A referendum on citizenship for foreigners is an important issue, as it concerns whether or not they belong to the political community
On 8 and 9 June, among the abrogative referendums for which Italian voters are called to the polls, is the one on citizenship for foreigners, and what is most surprising is that the majority of Italian citizens do not even know what it is. There are many who are unaware that the vote is taking place, and just as many who do not know what they are voting on. This is confirmed by various polls conducted in recent weeks on the subject, for example those carried out for television programmes and national newspapers, the results of which were reported in a recent article by Marta Regalia.
As we saw in that article, turnout is estimated to range from a minimum of 31% to a maximum of 39%, remaining below the 50% plus one vote threshold required for the referendum to be valid. This could mean the end of referendums, even more so than for the specific issue being voted on.. It is, in fact, the growing tendency of citizens to desert the polls, in local and political elections as well as in referendums, that makes promoting a repeal referendum tantamount to suicide. This is why many political parties prefer to resort strategically to calling for a no vote rather than engaging in a debate on the merits of the referendum questions. Even in a general political climate in which electoral demobilisation increasingly affects the middle classes of Italian society (professionally qualified voters with medium-high incomes), combined with a strong perception of the ineffectiveness of politics, the strategic choice not to vote risks further weakening the already growing delegitimisation of democratic politics.
By providing for a quorum for the approval of the referendum proposal, the Republican Constitution implicitly assumes that citizens can legitimately abstain from voting. Furthermore, the often overly technical nature of referendum questions (is, for instance, the case of referendums on labour) is such as to induce voters to abstain because they lack informed and motivated opinions on the issue under discussion. But since the time when repeal referendums were able to bring about fundamental changes in the customs and lifestyles of our community (think of the referendum on divorce in 1974 or the referendum on voluntary termination of pregnancy in 1980), things have changed radically. The horizon that would now face a hypothetical constitutional legislator would be very different from that of the Fathers of our Republic. Turnout, both in the first democratic elections by universal suffrage for the election of the Constituent Assembly and in the first political elections, was very high: 89.1% in 1946 and 92.2% in 1948. This is why the Constituent Assembly decided to set such a low threshold for the number of signatures required to call a repeal referendum, linking the validity of the vote to 50% plus one of those eligible to vote. Today, with turnout ranging from 63.9% in the last General election to 49.7% in the recent European elections, those conditions no longer make sense. It would therefore be necessary to increase the threshold of signatures required to call a referendum and, at the same time, eliminate the requirement of an absolute majority of eligible voters.
Another aspect of great concern is the low level of information available to voters on referendum questions. The alarm is really very high if even the Communications Regulatory Authority (Agcom) has called on television and radio broadcasters, including RAI, to increase their coverage of the referendums, stressing the importance of ensuring that voters are adequately informed so that they can exercise their right to vote in an informed manner. According to the IPSOS and Demopolis polls cited in the article by Marta Regalia, only 38% and 35% of interviewed on the so-called citizenship referendum were able to correctly identify the criteria that currently allow a foreigner to obtain Italian citizenship (in summary: 10 years of residence, no criminal record, sufficient and stable income, and a good knowledge of the Italian language). These percentages rise to almost 60% among those who said they intended to vote, demonstrating that the level of information available to voters has a significant impact on their voting (or non-voting) choices.
Yet a referendum on citizenship for foreigners is an important issue, as it concerns whether or not they belong to the political community. It is at least questionable that on an issue as sensitive to Italian public opinion as the rights granted to foreigners legally residing in our country, a downward spiral is being pursued, exploiting the long wave of abstentionism, only to then cry out about the risks to democracy when that abstensionism affects political parties, now chronically suffering from a serious crisis of legitimacy.
The vote on 8 and 9 June in the referendum on the conditions of citizenship for foreigners could represent an important step for the democratic life of our country. The “Yes” vote could be a majority or a minority, but if the vote is validated by a large turnout (sufficient to make the result of the consultation effective), the signal sent by the expression of people’s will would be clear. However, since it is highly likely, if not certain, that this will not happen, the final result will have no effect other than to perpetuate the ambiguities, contradictions and exploitation that still characterise public debate on the legal status of foreigners in one of the European most important and advanced democracies.
Luciano Fasano, Europe and Third Countries Department