The actorness of the President of the Republic in Italian foreign policy: a quantitative narrative analysis of two case studies (1999–2013)

Abstract

In this paper, we address the topic of policy actorness in Italian foreign policy to characterize the understudied role of the President of the Italian Republic (PoR). We apply quantitative narrative analysis (QNA) as the methodological tool of our study, answering two research questions to which the academic literature has so far produced limited responses: (a) whether the PoR can be considered a relevant actor in Italian foreign policy and (b) which factors can affect the Italian PoR’s relevance in foreign policy. Considering the Italian PoR’s Diary as the unit of analysis and source of data, we study the two crucial cases of Ciampi’s presidency (1999–2006) and Napolitano’s first presidency (2006–2013). QNA allows us to quantify and compare, while maintaining an actor-centred approach, the relations of the two PoRs with the most relevant actors in foreign policy. The results of our analyses highlight the relevance of the Italian PoR figure, identifying the main areas of influence of the Italian head of state and their changes over time. We conclude providing a few hypotheses to interpret the outcomes of our analyses on the PoR’s role in Italian foreign policy.

Super partes? Ideological leaning of heads of state and their distance from prime ministers

“…Still, the neutrality of the Italian Head of State only indicates he is not a partisan power, without minimizing his ability to influence significant political decisions (Amoretti and Giannone 2014). In fact, he can be considered as a relevant actor with the widest set of powers among parliamentary democracies (Grimaldi 2015;Tebaldi et al 2019Tebaldi et al , 2022.…”

“…To the contrary, the correlation between ideology and foreign policy is weak (0.15) and not significant. However, we know that specific competencies in the field of defence and foreign policy represent crucial formal attributions that the Italian Constitution has assigned to the Head of State (Tebaldi et al 2022). In particular, art.…”

“…87 Const., indicates that the President is the commander-in-chief of the armed forces, shall preside over the Supreme Council of Defence established by law, and shall make declarations of war (as have been agreed by Parliament); the President shall also accredit and receive diplomatic representatives and ratify international treaties (which have been, when required, authorized by the Parliament). In view of that, the political position of Presidents on foreign policy issues deserves further attention (Coticchia and Vignoli 2021;Tebaldi et al 2022). Figure 2 displays the position of Presidents on the foreign policy dimension with respect to their overall ideological leaning.…”

“…Within parliamentary democracies, however, some Presidents seems to retain stronger powers than others. This is the case of Italy, whose President is deemed to have the widest set of powers among European parliamentary democracies (Grimaldi 2015;Tebaldi et al 2019Tebaldi et al , 2022. Despite their formal powers, for a long time, Italian Heads of State were perceived as neutral political actors, with a limited influence on everyday politics.…”