THE POLITICS OF ELECTORAL-REFORM IN ITALY

Italy's 1993 electoral reforms were forced on parliament, and on the d ominant party elites, by elite outsiders using the referendum instrume nt. The resultant parliamentary electoral system was the product neith er of a rational process of institutional engineering nor even of conf licting party strategies. Whilst parliament was forced to legislate, t he established parties were unable to reassert control over the reform process even during its final, legislative phase. The parties' confli cting and uncertain interests, and above all their spectacular loss of legitimacy in the face of massive corruption scandals (Tangentopoli), allowed the reform movement to insist on certain general terms being respected. These terms, however, had themselves been forced on the ref ormers by the exacting constitutional requirements of the referendum p rocess. A democratic political mobilisation had, nevertheless, been ac hieved and further was possible, even likely, as new and old parties c ompeted to consolidate a new party system.