The never-ending transformation of the Italian party system

The 2013 general election saw the fall of both the mainstream parties which had alternated in government until then – the Democratic Party (PD – Partito Democratico) and Berlusconi’s People of Freedom (PDL – Popolo delle Libertà) – and the emergence of a new strong third political force, namely the Five Star Movement (M5S). This result challenged the new bipolar structure that Italy had acquired and, because of the absence of a majority in the Senate, generated a major political crisis which eventually led to the creation of a grand coalition composed of two former political competitors from the centre left and the centre right. The tripolar structure of party competition that came unexpectedly1 out from the 2013 election was confi rmed by the 2018 election together with an even stronger success of the Five Star Movement, which obtained alone more than 32 percent of votes in both chambers. These political events are not dissimilar from what happened in many other European democracies in recent times – crisis of the governing parties, success of new political actors, restructuring of the party system – and brought about a crucial question that we intend to address in the present chapter: can we speak of the launch of a third new phase in the Italian party system following the 2013 and, more recently, the 2018 elections? And what are the main causes of such changes?