Emanuele, V. (2015). Vote (de-) nationalisation and party system change in Italy (1948–2013). Contemporary Italian Politics, (ahead-of-print), 1-22. http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/23248823.2015.1076617#.VeYOsfbtmko Abstract The nationalisation of politics is a major political phenomenon deriving from the historical trend towards the formation of national electorates and party systems brought about by the progressive reduction in the significance of territorial cleavages. During the last 50 years, though the issue of vote nationalisation has been addressed by a large volume of literature, serious analysis of the Italian case has never made much progress, having been limited to the reflections of a few isolated authors. Over the past 20 years, a period...

Despite primary elections in Italy continue to be asymmetric – i.e. carried out only by the center-left coalition – their ability to involve the electorate and their growing media impact make it a powerful democratic tool. In this article we study the 2012 Italian primary elections, held by the center-left coalition in order to select the prime ministerial candidate for the 2013 general elections. In particular, we will shed light on three dimensions: turnout, electoral results and competitiveness. We will also take into account the role played by the new candidate selection rule – the two-round system – which will allow us to collect a lot of information about the voting behavior of the selectorate. What has been the turnout level in the 2012 Italian primary elections? Which similarities and differences can be found in the patterns of participation between the first and the second round? Which factors may explain the territorial differences in turnout levels? What have been the territorial patterns of voting behavior for the main candidates? The 2012 primary elections have been more or less competitive with respect to the previous Italian national primaries? We will try to address these questions through the use of a mainly quantitative methodology with aggregate data.

Segnalazione bibliografica. Autore: Timothy Hellwig Comparative Political Studies January 2012 vol. 45 no. 1 91-118 Abstract A positive relationship between economic performance and support for incumbents is routinely taken as evidence that elections work for accountability. Recent investigations into this relationship have examined just how signals from the economy translate into popular support. However, neither selection models nor sanctioning models explicitly incorporate the actions of political elites. This article advances a strategic parties model of economic voting. Political incumbents have incentives to adjust their policy positions in response to economic conditions. When parties advocate distinct positions on economic issues, elections can be understood in...