Arianna Giovannini’s research while affiliated with University of Urbino and other places

This chapter focuses on the communication dimension that played a key role during the Covid-19 emergency. It shows that regional political leaders and institutions have extensively relied on social media for promoting the policy measures aimed at mitigating the virus spread. Drawing on an original dataset gathering all the Facebook messages published by the official accounts of regional governments and regional presidents, the communication strategies adopted during the Covid-19 emergency are analysed. To identify the diverse patterns of public/political communication, we use a content analysis focusing on (a) volume of published content and (b) the topics addressed within the posts (whether they were Covid-related). The analysis reveals notable regional variations in the levels of social media activism. In regions where elections were taking place there was a marked increase in social media activity. This trend was particularly noticeable among regional presidents, who shared a significant volume of social media content. This suggests that the principles of institutional communication were integrated into a political-electoral strategy. In line with the concept of permanent campaigning, this strategy encouraged incumbents to capitalize on the visibility offered by pandemic-related interventions in the lead-up to electoral competitions. This was achieved by leveraging increased visibility and intensifying communication efforts on social media platforms.

This chapter provides an outline of the book’s analytical framework, with a specific focus on multi-level governance during times of crisis. We delve into the existing literature on this subject and explore the pivotal role played by regional governments in implementing a wide range of national and sub-national policies to address the challenges posed by the pandemic. Moreover, we examine the interplay between these policy responses, the communication strategies employed by regional leaders, and the perceptions of citizens regarding the roles of national and sub-national authorities. In the second part of the chapter, we proceed to contextualize the Italian case and present an overview of the country’s territorial governance. We focus on its distinctive features but also on characteristics, such as the blurring demarcations between federal and unitary state structures, growing political instability, leader-centric party competition and communication, economic uncertainty, and crisis of democratic representation, which make Italy relevant for the study of general trends in Europe and beyond. Additionally, we delve into the evolution of Italy’s regional system leading up to the pandemic. This comprehensive understanding of the Italian context serves as the foundation for the empirical analyses that will be discussed in the subsequent chapters.

This chapter examines the impact of Covid-19 on citizens’ perceptions of their local and regional governments, utilizing original survey data. The quantitative analysis considers various aspects, including trust in regional and national institutions, perceptions of regional inequality, and opinions on governance and the allocation of powers between sub-national and national governments. Our findings reveal that the favourable assessment of both regional and national health systems played a crucial role in enhancing the reputation of regional institutions during the pandemic. Additionally, we emphasize the significance of personal social media communication by regional presidents in bolstering their popular support. In general, while variables related to the regional level significantly influenced trust in regional governments, they appeared to have a lesser impact on shaping citizens’ views of national institutions. We demonstrate that increasing trust in the national government and achieving political congruence between regional and national administrations helped mitigate perceptions of territorial fragmentation and regional differences. Support for decentralization was substantially influenced by trust in regional governments, whereas trust in national institutions, along with political factors such as congruence and voting for national ruling parties, had the opposite effect, favouring centralization.

This chapter first provides an overview of the national context in which the Italian regions were embedded during the first two waves of the pandemic. It starts with an analysis of the immediate actions taken in the dramatic days of late February 2020 and then moves to an account of how the country coped with the full unfolding of the first wave. Next, it explores the period of attempted return to normalcy in the summer, followed by the even more intense second wave. Throughout these developments, the territorial dynamics between the central government and regions shaped the overall national responses to the crisis. The second part of the chapter focuses on specific developments in regional contexts during the same period. The analysis is divided into two sections: (1) a survey of the regions’ ‘policy outputs’, that is, the measures put in place by individual regional governments (in addition to the national ones) to limit the impact of the pandemic, and (2) a map of the ‘outcomes’, that is, an assessment of the wider socio-economic consequences of the pandemic in the various regions. This allows for the evaluation of potential disparities between the actions taken by regional governments and the actual impact of the crisis across the Italian territory.

The concluding chapter provides an overview of the main findings that have emerged from our analysis, returning to and addressing the research questions posed in Chap. 1. We begin by highlighting the tensions that emerged between Italy’s legacies of asymmetrical and competitive decentralization and the need for centralization and coordination in the first phases of the crisis. We then observe that, even at the peak of the first wave, some regional governments adopted notably distinct approaches to crisis management and tried to reassert their role in decision-making processes. Yet neither policy outputs nor actual health and economic outcomes unequivocally point to a single, best regional practice during the years 2020 and early 2021. For this reason, we also examine the way the crisis was communicated by regional governments and leaders, some of whom were able to exploit the visibility offered by pandemic-related interventions to boost their popularity and electoral support. Our analysis of survey data confirms the link between communication and public trust in regional leaders. Furthermore, it underscores that positive perceptions of regional governance significantly influence citizens’ attitudes towards decentralization. In our discussion of the key findings, we also offer reflections on the lessons that can be drawn from the Italian case, which may be applicable to other countries. Additionally, we suggest ideas for a broader, comparative research agenda.

This introduction to the special issue places the 2022 Italian general election within the recent electoral history of Italy and the broader European context. Following the same multidimensional structure adopted for this collection of articles, here we address general questions regarding the significance of the last election, its dynamics, and implications. Firstly, to what extent did it represent a change compared to previous Italian elections? Secondly, can Italy still be regarded as an anomaly in the European context? Have the 2022 results widened or narrowed the political gap between the country and its neighbours? By providing a longitudinal and cross-sectional overview, our aim is to suggest some interpretative keys, which, in conjunction with the rich data presented and discussed by the authors of each article, may enable readers to draw general lessons about recent developments in Italian and European politics. Our overall argument is that, while clearly significant in its political implications – producing the most ideologically right-wing government in republican history led by the first female prime minister –, the 2022 general election did not represent a radical change from previous Italian elections. Instead, it marked a further step in the emergence of a ‘new political normal’ characterised by volatility, fragmentation, mainstreaming of populist ideas and actors, polarisation and the reframing of socio-economic and socio-cultural cleavages. Additionally, while Italy can be regarded as the most advanced manifestation of these transformations, we observe similar shifts in most Western European countries, indicating that their seemingly unshakable stability is now in question.

Referendums on regional autonomy are rare events in European politics, but are likely to produce important political and institutional effects. This paper provides the first systematic account of the autonomy referendums held in October 2017 in Lombardy and Veneto (Italy), and seeks: (1) to explore the origins of autonomy referendums, placing them within a wider comparative framework of similar exercises across Western European countries; (2) to explain their political, economic, social and cultural roots; (3) to analyze the campaigns and the results, assessing variations across and within the two regions; and (4) to reflect on the political and institutional implications of the referendums, and to evaluate the extent to which they could lead to a new era of regionalism in Italy, characterized by further asymmetries and fragmentation at both political and institutional levels. Far from being an isolated case, Italy can provide useful insights into the new politics of regionalism and federalism in Western Europe. It is also suggested that a more nuanced approach to the study of regionalism should not only focus on regional–central relations but also account for tensions existing within regions (e.g., regional versus local levels and cities versus provinces).

Whilst the Lega Nord has traditionally been defined as a regionalist populist party, since Matteo Salvini became its leader in 2013 it has undergone a process of profound ideological transformation. This article assesses this momentous change and the impact it could have on the future of the Lega, drawing on a content analysis of Salvini’s and the party’s Facebook posts, as well as interviews with regional leaders. It argues that, under Salvini’s personal style of leadership: (a) regionalism has been replaced by an empty form of nativist nationalism, which fails to address socio-economic issues related to the North–South divide; (b) populism remains central to the party’s strategic communication, but the EU has taken Rome’s place as the people’s ‘enemy’; (c) this ideological shift has paid-off at the 2018 general election, but is underpinned by latent fractures between the leader and regional representatives which could have profound implications in the future.