A new electoral law, but not too quickly

Addressing the international
trade and industrial fair “Fiera del Levante”, on Saturday Prime
Minister Prodi said that changing Italy’s electoral law was fundamental and
would not lead to early elections. The Premier declared he was convinced
“Italians understand that it is indispensable for the government to
continue its work so that the country can resolve its problems and return to
normality”. But to do so, Prodi said, it is a necessity “to overcome
the elements of instability and fragmentation produced by the current electoral
law”.

The current proportional voting
system, introduced by the previous centre-right Berlusconi government just four
months before the April 2006 election, assured Prodi a fair majority in the low
chamber but not the Senate, where the governing coalition holds just two seats
more than the Berlusconi-led opposition. This is a serious source of weakness
for Prodi who, since the beginning of his legislation, has been at the mercy of
the several small parties in his fragile alliance.

The government has repeatedly
held that a new electoral law is a priority and has sought the opposition’s
collaboration on the issue so as to avoid having the matter decided by
referendum, which would happen if a new law is not passed by the spring of
2008.

Earlier this week, Berlusconi
said he and his allies had reached an accord on electoral reform, potentially
opening the way for cooperation with the centre-left government. The opposition
leader defended the electoral law passed by his government but declared his
coalition was willing to consider supporting a new one as long as it respected
three key requirements. First, the new law should preserve Italy’s bipolar
system. Second, alliances and premiership candidates should be specified in
advance. Third, in order to prevent fragmentation, parties with less than a
certain percentage of the votes should be excluded from parliament.

The issue of a reform of
the electoral system has become an oddly bipartisan one. On one hand, Prodi’s
government has made it a cornerstone of its policy to link the new electoral
law to its own survival, by rendering the debate slow and intricate, aware of the fact that,
once an agreement on the reform is reached, new elections toward a more stable
majority will be inevitable. On the other hand, the right seems to be willing
to comply with this bid, until it solves its own internal leadership problems
and becomes ready for new consultations. As it looks, once again a real problem
such as creating an effective electoral law which will guarantee representation
and governability at the same time, has turned into a merely tactical political
one, raising legitimate doubt on how effectively it will be tackled by both
coalitions.