Talk:2001 Italian general election

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Can anyone refer me to an online source of maps showing the electoral circumscription boundaries? Adam 03:43, 23 September 2005 (UTC)

Map of Italian provinces

• Italy provides a division in 27 "circumscriptions" (circoscrizioni); each circumscription is then divided in a number of electoral costituencies (collegi), which are proportional to the population (except the circumscription of Aosta Valley, which is composed by just one costituency too). If you refer to the circumscriptions, you may find them here. On the link I passed you, Aosta Valley is not indicated, but what I told above is explicited on the electoral law. You will discover that each circumscription is made up by a number of provinces; you should so look for a map of the Italian provinces, and you may find some in Wikimedia Commons, such as the one in the right. The provinces have changed after 2001 (some other ones, all in Sardinia, have added in 2005), but they should not have affected the composition of provinces in the country, because the whole Sardinia is one only circumscription. I hope this could be helpful, anyhow feel free to ask me whatever you could find useful about your needings. Ciao. --Angelo 11:59, 23 September 2005 (UTC)

Yes, thanks for that. What I want is maps of the collegi within each circonscizione. Adam

• I made a search on the Internet, but I did not find any map with the boundaries, at least not for the whole Italy, even if there are for some regions of the country (such as this for Basilicata). If you need just to know the composition of all the "collegi elettorali" (electoral districts, P.S.: good sentence for a search by Google ;-), you could instead look at the links described on the article. --Angelo 17:14, 23 September 2005 (UTC)

No I don't think they are online anywhere, which is surprising. If you see them in print anywhere, please scan them for me :) Grazie. Adam 02:20, 24 September 2005 (UTC)

Someone have to put the template of the Olive Tree for Francesco Rutelli. Thanks a lot. Luc19 14:18, 29 august 2009 (UTC)

PRC/third party in infobox

@Wololoo: @Nick.mon: I'm opening a discussion here about the issue of whether to have the Communist Refoundation Party in the infobox or not. I'm pinging both of you because you were both involved in this issue throughout several articles. It'd be also useful if some common paramaters can be obtained to determine when a third party should be in the infobox or not for post-1994 Italian politics, as Italian elections have been primarily dominated by centre-right and centre-left coalitions ever since.
I agree with Nick.mon's rationale, which seems to be that third parties should be included only when they're large enough. This is undoubtely the case for 2013 and 2018 (no discussion, as M5S scored above 25-30% in both elections), and possibly 1994 too (Pact for Italy scoring above 15%). For 1996 it could be also reasonably applied, as LN scores above 10% (while a great distance from the two main coalitions, it dominates a large chunk of the North).
In my view, however, third parties should not be added, under this rationale, for 2001 and 2008, as the third most-voted parties (PRC and UdC, respectively) have weak results in both of these (barely above 5%), whereas in 2006 there is no third party at all. Impru20 (talk) 13:30, 18 March 2018 (UTC)

@Impru20: "Large enough" it is a generic definition, if we exclude the Prc in the infobox of this election, then we also have to exclude the Northern League in the 1996 election and the UDC in the 2008 election, but also the centrist pole in the 1994 election. Indeed in these italian elections the political context was substantially bipolar. If you want to include in the infobox only the political poles that have reached at least the 10% of the votes, instead you must also include Monti in the infobox of the 2013 election. --Wololoo (talk) 14:08, 18 March 2018 (UTC)

@Wololoo: Not at all. For some countries there are WP:LOCALCONSENSUS rulings that, whenever a party scores above a given threshold in specific situations, that party may be present in the infobox. This is done in order to avoid WP:UNDUE situations where very insignificant parties could be forced into the infobox just because they scored third or fourth as a consequence of the vote coalescing into the top voted parties (which would only be an indicator of the top parties strength, not of the third party's particularly good electoral performance).

I'm aware of the shortcomings of the current design, and I agree that "large enough" is too generic, so we should establish what could possibly constitute "large enough" third parties. Looking at elections from 1994 to 2018, it looks like the 10% threshold seems enough for a party or coalition to be considered as "significant" in post-1994 Italian politics, and I'd be fine with that. In that case, I agree with you with the point that Monti should be also present in 2013 (and not only because of his coalition's results, but also the fact that he was the outgoing Prime Minister makes him significant enough to deserve a place in the infobox). Let's see what @Nick.mon: thinks about this. Impru20 (talk) 14:16, 18 March 2018 (UTC)

My position is to include third parties if they have obtained seats in parliament. The LN in 1996, the PRC in 2001, the Udc in 2008, but also Monti in 2013 are considerable as outsiders, regardless of 10%. Furthermore, you must consider that the Civic Choice party in 2013 took only the 8% of the vote (only the coalition barely exceeded the threshold of 10%), this detail must also be considered. Also the PSI in the 70s did not reach 10% of the votes in the election --Wololoo (talk) 14:33, 18 March 2018 (UTC)

Well, given that Italian electoral systems post-1994 rely primarily on coalitions, coalition vote is the one which must be counted. If Civic Choice ran within a coalition which polled above 10%, then it's the coalition vote which should be included; if you see, separate parties are not included (this, obviously, not considering single-party coalitions such as M5S, but With Monti for Italy was a coalition on its own).

Under the current scheme (which means to show whole coalitions in the infobox rather than individual parties) I do not favour having separate, minor parties such as PRC (2001) and UdC (2008) because they may give a false impression, when put together to the centre-right and centre-left, that they were much larger than their actual results suggest, as they were disproportionately smaller than the big coalitions in 2001 and 2008. If you consider seats, as you've mentioned, you'll see that PRC obtained 11/4 seats in 2001 when compared to the 368/176 of Berlusconi and the 250/130 of Rutelli. For UdC in 2008 the distance is somewhat reduced, but still very substantial (36/3 to 344/174 and 247/132). Impru20 (talk) 15:02, 18 March 2018 (UTC)

Well, in my personal view, we should maintain only the two coalitions and a third party that does particularly well (maybe more than 15%), for example the M5S in 2013, and also the Pact for Italy in 1994. So we could remove PRC, UDC and if you want also Lega Nord; but in 1996 Lega won many seats in the north and it appears in the map, so I think we should leave it. -- Nick.mon (talk) 15:10, 18 March 2018 (UTC)

I see no reason as to why Lega could not be there in 1996 (as you say, they did win many seats in the north and won in several provinces). They won about 10% of the vote, which is significant on their own, but they also did so without contesting in the south (so their 10% comes as a result of scoring 0% in the south, but 20-30% in the north). So I also think we should leave it. On PRC and UdC I agree: they're not relevant enough to be in the infobox next to the big coalitions.

As for Monti, I think he should be present in the 2013 infobox because he polled high enough to be considered as somewhat relevant as well as because his status as incumbent Prime Minister makes him relevant on his own, but I'm aware of the issues that could arise as a result of changing from a 3x1 infobox to a 2x2 one, because of the election maps' width. Impru20 (talk) 16:50, 18 March 2018 (UTC)

The status of Monti as Prime Minister isn't relevant, just as the fact that the league took vows only in the north Italy. But if a 10% threshold is established, all parties/coalitions that exceed it must be included in the infobox--Wololoo (talk) 17:01, 18 March 2018 (UTC)

Personally I would “vote” to keep Lega in 1996 and remove Monti in 2013, but I know that maybe it’s isn’t so consistent. So my “threshold” should be a party that gains 10% of votes and wins at least a province/constituency. -- Nick.mon (talk) 21:08, 18 March 2018 (UTC)

It would be a specific rule with the only purpose to maintain the LN in the infobox of the 1996 election, I am strongly opposed to this type of solution. Please avoid rules designed for a specific party--Wololoo (talk) 11:12, 19 March 2018 (UTC)

In my view all coalitions scoring more than 10% should be included in the infobox. Other than the centre-right and the centre-left, that means the PpI in 1994, the LN in 1996, the M5S and CMpI in 2013. However, I would not invent a specific rule, but be flexible. --Checco (talk) 13:40, 19 March 2018 (UTC)

Ps: Being flexible might mean not include no more than three coalitions. --Checco (talk) 13:45, 19 March 2018 (UTC)

In my view the thresholds and a fixed number of parties/coalitions are incompatible with each other: or we apply a fixed threshold or we apply a fixed number of parties/coalitions in the infobox. The application of both criteria would be, at the end, a rule designed to keep a specific party in a specific infobox --Wololoo (talk) 00:13, 20 March 2018 (UTC)

@Checco: @Nick.mon: I'm pinging you both here, as participants of this discussion, to clarify on whether the conclusion reached at the present discussion (i.e. 10% threshold) involved just post-1994 elections (as it was highlighted throughout the talk, due to the issue of multi-party coalitions forming only from 1994 onwards) or it was meant to be appliable to pre-1994 elections as well. This comes in light of a recent clash with Wololoo over this. It may be needed to reach a clear consensus on the issue: 1. on the threshold to be applied; 2. the scope in which this should be applied; i.e. just elections from 1994 onwards, all Italian elections, or whatever. Impru20 (talk) 21:26, 25 March 2018 (UTC)

Indeed, the purpose of this discussion was to not give an undue weight to the smaller parties, and the established threshold was 10%. I was contrary, I wanted to indicate also the third parties under the 10% threshold if they obtained seats, but it is clear that if applied this rule must apply to all elections, for consistency. A 7% party remains a 7% party, both in 1948 and in the 2000s. --Wololoo (talk) 21:40, 25 March 2018 (UTC)

If that's your thought, then you should've came here (or elsewhere) and discussed it, instead of engaging in WP:POINTy behaviour by applying your own interpretation of it. You should NOT disrupt Wikipedia to illustrate a point; applied to this case, you should not apply the 10% threshold beyond the scope initially agreed upon this discussion just to illustrate your disagreement with such a threshold, which is what you're just doing. Discuss and reach consensus first. Impru20 (talk) 21:46, 25 March 2018 (UTC)

I repeat: also if you focused only on the post-1994 elections to give examples, it has not been decided anywhere to apply this threshold only for the elections post-1994. The application of this threshold only for some elections does not make any sense if the purpose is to not give an undue weight to the small parties, please be consistent--Wololoo (talk) 21:54, 25 March 2018 (UTC)

It was clear that the scope of the discussion was limited to post-1994 elections. If you think that The application of this threshold only for some elections does not make any sense if the purpose is to not give an undue weight to the small parties, please be consistent, it's perfectly fine and legitimate, but that's your thought, not anything which has been explictly said here, as you previously claimed. Neither it is necessarily true: post-1994 large multi-party coalitions were formed when they weren't before, so the same criteria may not necessarily apply. If you wish to base your actions on an alleged consensus here, then seek such a consensus and discuss the issue to convince others and obtain it. Impru20 (talk) 22:22, 25 March 2018 (UTC)

As far as I understood, this discussion was on elections from 1994 onwards. I find a 10% threshold rather reasonable. Additionally, I would avoid infoboxes with more than three or four parties/coalitions. We could extend the "rule" also to previous elections, but I agree with User:Impru20 that pre-1994 and post-1994 elections can be treated differently, due to the different electoral and party systems. Side note: we should find a place (Talk:List of political parties in Italy? Talk:Politics of Italy?) where we can discuss similar issues on Italian parties and politics, so that all the users interested in Italian politics can watch the talk through their watchlists and have a say when they want to. Also User:Autospark is a frequent contributor. --Checco (talk) 08:18, 26 March 2018 (UTC)

Yes, I agree, before 1994 the electoral system was radically different, so we could treat them differently. Moreover, as Checco said, I would insert at most three parties in the infobox -- Nick.mon (talk) 09:45, 26 March 2018 (UTC)

Agree with User:Nick.mon without any issues – the pre-1994 system should be treated differently, and three parties/alliances should be enough for the infobox.--Autospark (talk) 14:57, 26 March 2018 (UTC)

@Checco, Nick.mon, Impru20, and Autospark: Please to answer my question: Where is the difference between a small party pre-1994 and a small party post-1994? Why after 1994 there is undue weight and before 1994 not? You say the systems pre-1994 and post-1994 are different: yes, they are different, from 1994 to 2008 the Italian political system was bipolar, Northern League in 1996 (10%), Communist Refoundation in 2001 (5%) and UDC in 2008 (5.6%) were outsiders in the same way. If you consider the type of political system these 3 parties should be all excluded, because considering that system the electoral competition took place between center-right and center-left (the only exception could be the centrist coalition in 1994). So, if the purpose is to not give an undue weight to the smaller parties, the 10% threshold has to been applied to all elections, because the political system in this case it is irrelevant. If instead the purpose is to give evidence only to the actual competitors to electoral victory (post 1994), the 10% threshold is obviously too low (it should be at least 15%). It would be unjustifiably inconsistent to apply the 10% threshold only for the pst-1994 elections, because the principle of undue weight is valid for all elections, regardless of the political and electoral system. So please make a coherent decision, because, as I explained, the application of the 10 % threshold to the only post 1994 elections isn't a consistent solution. The best solution remains, imho, the previous version of these pages: indicating the third party if it took seats in parliament--Wololoo (talk) 20:00, 26 March 2018 (UTC)

@Wololoo: Where is the difference between a small party pre-1994 and a small party post-1994? The difference is that elections post-1994 use a whole different political system favouring coalitions. Specially for most of the post-1994 period, when the winning coalition automatically received a majority of seats (thus greatly decreasing the relevance of third parties when compared to Italian politics before 1994).

It's you who seemingly consider that electoral competition took place between center-right and center-left. It wasn't, obviously, for 2013 or 2018. Doubts could be cast about 1994 in that sense, and such a competition definitely did not exist in 1996 in the northern half of the country. The defining factor of post-1994 Italian politics is that it is not parties which are shown in the infobox, but coalitions (unless, obviously, that they are not integrated within a coalition, such as may be the clear case of the M5S).

Now, you argue that It would be unjustifiably inconsistent to apply the 10% threshold only for the pst-1994 elections, because the principle of undue weight is valid for all elections, regardless of the political and electoral system. So? And you do not see it as "inconsistent" that separate parties are not shown in the infoboxes of elections held from 1994 onwards? Concurrently, you criticize the 10% threshold, but you then suggest a threshold of your own (15%). You say the 10% threshold seeks to give undue weight to some parties, but maybe it's you and your 15% threshold who intend to remove some specific party from an infobox (i.e. LN in 1996). So, what gives? It is inconsistent to apply 10%, but not 15%?

The principle of undue weight would actually allow to apply different criteria to each election on a case-by-case basis if needed, because not all parties have equal relevance for all elections (in fact, the Wikipedia policy on undue weight says each article). Applying a threshold for allowing parties into an infobox is a practice which is applied in some other countries (i.e. the US), and does not mean that due weight is not given; it actually serves to establish a consistent criteria to a given set of articles. Such a set may encompass all elections in a given country, or may separate them according to different political systems. This may happen because not all circumstances around all elections are necessarily similar to force the application of the same criteria to all of them.

In the present case, it's obvious there's a similar set of circumstances for the political system post-1994, and other different circumstances for elections previous to 1994. It's not inconsistent nor contrary to policy to agree on different criteria for each period; in fact, seeing as to how consensus has been now unambiguously reached to apply the 10% threshold only to post-1994 elections, it looks weird that you now try to impose your own, specific thoughts to avoid abiding to such a consensus. This comment from you would be inconsistent with your reverts at Italian general election, 1948, where you enforced the removal of the US party from the infobox arguing it twice that consensus on the 10% threshold was not limited to post-1994 articles (see it here and [1]). You brought the same reasoning to try to deflect my request in your talk to revert such edits in that article. Seeing as to how there can't be any doubt right now that consensus around 10% applies just to post-1994 elections, and that Wikipedia should not be disrupted just to illustrate a particular point of view, I ask you again to revert your edit at Italian general election, 1948 removing US from the infobox there and engage in discussion to reach consensus on the 10% threshold being applied beyond post-1994 elections. Impru20 (talk) 21:35, 26 March 2018 (UTC)

Well, in your view there is an undue weight for a 5% party if the political system favors the coalitions, while there is not if the political system is a Multi-party system: the weight of a 5% party remains the same in both political systems! How can you say that there is consistency?

You say the 10% threshold seeks to give undue weight to some parties, but maybe it's you and your 15% threshold who intend to remove some specific party from an infobox (i.e. LN in 1996): NO, it is the 10% threshold applied only for the post-1994 elections that is designed to exclude two parties from the infoboxes (UDC in 2008 and PRC in 2001) and to include another party (LN in 1996). I am sincerely amazed at how you do not notice this underlying inconsistency. Why do you think there is an undue weight for a 5% party in 2001 and 2008 and not for a 7% party in 1948? Only for the presence of coalitions? Does the presence of coalitions change the weight of a 5/7% party??? No, the weight is the same, so the treatment can not be different

ps. this whole discussion was born because you have wanted to exclude two specific parties from the infoboxex of 2001 and 2008 elections--Wololoo (talk) 22:16, 26 March 2018 (UTC)

You are mistaking undue weighting with false balancing. It is obvious that the weight of a 5/7% party may vary depending on the electoral system; in fact, WP:UNDUE encourages taking a consideration to the specific circumstances in each article in proportion to their prominence. You base your reasoning in the fallacy that parties should be treated equally in all situations, even when situations may not be the same (i.e. WP:FALSEBALANCE).

You may be amazed at whatever you please, but I would think that the presence of an electoral system which gives an automatic 50%+1 of seats to the largest coalition does change the weight of a 5/7% party, and it is not just me: actually, you seem the only one in this discussion who is outrightly opposed to the 10% threshold proposal. All of this said, the thing is to determine an established value for what "smaller party" means and to draw a line for it, which has been formally determined in this discussion.

It is perfectly legitimate for you to have your own view and to not be in agreement with the established consensus, but you must realize that when your opinion does not win through, you must not push it further by pretending to impose it to others. 1) Wikipedia is not a place to Right Great Wrongs. 2) In the case you're not successful in convincing others about your views (i.e. the 10% threshold in this case), you should not try to discredit such a criterion by applying it consistently, as you intended at Italian general election, 1948.

So, everything clarified, all that is left for us is to know is whether you will abide to consensus and revert your edit yourself, seeing how the basis for such an edit was that this discussion never talked about the application to post-1994 elections only (something which has been proven untrue: it has been explictly remarked that the 10% threshold applies just to elections from 1994 onwards and the reasoning for it has been given and is not contrary to UNDUE as you argue). Cheers. Impru20 (talk) 19:54, 27 March 2018 (UTC)

Obviously, regarding the seats, PRC was penalized by the First-past-the-post system in 2001 and UDC was penalized for the Senate by the 8% threshold in 2008, however I don't see huge differences in seats. I'm a little annoyed that the others did not answer my question, vague reasons are never constructive, you were the only one to answer me. I do not agree with the decision to eliminate parties with 2 million votes from the infobox, leaving parties with the same electoral weight in other situations, but honestly I do not want to discuss this topic any more. Revert my edit myself? No, your intent was not explicit and however I do not agree with this infobox setting, I will not do edits that I think are inconsistent--Wololoo (talk) 22:25, 29 March 2018 (UTC)

I understand your opinion, but in this situation a choice had to be made and it was made, and it was chosen to apply this criterion to post-1994 elections only (which were the ones where the larger discrepancies ocurred). While you may not agree, others have voiced their support for such a criterion and a clearly majoritarian consensus has been reached. As such it should be applied. No worry, if you're not willing to do it I can do it myself, though I don't actually see inconsistency between this specific edit and your own opinion. In fact, having the third party in 1948 is reflective of your own view that you do not agree with "eliminating parties with 2 million votes from the infobox". Your opposition focuses in the use of this criterion for post-1994 elections, so the right way to go would be to stay focused on such period and present further arguments against such a decision, or accept consensus and wait until it may evolve in the future towards your own view, which is something you should not discard right away either. It is not appropiate to extend a contentious issue to articles where such an issue is not contentious. Cheers. Impru20 (talk) 18:17, 7 April 2018 (UTC)

@Impru20, @User:Wololoo I am for a 17% limit on regional elections and parliamentary elections because it excludes many relative short-lived alliances (Monti, PRC, Murgia (Sardinia 2014)), but still receives most of the M5S results (like 2013 Friuli-Venezia Giulia, 2015 Apulian, 2015 Campania, 2013 Trentino (PT) and 2018 Molise (CSX)) Braganza (talk) 07:41, 1 June 2019 (UTC)