Elected representatives influenced by strong party identities.
Rather than being a characteristic specific to Vicenza, the distance maintained by the Berici elected representatives from the practice of political opportunism stems from a sense of ‘accountability’ linked to the nature of the parties to which they belong. This is the view of Daniele Marini, a native of Vicenza and lecturer in sociology at the University of Padua.
The chronic ailment of Italian politics – the switching of allegiances in Parliament – is currently in an acute phase. What is causing this?
There are many reasons for this, but they all boil down to one: we still do not have a stable political system. Since the Tangentopoli scandal, there has been a continuous process of the parties breaking up and reforming. This has been going on since 1992 and is an ongoing process of redefinition.
