible, as in Veneto, or by preventing people from bringing the virus to Campania - an irony of Italian history, where a southerner prevents northerners from coming to his home. Perhaps this should be a more general lesson: letting the virus circulate is not a good option from a strictly electoral point of view. We'd do well to realize this on this side of the Alps too.
A short version of this analysis was originally published by FigaroVox on September 24, 2020.