Political Party Funding and Private Donations in Italy

Despite any evidence against it, political parties still represent the most important collective actor in a democratic political system. Their role in representing pluralism and their electoral centrality is not undermined, even when it is strongly questioned. As long as political parties can be understood as representative actors articulating political demands, this book focuses on the capacity of Italian political parties to mobilize resources and financial resources in particular. Through the analysis of private financial donations to political parties, a neglected source of information that will be fundamental in the near future, the author assesses their connective capability with specific interests' representatives in the last decades in order to provide evidence of their changing representational role as collective actors.

Explores the broader regulation of party funding and its evolution over time in the European context Analyzes party funding to understand two broader processes: the cartelization and growing personalization of politics Brings a fresh perspective to the relationship between parties and money, based on new and original data

Auteur

Chiara Fiorelli is a Research Fellow in Political Science and Adjunct Professor for the course Political Parties, Leadership and Democratic Processes at the Department of Political Sciences, Sapienza University of Rome. Her research interests include party politics, political organizations, and the relationship between political actors and interest groups.

Résumé
"It takes a much greater effort to establish some basic numbers than in other areas of political science. Theoretically, political finance has often been isolated from the centre of political science and, indeed, from the centre of any other discipline. Chiara Fiorelli's excellent book overcomes these challenges to provide us with a slew of basic data that contribute to one of the defining debates of European political science. ... This is a vital book for political finance and party organization scholars." (Iain McMenamin, Italian Political Science Review, February 7, 2022)

Contenu
Chapter 1: Introduction: The informative power of private political financing.- Chapter 2: Challenges and Perspectives in the Study of Political Financing.- Chapter 3: Private Political Financing: Between Regulations and In-depth Research.- Chapter 4: The Connective Capability of Italian Political Parties.- Chapter 5: The Donors' Dilemma.- Chapter 6: The Financial Appeal of Political Parties: Looking for the Determinants of Donors' Preferences.- Chapter 7: Conclusion: 'Winter is Coming' and Political Parties will be left out in the cold.