Party conflict over European integration in Italy: a new dimension of party competition?

The problem of party attitudes towards the process of European integration is one of growing interest in the literature on European studies, as well as that on party politics. Until recently, the two literatures developed without intersecting, until a number of contributions started to focus on the relevance of party orientations towards the EU for the development of European integration as well as for developments in party politics. In this context, Italy has long been associated with a tendency of diffuse party-based Europhilia following a process of slow re-alignment on the issue of European integration lasting more than 30 years. If at the beginning of the 1950s, on the question of the integration of West European democracies there was a deep polarisation—one that reflected the broader polarisation of the party system—at the end of the first republic in the early 1990s, the situation was one of convergence. All parties, excluding the extreme ones, shared not only a broad support for the integration process, but also a specific support for its trajectory as represented by the EC/EU. A widespread expectation at that time was that since the Italian party system had been penetrated by Europhilia, this sentiment would persist even after an important systemic change. This enthusiastic party attitude towards European integration developed alongside a traditional loyal attitude of domestic elites towards the EC. Indeed, it has been argued that among the various attitudes Italian negotiators adopted within the European arena, theirs was always one of loyalty. The instability of domestic governments, characterised by frequent change and ministerial turnover, alongside the frequent change in the government representatives acting in the European arena, might explain the flawed and rather submissive presence of Italy in EC/EU negotiations. The principle-based support for the process of European integration of the leading party of every government coalition, the Christian Democrats (Democrazia Cristiana, DC), and its ability to keep government foreign policy as its privileged domain for almost 50 years contributed to this loyalty on the part of Italian governments. Overall, ideological commitment, a lack of sophisticated tools of foreign policy and a deep embedding of the DC in domestic problems, contributed to the rather submissive attitude of the Italian government in the European arena.