When National or Local? The Dual Climateof Opinion in the Italian Regional Elections

Local elections in Italy have, for some time, been closely analysed because their importance in the electoral cycle has been heightened by voting-system changes that have increased the significance of sub-national levels of government. The regional elections of 2010, here examined in terms of the way they were covered in Italian national daily newspapers were, however, subject to media discussion that was dominated entirely by national issues, which obscured local issues and parties, and relegated to the background what was really at stake in these contests. The aim of this article is to verify empirically the existence in Italy of a state of permanent campaigning supported by news coverage which tends mainly to concern itself with the affairs, public and private, of Silvio Berlusconi and his governing majority. However, local politics have continued, in a less obvious but significant way, to structure the climate of opinion.