ABSTRACT
Despite the fact that the change in the party system does not yet seem to have come to a resting place, it would be surprising indeed if the destruction of the old system had not had significant political consequences: the political party is central to the functioning of the modern state and to the running of government, so that it is only natural to expect that party-system changes will have significant consequences elsewhere in political systems. To one degree or another we might expect party-system change of the magnitude Italy has witnessed to have affected: political institutions and the way they function; the social characteristics of those who staff those institutions; the nature of the public policies that are the consequences of institutions’ functioning and the decisions of those who staff them.
