Class, Religion and Electoral Behaviour in Italy : An Analysis of Trends over Time

In the last decades Italian party system have undergone an important process of transition, that led it into Second Republic. The presence of new parties, together with their different connection with social cleavages have been regarded as main characteristics of this transition. The purpose of this paper is to investigate how religion & class stratification influence voting choices before and during this period. In particular, we deal with the interplay between these two social divisions. Comparing survey data about Italian First & Second Republic, we find meaningful differences. In the last elections, religion based voting seems to be affected by the collapse of Christian Democrats (Dc) as well as by the change between Catholic Church & its believers. On the other hand, the working class show to vote similarly for different parties, while political organisations such as unions lose their relevance in structuring political identities. However, despite these findings, we notice differences also within Second Republic’s elections.