Italy’s new electoral law rests on a reasonable ambition. Voters should know which coalition intends to govern, who would lead it and whether it has a realistic prospect of securing a parliamentary majority. The difficulty lies in the distance between producing that majority and keeping it together.
The reform received final parliamentary approval in the Camera on 8 October, with 227 votes in favour and 164 against. The opposition voted against it. Its abstention the previous day concerned only the separate provision for voting away from home, which it considered insufficient.
The new system called Stabilicum replaces most single-member constituencies with proportional representation and a conditional majority bonus. The leading coalition reaching at least 42 per cent in both chambers qualifies for 70 bonus seats in the Camera and 35 in the Senate, subject to allocation limits. If those conditions are not met, the bonus does not apply.
There is a defensible argument for this arrangement. Proportional representation reflects the distribution of support among parties, while the bonus can give an electoral alliance sufficient parliamentary strength to govern. The trade-off is explicit. Some proportionality is surrendered in exchange for a clearer outcome.
The threshold nevertheless creates a sharp difference between electoral results that may be very close. A small movement in votes can determine whether an alliance receives a substantial parliamentary advantage. The requirement to qualify in both chambers adds another condition. Where it fails, government formation remains dependent on parliamentary negotiations. Stability is therefore one possible outcome of the system, rather than its assured result.
The reform’s strongest feature is the requirement to identify a proposed prime minister before the election. Parties seeking to govern together must give voters an answer on leadership. That is useful information, particularly where an alliance contains several competing centres of authority. The designation remains a proposal to the president of the Republic, preserving the constitutional distinction between campaigning for office and being appointed to it.
Agreeing on a name, however, is only the beginning of agreeing on a government. The majority bonus encourages parties to combine their support before polling day. It cannot ensure that they share a position on taxation, spending, foreign policy or the distribution of ministerial responsibilities. An alliance can be electorally efficient and politically fragile.
This is the principal limitation of the reform’s promise. Additional seats can protect a government against individual defections or narrow parliamentary margins. They offer less protection against a dispute between coalition partners. If a constituent party withdraws its support, the political problem survives whatever formula originally produced the majority.
The threshold may also strengthen smaller allies during negotiations. A party whose votes are needed to secure the bonus can demand influence beyond what its individual share of support might suggest. That bargaining is a normal feature of coalition politics. The reform moves more of it before the election without necessarily reducing what takes place afterwards.
Less persuasive are the provisions protecting list leaders and increasing signature requirements for new political formations. Preferences restore a measure of voter choice, but protected positions preserve party leaderships’ influence over parliamentary selection. Higher entry requirements favour organisations already established in the system. Neither feature follows necessarily from the objective of making governments more durable.
The opposition has challenged both the substance of the reform and its passage through confidence votes. Its accusation that the rules were designed to benefit the government is a political claim, rather than proof of how the next election will unfold. The more enduring test is whether the system offers an acceptable balance between representation, competition and the ability to govern, regardless of who wins.
The reform has a coherent electoral logic but asks too much of electoral engineering. Greater clarity over leadership is valuable. A conditional majority bonus is defensible. The case would be stronger if these were accompanied by more open access to competition and greater voter influence over candidates. A workable parliamentary majority matters, but so does how it is chosen.
For Meloni, an established coalition and recognised leadership provide a useful starting point, while fragmentation on the right could jeopardise the bonus. For Schlein, the same mechanism offers a route to government if she can assemble a sufficiently broad and credible alliance. Both would benefit from rules that make victory governable. Neither can rely on those rules to supply the political agreement needed to govern.
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