Not a normal country: Italy and its party systems

Abstract

This article is devoted to the analysis of the unusual trajectory of Italian parties and party systems from the end of World War II to the 2013 general election, when an oversized coalition of three parties, with the crucial support of the President of the Republic, formed a so-called "broad agreements" government. This article will not retell the story of the passage from the First to an alleged Second Republic, for the simple fact that this transition never actually took place. Italy changed the format and, above all, the mechanics of its party system in the mid-1990s, but it has never significantly changed the Constitution and the functioning of its main political institutions. If the label "Second Republic" is designed to describe the transition from a constitutional structure to something else, that "Second" republic never existed. This article will describe the history of this "phantom" republic, and it will also analyse the evolution (or devolution) of the Italian party systems.