From the Demolition to the Re-Composition of Parliamentary Elites: Novelties and New Modes of Political Recruitment in the 2018 Italian Lower House

Abstract

The 2018 Italian general election marked the consolidation of a three-pole party system. However, the contours of parliamentary elites seem to be still in motion. This article aims, at first, to describe the main features of Italian Lower House MPs by recurring to a five-fold classification, where different MPs’ career features are taken into consideration. Then, it puts forward an analysis of the connection between this classification and the tool of multi-candidacies. Subsequently, the article presents the features of parliamentarian and governmental elites, before concluding by underlying the presence of both innovations and traditional patterns of career and pointing towards future avenues of research.