The 2019 European Elections: a ‘second-order’ vote with ‘first-order’ effects

ABSTRACT

In this article we provide a general interpretation of the results of the 2019 elections of the European Parliament in Italy. The Italian case contains several elements that are, at the same time, ambivalent and interesting, especially if observed in a larger, European-wide comparative perspective. Besides a general interpretation of the vote for the European Parliament, the article discuss also the consequences of the elections results for the transformations of the Italian party system and the patterns of government formation in a context characterized by an increasing process of political integration in a multilevel political system. Finally, we discuss the trend of Euroscepticism in the Italian public opinion and the role played by radical or ‘sovranist’ parties in promoting a feeling of distrust or detachment towards the European Union.     

The Catholic and the Communist Women's Press in Post-War Italy—An Analysis of Cronache and Noi Donne

This article aims to provide a systematic, comparative analysis of two of the main women's mass publications in order to trace continuities and changes in the development of women's role in the public sphere in Italy. The analysis begins with an elaboration of the social and political context, which is crucial for the understanding of media texts in general. It shows how the existence of only limited political spaces in post-war Italian society due to the polarisation of Catholicism and communism delayed both an open political discourse on women's conditions and the gradual development of an autonomous and lay feminist movement. Noi Donne of Union Donne Italiene (UDI) was closely aligned with and financed by the Italian Communist Party (PCI) and lacked any substantial autonomy until the early 1970s, while Cronache of the Catholic women's organisation Centro Italiano Femminile (CIF) was a faithful instrument for the propagation of those Catholic concepts of femininity that were redefined and reinforced by the Vatican in the Catholic publication Civiltà Cattolica.     

Ballots and barricades enhanced: far‐right ‘movement parties’ and movement‐electoral interactions

Far‐right organisations offer an ideal common ground to bridge the scholarships on social movements and party politics. Indeed, they can be often interpreted as ‘movement parties’, i.e. hybrid collective actors spurring from the protest arena and translating social movement practices in the arena of party competition. This contribution enhances our understanding of the contemporary far right by focusing on the neglected links between movements and elections within the broader context of contention. The article assesses and refines propositions about such interactions through the adoption of a specific framework, ultimately showing that the Hungarian Jobbik consistently subscribed to the linkage mechanisms discussed.     

The European Union in the media coverage of the 2019 European election campaign in Italy: towards the Europeanization of the Italian public sphere

ABSTRACT

This article investigates the patterns of Europeanization of the Italian public sphere during the 2019 European Elections campaign. Europeanization is meant as a multifaceted process. The visibility and salience of the European Union (E.U.) within the public debate is realized by dynamics involving different actors, in terms of interactions, connections and contaminations between different public spheres. The aim of the article is to clarify whether and to what extent the Italian media covered the E.U. during the European Parliament (E.P.) elections campaign and more precisely to assess through which dynamics of Europeanization the E.U. entered the domestic public debate. We relied on data from a human content analysis carried out on 10 Italian media outlets during the seven weeks before election day. Our findings suggest that, compared to 2014, the visibility of E.U. and E.U. related issues is increasing within Italian media coverage. Italian media still maintain a neutral approach to the issue, resisting to Eurosceptic claims from political parties and public opinion. With regard to the Europeanization, we found that media tend to focus on the vertical dimension especially, providing visibility to domestic actors addressing the E.U. and its political actors. Elements of horizontal Europeanization, instead, are mainly referred to events from other E.U. member states, with few connections among political actors. All in all, our results confirm the idea of a growing centrality of the E.U. within national public debate combined with signals of more structured and substantial Europeanization.     

Identity of non‐self‐evident nation: Czech national identity after the break‐up of Czechoslovakia and before accession to the European Union*

ABSTRACT. In this study the authors analyse Czech national identity after the break‐up of Czechoslovakia and before accession to the European Union. National identity is understood here as a construct consisting of several elements, four of which the authors analyse: territorial identity (localism, regionalism, patriotism, and Europeanism), the image of the nation – the cultural nation (ethno‐nation) and the political nation (state‐nation), national pride (in general, and in cultural performance and in the performance of the state), and love for the nation – nationalism (or more precisely, chauvinism) and patriotism. To create a more complex picture of Czech national identity the authors compare it with national identities in eleven other European countries. To conclude, the authors analyse the attitudes of Czechs toward the European Union, and national identity is used as an important explanatory element of the support for EU governance.     

权力的让渡和主权的坚持:略析欧洲一体化中的“主权让渡”

欧洲一体化实行了一定程度的权力让渡和共享,但成员国仍然保持着主权,并主导着一体化。证诸欧洲一体化进程可以看到:一、所有的权力让渡都需要成员国全体一致同意,体现了成员国主权的行使;二、辅助性原则限制着权力让渡;三、偏向于政府间主义的机构间平衡,共同体/欧盟的决策/立法权始终掌握在由成员国代表组成的理事会手中;四、种种灵活性和例外,使成员国在权力让渡的问题上保持最大限度的自主性。     

Home-rule versus non-territorial autonomy? Western European national movements and their views on the minority question, 1919–1939

The leading elites of the ethnonationalist movements that developed in the aftermath of World War I in Western Europe usually refused to see their nations and territories as ‘national minorities’. In their view, they were stateless nations or nationalities. However, in the aftermath of World War I, the prior international discussion on the nationality principle was increasingly replaced with the notion of ‘minority rights’, enhanced by the implementation of the Minorities Treaties by the League of Nations. Thus, the term ‘national minority’ emerged as a label that permitted ethnonationalist activist to present their claims on the international stage. This became evident in the participation of some Western European national movements in the activities of some transnational non-governmental organisations, such as the Congress of European Nationalities (1925–1939). However, the general programme advocated by the most influential leaders of East-Central ethnic minorities, based on the extension of the personal principle and the implementation of non-territorial autonomy all over Europe, was hard to accept for ethnonationalist elites from Western Europe, which were interested in territorial home-rule and believed that their homelands did not fit in the category of ‘minority’. This article explores the modalities and limits of that cultural and political dialogue.     

Resisting Bodies: Narratives of Italian Partisan Women

The second part of 2015 Pulitzer Prize winning author David I. Kertzer's interview with the Italian political leader Romano Prodi covers the period from the fall of Prodi's first government in 1998. Starting with the causes of the 1998 crisis, the discussion follows Prodi's subsequent career as President of the European Commission (1999–2004), the introduction of the Euro, the expansion of the EU, and the attempts to introduce a new European constitution, before moving to the second Prodi government (2006–08). Describing his subsequent role as UN Special Envoy for the Sahel and his candidacy in the 2013 Italian presidential elections, Italy's former Prime Minister reflects more widely on the current state of European and Italian politics.     

Europe's odyssey?: political myth and the European Union

The article argues that the European Union, despite being a different kind of polity, has political myths that are similar to those that have characterised nation‐states. It examines two types of political myth – foundation and exceptionalism – and demonstrates that they have been used in an attempt to make the European Union understandable and acceptable as a form of governing. The article also argues that political myths about the EU have had limited success not only because they are based on the same content as national myths but also because they do not always conform to recognisable narrative forms. The EU, with its ambiguous aim of creating ‘an ever closer union’, does not provide the basis for sacred narratives that become normative and cognitive maps that make the new polity ‘normal’ and provide the EU with ontological security.     

Two bullocks,a ladder and a lamp: electoral symbols in Nehruvian India

There is a substantial body of literature on nation‐building that, from a variety of theoretical approaches, examines the role of symbolic constructs in the process of construction and consolidation of new nation‐states. Among these works, the dramatic and symbolic aspects of election and their function in the nation‐building project have been investigated by political scientists and anthropologists alike. However, analysis of electoral emblems as constitutive elements in the nation‐building process has been largely missing from most studies of nation‐building and official nationalism. A case study of postindependence India suggests how national belonging was also made to hinge upon on competent democratic participation of the masses in the political life of the country. Central to this process of identity work was the establishment of an independent Election Commission and of strict rules for the design, selection and allotment of election emblems. Conventional accounts have argued that these procedures were introduced primarily for the benefit of the uneducated masses who were suddenly invited to participate in India's democratic process. I argue against this simplistic interpretation. Far from being only tools for the simplification of electoral processes, India's election symbols were one of India's institutional mechanisms designed to nurture the development of a correct democratic conduct and therefore ultimately contributing to the Nehruvian national project.     

Turkey's Bid for European Union Membership: Between "Thick" and "Thin" Conceptions of Europe

A team of Central Europe-based political geographers examines Turkey's bid for European Union (EU) membership, one of the most controversial issues confronting that country's and EU politics. The authors analyze Eurobarometer public opinion survey data on EU enlargement (and particularly Turkey's EU membership) across the 27 polities of the enlarged EU as well as in Turkey itself. The analysis of the data points to clear regional differences in support for Turkey's EU membership. Moreover, the authors' statistical analysis indicates two major components around which public perceptions of Turkey's EU membership coalesce. The first, identified as a "thick" component, based on the idea that EUrope embodies a specific cultural identity, opposes Turkish membership, whereas a second "thin" component, comprised of institutional-procedural norms, leaves the door open to Turkey. They argue that it is at the complex intersection of these two opposing views that Turkey's bid for EU membership should be located and eventually decided.     

The Dynamics of the Electoral Geography of the Five Star Movement: The Role of Territorial Area and Municipality Size

ABSTRACT

The aim of the article is to trace the evolution of the Movimento 5 Stelle (Five Star Movement [M.5.S.]) over the last four national elections (the 2013 and 2018 general elections and the 2014 and 2019 European elections). In particular, our goal is to understand how the electoral support for the party changed, in the context of the broad transformations of the Italian electoral geography. In order to accomplish this goal, we investigate the explanatory role of the spatial dimension on electoral support, specifically in terms of geographical zone and municipality size. The M.5.S. is also compared with the two parties that reported the best results in the last European elections: the Lega (League) and the Partito Democratico (Democratic Party [P.D.]). Our results show that the recent European elections do not represent a turning point in the (electoral and geographical) history of the M.5.S.: its territorial rooting in the south of the country and in medium-sized municipalities are present from the 2014 European elections onwards. Interpretations and implications of these findings are discussed in the conclusions.