Persistent bugs and misrepresentation in Italy’s regional electoral laws

Electoral laws sometimes produce contradictory results. This is the case in many countries and also in procedures adopted for the election of 19 Italian regional councils. The current Italian regional laws use a variety combinations and adjustments to traditional proportional formulae in the effort to find a balance between governability and representation. This survey questions whether such complex and inextricable procedures are really necessary or just the result of compromise and historical stratification, which are making them basically incomprehensible to voters. It also shows how a flaw in achieving double proportionality in the national law has been passed onto the regional laws. Even in those few cases the legislator has acknowledged the bi-proportional nature of the problem, attempts to solve it remain unsatisfactory.