UNIVERSITA CATTOLICA DEL SACRO CUORE

Sede di Milano

Facolt di Scienze Politiche e Sociali

Corso di Laurea in Politiche Europee ed Internazionali

MORAL FOUNDATIONS THEORY AND VOTING INTENTION IN THE

ITALIAN GENERAL ELECTION 2013

Relatore:
Chiar.ma Prof.ssa Patrizia Catellani

Tesi di Laurea di:

Paulo DAlberti
Matricola: 4010041

Anno Accademico 2012/2013

Index
Introduction ........................................................................................................................................... 4
1

Moral Foundations Theory ............................................................................................................. 8

1.1

Morality in the Western World............................................................................................... 8

1.2

Not Two, but Five Moral Foundations .................................................................................. 12

1.3
Why Five and not Ten? Moral Foundations Theory vs. Schwarzs Values System and Moral
Development .................................................................................................................................... 18

1.4

Moral Foundations Theory and the Big Five Trait Taxonomy ............................................... 26

1.5

Moral Foundations Theory, Voting Behaviour, Political Attitudes, and Political Ideology .... 30

Psychological Determinants of the Vote ...................................................................................... 36

2.1

Personalisation of Politics ..................................................................................................... 36

2.2

The Big Five Trait Taxonomy ................................................................................................. 37

2.3

Values ................................................................................................................................... 39

2.4

Issue voting........................................................................................................................... 41

2.5

Ideological Orientation ......................................................................................................... 43

2.6

Social Identity ....................................................................................................................... 43

Voting Choice in Italy .................................................................................................................... 45

3.1

Milestones in the History of Italian Politics from the 90s Till the Present Days ................... 45

3.2

Current Political System in Italy ............................................................................................ 48

3.2.1

The Legislative Branch .................................................................................................. 48

3.2.2

The Executive Branch.................................................................................................... 51

3.2.3

The Judicial Branch ....................................................................................................... 52

3.2.4

Electoral campaign ....................................................................................................... 52

3.2.5

Party system ................................................................................................................. 55

3.2.6

Election and aftermath ................................................................................................. 58

The Italian General Elections of February 2013 and the Moral Foundations Theory ................... 62
4.1

Aims ...................................................................................................................................... 62

4.2

Method ................................................................................................................................. 66

4.2.1

Participants ................................................................................................................... 66

4.2.2

Materials ....................................................................................................................... 67

4.2.3

Procedure ..................................................................................................................... 69

4.3

Results .................................................................................................................................. 69

4.3.1

General Results ............................................................................................................. 69

4.3.2

Correlations between Moral Foundations and Socio-Demographic Factors................. 70

4.3.3

Correlations between Moral Foundations and Political Orientation ............................ 72

4.3.4

Correlation between the Big Five Trait Taxonomy and Voting Intention ...................... 81

4.4

Discussion ............................................................................................................................. 82

Conclusion ............................................................................................................................................ 88
2

Bibliography ......................................................................................................................................... 90
Online sources ................................................................................................................................ 103
Appendix ............................................................................................................................................ 105
Appendix A ..................................................................................................................................... 105

Introduction
If an asteroid were headed for Earth, we would all band together and figure out how to stop it just
like in the movies. We would put aside our differences, we would spend whatever it took, and we
would find a way to deflect it. Well, its a good thing that it would go like this, because theres an
asteroid headed our way. However, this asteroid is different. It isnt a real giant boulder flying in
space threatening to kill us, but rather a metaphor1. A metaphor for a great danger that can change
society as we know it. Unfortunately, since it isnt a clear, giant boulder, we differ in our reactions,
some taking no action, even though the longer we wait, the more difficult and expensive it becomes.
It pits us into opposing camps, fighting to promote the importance of the actions that must be taken
and wondering why the other side doesnt see what we see.
What is this danger then? Is it the economic crisis? Not really, even though some of the aspects
described would fit it (do we fight the crisis through austerity or borrowing?). The danger could have
different faces and
work differently in
different

countries.

One of the faces

could

be

that

rising
disparity

of

income
between

the poorest and the

richest.

Figure

0.1

shows

us

the

development

of

after-tax income in
the United States of
America. As we can Figure 0.1: Percent change in real after-tax income since 1979 in the USA (Stone, Trisi,
see,

despite

Sherman, and Chen, 2013)

occasional drops, the income of the top 20%, and especially that of the top 1% always rose faster
than that of the rest, opening more and more the scissors that represent the income disparity. Why
would this be an asteroid? Because when there is too much inequality it makes it difficult to feel like
we are all in the same boat; we start questioning the legitimacy of the incomes of the richest, and
start developing resentment towards them.

Which were borrowing from James Hansen who used it in his TED talk Why I must speak about climate
change, retrieve 28.12.2013 from http://www.ted.com/talks/james_hansen_why_i_must_speak_out_about_
climate_change.html

Lets take another example. Another face of the asteroid could be that of the rising number of nonmarital births. This represents two things: children born to single women and children born to
unmarried women. Children born to single women are at a greater risk for adverse consequences
because the social, emotional and financial resources for the
family may be limited (McLanahan, 1995). However, even the
second group, children born to unmarried women, face elevated
risks of falling into poverty, failing in school or suffering emotional
and behavioural problems (DeParle and Tavernise, 2012). This
becomes even more of an issue when the number of kids growing
outside of marriage is bigger and bigger, and Figure 0.2 shows
that this might be actually the case. The number is steadily
increasing to a point where now more than 40% of all children are
Figure 0.2: Percentage of births outside
of marriage in the USA (DeParle and
Tavernise, 2012)

born outside of marriage, the majority to women under 30 years

old. And the graph shows us that we can expect an increase in the
future.

The two graphs shown have some points in common. First of all its the apocalyptic message that
they are trying to give: we must act now before its too late. More importantly however is the
second common point that only one portion of society realizes its importance. In the United States
of America, liberals would be much more inclined to react to the first graph, seeing the danger that it
represents, while conservatives would have this reaction with the second graph. So the second part
of the sentence would be: Why dont you see it? Why are you so blind to this danger? It is this
blindness that fascinated Jonathan Haidt and his co-workers, leading them to search for answers.
And they believed they found the answer: morality.
As Haidt explains in many of his works or presentations (one example for all: Haidt, 2012) morality
binds and blinds. It binds us into ideological teams that fight each other as though the fate of the
world depended on our side winning each battle. It blinds us to the fact that each team is composed
of good people who have something important to say. This is most evident in the culture war that is
happening in the USA. When asked to place themselves on a scale from 1 (no trust at all) to 10 (great
deal of trust) to express their trust of the opposite party (Democrats about Republicans and viceversa), more than 60% in both cases placed themselves between 1 and 4, expressing little or no trust
(Page, 2013). In another example, regarding the government shutdown that happened in America, a
poll showed that 44% of Americans blamed Republicans for the shutdown, 35% blamed President
Obama and the Democrats, and only 17% blamed both parties (Berezow, 2013).
The division in America was evident, and Haidt believed that the reason behind this division was
morality. Or better still: the different moral foundation of liberals and conservatives. These
5

differences allowed a perception of the members of ones own group as moral (binding), while at the
same time casting a light of immorality on the members of the other group (blinding). Very seldom
would the differences be perceived as complimentary or enriching. Very often the opposite would
happen: a Democrat would see a Republican as immoral, evil, caring only for his own good or that of
a negatively defined group, and vice versa. These findings were very interesting because essentially
they helped shed some light upon an important question: why are good people divided by politics
and ideology?
The premises seemed interesting enough, but we decided to take it a step further and see how these
moral divisions might affect voting behaviour. We took the research, the material from it, and
applied it in our own country: Italy. This is what this thesis is about.
We start this thesis with an exposition of the theoretical background upon which all the research
stands: the Moral Foundations Theory (MFT). This theory was devised to cover the flaws of western
morality which is very limited. We show some of the philosophical and psychological roots of
western morality, and how it is represented in MFT. Next we take up the works of Shweder who
already considered the possibility of a broader morality than that offered by the West (MFT also
partially builds upon his work). Another system with which we compared MFT is that of Schwartzs 10
values model. Moving away from morality, we take a look also at personality traits and the way they
can be used in a complementary way with MFT. Lastly we take a look at what research has been
done to see the effects of moral foundations in relation to voting issues, political ideology, and
political attitudes.
In the second chapter we take a look at the aspects of social psychology, concretely, different aspects
that might influence the vote. These are important to analyze because as we show in that chapter we
live more and more in an era of personalized politics (especially in some countries, Italy included):
where voters look more at the individual characteristics of each candidate, and less at the party and
its programme.
In the third chapter we move from social psychology to political history and political science. Each
country has its own historical path that moulded it into the contemporary political reality. And this
political reality the electoral system, party system, political culture, etc. also influences the
electoral outcome. Therefore we present both Italys history and its current political system. In
addition, since the research for this thesis was done in the context of a political election, we uncover
the context, from the campaign to the post-election aftermath.
We did not want this thesis to just be some theoretical analysis and philosophical speculation, so we
included some experimental research. We researched the correlation between Moral Foundations
Theory (both in its typical form and in the form of moral trade-offs, where we ask how much money
one would be willing to take in exchange for violating a moral foundation) and voting intention in the
6

Italian general election of February 2013. This allowed us to see how well MFT can be used to predict
voting behaviour and ideological allegiance in countries other than the United States of America. And
since all the previous chapters basically prepare us with the necessary information to understand this
research as much as possible, we can say that this is the main chapter of the whole thesis.
Let us now look then at what this work has to offer.

1 Moral Foundations Theory

1.1 Morality in the Western World
Even when producing the most brutal animated porn, where apart from sperm there squirts blood,
guts and brains, and monsters with half-meter penises butcher 5-year-old little girls, no one really got
hurt and it still is a problem. Why? I dont see a single truly logical reason why something like this
should be banned.2
In one of the Internet forums a discussion was started about relationships between men and women.
This eventually led to the topic of pornography and then child pornography: whether it should be
banned, regulated or allowed. The discussion went on for a couple of pages and at one point one of
the users wrote the message quoted above. It was quite peculiar to observe the reaction of the other
forum members: despite evidently feeling uneasy in front of such a disturbing statement, they did
not know how to refute it. After all there is some truth to the above statement: in the case of
animated pornography none of the actors get hurt, physically or emotionally: It can also be argued
that watching pornography can lead people away from committing sexual crimes. Under this lens
pornography is actually a good thing. It is even better if animated pornography can satiate the thirst
of paedophiles and stop them from becoming child molesters by picturing little children. Despite a
sense of disgust or indignation, some readers may rationalize this argument to the point where they
agree with the author of the quoted statement.
On the other hand, many will stand up claiming that the above statement is false, that a lot of
research has proven that watching violent pornography regularly, even if animated, leads to a more
violent lifestyle, eventually causing harm.
The purpose of this study isnt to analyse whether the statement is true or false. Whats more
interesting is to observe the reaction it provoked. As mentioned, despite being so disturbing, many
users (who, it is assumed, lack knowledge about specific research) did not know how to react
towards an event that did not seemingly provoke any physical harm to anyone. And yet, despite
being apparently harmless, there are many people who, even without knowledge of specific
research, are against the idea of rendering brutal animated child porn legal, or even available, not
because it hurts someone, but because its wrong. Why is that so?
Heinrich, Heine and Norenzayan (2010) talk about the WEIRD (Western, Educated, Industrialized,
Rich and Democratic) society. They explain that in WEIRD societies there is a greater emphasis on the
individual rather than on the family or community.
How are differences manifested between WEIRD and non-WEIRD societies? It has been reported that
Westerners have a more independent and autonomous concept of the self than do East Asians
2

Samiky a sameci [Females and males], retrieved 23.6.2013 from

viewtopic.php?f=216&t=6354&start=2640

http://rpgforum.cz/forum/

(Markus and Kitayama, 1991). For example, when asked to write twenty statements beginning with
the words I am..., Americans are likely to list their internal psychological characteristics (happy,
outgoing, interested in jazz), whereas East Asians are more likely to list their roles and relationships
(a son, a husband, an employee of Fujitsu).
The differences run deep; even visual perception is affected. In whats known as the framed-line task,
you are shown a square with a line drawn inside it. You then turn the page and see an empty square
that is larger or smaller than the original square. Your task is to draw a line that is the same as the
line you saw on the previous page, either in absolute terms (same number of centimetres; ignore the
new frame) or in relative terms (same proportion relative to the frame). Westerners, and particularly
Americans, excel at the absolute task, because they see the line as an independent object in the first
place and store it separately in memory. East Asians on the other hand outperform Americans at the
relative task, because they automatically perceived and remembered the relationship between the
parts (Kitayama et al., 2009).
Related to this difference in perception is a difference in the way of thinking. Most people think
holistically (seeing the whole context and the relationships among parts), but WEIRD people think
more analytically (detaching the focal object from its context, assigning it to a category, and then
assuming that whats true about the category is true about the object), (Nisbett et al., 2001).
All this doesnt just relate to common people in Western countries (actually, as Haidt, 2012 writes,
the common people working-class adults without a university degree, the subjects he used for his
research dont fall exactly into the WEIRD category), but more importantly to the academics and
opinion makers, such as philosophers (Haidt, 2012, p.97), psychologists, sociologists, and others.
There are two influential psychologists who laid down the bases of a new field within psychology:
moral development. These psychologists are Lawrence Kohlberg and Carol Gilligan. Let us take a
look at them.
The American psychologist Lawrence Kohlberg (1958) hypothesized that people's development of
moral standards passes through stages that can be grouped into three moral levels. At the early level,
that of pre-conventional moral reasoning, children use external and physical events (such as pleasure
or pain) as the source for decisions about moral rightness or wrongness; their standards are based
strictly on what will avoid punishment or bring pleasure. At the intermediate level, that of
conventional moral reasoning, the child or adolescent views moral standards as a way of maintaining
the approval of authority figures, chiefly his parents, and acts in accordance with their precepts.
Moral standards at this level are based on a positive evaluation of authority, rather than on a simple
fear of punishment. At the third level, that of post-conventional moral reasoning, the adult bases his
moral standards on principles that he himself has evaluated and that he accepts as inherently valid,

regardless of society's opinion. He is aware of the arbitrary, subjective nature of social standards and
rules, which he regards as relative rather than absolute in authority.
Thus the basis for justifying moral standards passes from avoidance of punishment to avoidance of
adult disapproval and rejection to avoidance of internal guilt and self-recrimination. The person's
moral reasoning also moves toward an increasingly greater social scope (i.e., including more people
and institutions) and greater abstraction (i.e., from reasoning about physical events such as pain or
pleasure to reasoning about values, rights, and implicit contracts). Different people are likely to reach
different levels of moral thinking in their lives, giving rise to the possibility that some people may
never reach the later, more abstract, stages3.
Related to this is the concept of justice. Kohlberg's conception of justice (that is best seen in the last
stage of moral development) follows that of the philosophers Kant and Rawls, as well as great moral
leaders such as Gandhi and Martin Luther King. According to these people, the principles of justice
require us to treat the claims of all parties in an impartial manner, respecting the basic dignity, of all
people as individuals. The principles of justice are therefore universal; they apply to all. Thus, for
example, we would not vote for a law that aids some people but hurts others. The principles of
justice guide us toward decisions based on equal respect for all.
In practice, Kohlberg says, we can reach just decisions by looking at a situation through one another's
eyes. For that purpose he used whats known as the Heinz Dilemma:
A woman was near death from a special kind of cancer. There was one drug that the
doctors thought might save her. It was a form of radium that a druggist in the same
town had recently discovered. The drug was expensive to make, but the druggist was
charging ten times what the drug cost him to produce. He paid $200 for the radium and
charged $2,000 for a small dose of the drug. The sick woman's husband, Heinz, went to
everyone he knew to borrow the money, but he could only get together about $1,000
which is half of what it cost. He told the druggist that his wife was dying and asked him
to sell it cheaper or let him pay later. But the druggist said: No, I discovered the drug
and I'm going to make money from it. So Heinz got desperate and broke into the man's
store to steal the drug for his wife. Should Heinz have broken into the laboratory to steal
the drug for his wife? Why or why not? (Kohlberg, 1981; Kohlberg, 1963, p. 19)
The emphasis for Kohlberg here is not on whether one answers "yes" or "no", but rather the
reasoning behind the answer (Kohlberg, 1971).
In the Heinz Dilemma, this would mean that all parties the druggist, Heinz, and his wife take the
roles of the others. To do this in an impartial manner, people can assume a "veil of ignorance"
3

Kohlbergs Stages of Moral Development, retrieved 09.07.2013

3%20Intro%20to%20Kohlbergs%20Stages%20of%20Moral%20Development.pdf

10

from

http://azslattery.net/

(Rawls, 1971), acting as if they do not know which role they will eventually occupy. If the druggist did
this, even he would recognize that life must take priority over property; for he wouldn't want to risk
finding himself in the wife's shoes with property valued over life. Thus, they would all agree that the
wife must be saved this would be the fair solution. Such a solution, we must note, requires not only
impartiality, but the principle that everyone is given full and equal respect. If the wife were
considered of less value than the others, a just solution could not be reached (Kohlberg, 1971).
One criticism of Kohlberg's theory is that it emphasizes justice to the exclusion of other values. As a
consequence of this, it may not adequately address the arguments of people who value other moral
aspects of actions. Carol Gilligan (1982) has argued that Kohlberg's theory is overly androcentric - the
practice, conscious or otherwise, of placing male human beings or the masculine point of view at the
centre of one's view of the world and its culture and history. Kohlberg's theory was initially
developed based on empirical research using only male participants; Gilligan argued that it did not
adequately describe the concerns of women. Although research has generally found no significant
pattern of differences in moral development between sexes, Gilligan's theory of moral development
does not focus on the value of justice. She developed an alternative theory of moral reasoning that is
based on the ethics of caring4. Analyzing the responses of girls, she came to realize that they were
much more focused on relationships, than the responses of the boys were. She then attributed this
difference to a greater sense of care as opposed to the greater sense of justice found in Kohlbergs
research (Gilligan, 1982).
Criticism

also arose also

about Gilligans work, but

essentially

both

Kohlberg

and Gilligan agreed that

morality was about how well
or poorly individuals treated
other individuals. Thus a
consensus was established in
the Western world: that
morality is dominated by two
foundations justice and
care. This two-foundation Picture 1.1: a billboard of a pro-gay marriage campaign that reads It helps some, it
morality has spread into our

hurts none, the graffiti on the billboard reads yuck, nasty! (Fialov, 2002)

society to such an extent, that we consider it normal to think in such terms. So when we are faced
4

Kohlbergs Stages of Moral Development, retrieved 09.07.2013

3%20Intro%20to%20Kohlbergs%20Stages%20of%20Moral%20Development.pdf

11

from

http://azslattery.net/

with an issue, that we think should be very easy to resolve morally, we are baffled to see a great
number of people disagree and, for lack of a better explanation, consider their behaviour as driven
by immoral, out-of-date behaviour. Consider for example the never-ending debate on gay marriage,
where supporters are driven by a strong feeling of care (gays are hurt by the current system) and
justice/equality (gays should have the same rights as non-gays) as seen for example in the pro-gay
marriage campaign that took place in the Czech Republic in 2002 (picture 1.1) (Fialov, 2002). The
main slogan for the pro-gay marriage activists was it helps some, it hurts none, a slogan clearly
based on the two foundations of equality and care. So when opposition arose to protest against the
initiative, to many it seemed as though they did not want to accept the obviously positive
foundations of equality and care and, as such, they started viewing their opponents as immoral,
calling them names like homophobic, bigoted, and so on. However, was the behaviour of the
opposition truly motivated by a simple lack of morality?

1.2 Not Two, but Five Moral Foundations

In one of his studies, Shweder together with Much, Mahapatra, and Park (1997) analysed the
explanation of suffering in Indian society. When he touched the topic of moral discourse as a reason
to explain suffering, he realised that the moral discourse that we use in the West isnt nearly enough
to cover the mindset of morality that he encountered. He devised a new vision of ethical discourse, a
Big Three, represented by Autonomy, Community, and Divinity.
The ethics of autonomy aims at protecting the zone of discretionary choice of individuals and to
promote the exercise of individual will in the pursuit of personal preferences. Autonomy is usually
the official ethic of societies in which individualism is an ideal. The ethics of community, in contrast,
aims at protecting the moral integrity of the various stations or roles that constitute a society or a
community, where a society or community is conceived of as a corporate entity with an identity,
standing, history, and reputation of its own. Finally, the ethics of divinity aims at protecting the soul,
the spirit, the spiritual aspects of the human agent and nature from degradation. These three ethical
discourses work together to promote three different types of good.
Different cultural traditions try to promote human dignity by specializing in (and perhaps even
exaggerating) different ratios of moral goods. Consequently, they moralize about the world in
somewhat different ways and try to construct the social order as a moral order in somewhat
different terms. Cultures differ in the degree in which one or another of the ethics and corresponding
moral goods predominates in the development of social practices and institutions and in the
elaboration of a moral ideology.
For example, in the United States today, and in other Western countries, we are experts on the topic
of the ethics of autonomy. We have extended the idea of rights to different domains such as

12

education and health care. We have extended the class of right holders to include children and
animals. We have expanded the idea of this worldly autonomy to such an extent that we can imagine
that children should be free to choose their parents. We wish to be protected from every imaginable
harm, including secondary cigarette smoke and psychologically offensive work environments. Such
all-embracing notions as harassment, abuse, and exploitation have great resonance today. We have
stretched the notion of rights, autonomy, and harm even as we wonder nostalgically how we lost our
sense of community and divinity and struggle to find a way to recover them. In rural India, on the
other hand, the ethics of autonomy is much less salient, while the institutions and ideologies of
community and divinity are highly elaborated and finely honed, which create their own special
distortions, of course.
It is from here that Graham, Nosek, Haidt, Iyer, Koleva, and Ditto (2011) began their quest to define a
systematic theory of morality, explaining its origins, development, and cultural variations. Thus they
created the Moral Foundations Theory (MFT). Haidt and Joseph (2004) began by surveying the
literature in evolutionary psychology and anthropology, looking for matchesfor virtues and areas of
moral regulation that were common (though not necessarily universal) across cultures and that had
some clear counterpart in evolutionary thinking. For example, virtues related to fairness and
practices of reciprocal gift exchange (e.g., Mauss, 1924/1990) bore an obvious similarity to the
evolutionary literature on reciprocal altruism (Trivers, 1971); virtues of purity and practices
regulating food and sex (e.g., Douglas, 1966) bore an obvious relationship to the evolutionary
literature on disgust (Rozin, Haidt, & McCauley, 2000). The results of this cross-disciplinary review
produced five top candidates for being the psychological foundations upon which cultures
construct their moralities. These five foundations are consistent with, but expand upon, several
existing taxonomies of moral concern, including Fiskes (1992) four models of social relationships;
Shweder et al.s (1997) account of the three ethics of autonomy, community, and divinity that are
found widely around the world; and Hogan et al.s (1978) evolution-based socioanalytic theory of
moral development. MFT can therefore be seen as an attempt to specify the evolved psychological
mechanisms that were part of the definition of moral systems given earlier. Even if all moral
systems are social constructions, they are constructed by people whose minds are not at all like blank
slates (Marcus, 2004). In this way, MFT allows for intuitive or emotional bases for moral judgments as
well as more deliberate reasoning processes (Greene, Sommerville, Nystrom, Darley, & Cohen, 2001;
Haidt, 2001).
Haidt and Graham (2007) expanded the theory and modified the names of the foundations to
become: Harm/Care, Fairness/Reciprocity, Ingroup/Loyalty, Authority/Respect, and Purity/Sanctity.
Harm and Fairness generally correspond to Shweder et al.s (1997) ethics of autonomy; Ingroup and
Authority generally correspond to the ethics of community; and Purity generally corresponds to the
13

ethics of divinity. Haidt and Graham also applied the theory to a particular kind of cultural variation
within the United States: the culture war between political liberals and conservatives. Drawing on
Shweder et al. and several political theorists (e.g., Burke, 1790/2003; Lakoff, 1996; Mill, 1859/2003;
Muller, 1997; Sowell, 2002), liberalism was hypothesized to indicate a morality in which the
individual is the locus of moral value. In such a moral world, moral regulation revolves around
protecting individuals from harm or unfair treatment by other individuals or by the social system. In
contrast, conservatives at least, the social conservatives of the religious right try to create more
tightly ordered communities in which (for example) proper relationships between parent and child,
man and woman, and human and God are part of the aim of moral regulation. In such a moral world,
the individual is not the primary locus of moral value; the building block of society is thought to be
the family, and a much greater emphasis is placed on virtues and institutions that bind people to
roles, duties, and mutual obligations (Graham et a., 2011).
But why these five foundations? As the authors explain, its because they are innate. Not innate as in
hardwired, unchangeable by experience, and found in all cultures, but rather as prewired flexible
and subject to change. To use an analogy, the brain is like a book, the first draft of which is written by
the genes during foetal development. No chapters are complete at birth, and some are just rough
outlines waiting to be filled in during childhood. But not a single chapter be it on sexuality,
language, food preferences, or morality consists of blank pages on which a society can inscribe any
conceivable set of words (Haidt, 2012, 130-131). With this in mind, lets take, then, a deeper look at
the five foundations individually:
(1) Harm/care. The long history of mammalian evolution has shaped maternal brains to be sensitive
to signs of suffering in ones own offspring. In many primate species, particularly humans, this
sensitivity has extended beyond the mother-child relationship so that all normally developed
individuals dislike seeing suffering in others, and have the potential to feel the emotion of
compassion in response. (Compassion is not inevitable; it can be turned off by many forces, including
the other four systems described below.) Because people have a sensitivity to cruelty and harm
(analogous to the negative sensations caused by taste buds for bitterness), they feel approval toward
those who prevent or relieve harm, and this approval is culturally codified in virtues such as kindness
and compassion, and also in corresponding vices such as cruelty and aggression. Cultures vary in how
much they value and emphasize these virtues and vices related to others described below (Haidt and
Graham, 2007).
(2) Fairness/reciprocity. The long history of alliance formation and cooperation between unrelated
individuals in many primate species has led to the evolution of a suite of emotions that motivate
reciprocal altruism, including anger, guilt, and gratitude (Trivers, 1971). Because people feel these
emotions when they observe or engage in reciprocal interactions, all cultures have developed virtues
14

related to fairness and justice. These virtues can, of course, be overridden by moral concerns from
the other four systems, and by the many self-serving biases that lead to errors of social perception. In
some but not all cultures, participation in reciprocal interactions and role playing (plus many other
historical and economic factors) have led to the elaboration and evaluation of individual rights and
equality (in much the same way that Kohlberg said). Most traditional cultures, however, do not have
highly developed notions of individual rights, nor do most cultures appear to value or seek to create
equality among all adult members, or even among all adult male members. (See Boehm, 1999, on
how rare egalitarian societies are, and on how hard people in such societies must work to suppress
their natural proclivities toward hierarchy.) Fairness is an excellent candidate for a universal (though
variably applied) value, but equality of outcome or status is not (Haidt and Graham, 2007).
(3) Ingroup/loyalty. The long history of living in kin-based groups of a few dozen individuals (for
humans as well as other primate species) has led to special social-cognitive abilities backed up by
strong social emotions related to recognizing, trusting, and cooperating with members of ones coresiding ingroup while being wary and distrustful of members of other groups. Because people value
their ingroups, they also value those who sacrifice for the ingroup, and they despise those who
betray or fail to come to the aid of the ingroup, particularly in times of conflict. Most cultures
therefore have constructed virtues such as loyalty, patriotism, and heroism (usually a masculine
virtue expressed in defense of the group). From this point of view, it is hard to see why diversity
should be celebrated and increased, while rituals that strengthen group solidarity (such as a pledge
of allegiance to the national flag) should be challenged in court. According to ingroup-based
moralities, dissent is not patriotic (as some American bumper-stickers suggest); rather, criticizing
ones ingroup while it is engaged in an armed conflict with another group is betrayal or even treason
(ibid.).
(4) Authority/respect. The long history of living in hierarchically-structured ingroups, where dominant
males and females get certain perquisites but are also expected to provide certain protection or
services, has shaped human (and chimpanzee, and to a lesser extent bonobo) brains to help them
navigate with flexibility in hierarchical communities. Dominance in other primate species relies
heavily on physical force and fear, but in human communities the picture is more nuanced, relying
largely on prestige and voluntary deference (Henrich and Gil-White, 2001). People often feel respect,
awe, and admiration toward legitimate authorities, and many cultures have constructed virtues
related to good leadership, which is often thought to involve magnanimity, fatherliness, and wisdom.
Bad leaders are despotic, exploitative, or inept. Conversely, many societies value virtues related to
subordination: respect, duty, and obedience. From this point of view, bumper stickers that urge
people to question authority and protests that involve civil disobedience are not heroic they are
antisocial (Haidt and Graham, 2007).
15

(5) Purity/sanctity. Against the long background of primate evolution, the human transition to a
heavily meat-based diet occurred quite recently (13 million years ago; see Leakey, 1994). The move
to meat, which may have included scavenging carcasses, coincided with the rapid growth of the
human frontal cortex, and these two changes (meat eating and cortical growth) appear to have given
humansand only humansthe emotion of disgust (see Rozin et al., 2000). Disgust appears to
function as a guardian of the body in all cultures, responding to elicitors that are biologically or
culturally linked to disease transmission (faeces, vomit, rotting corpses, and animals whose habits
associate them with such vectors). However, in most human societies disgust has become a social
emotion as well, attached at least to those whose appearance (deformity, obesity, or diseased state),
or occupation (the lowest castes in caste-based societies are usually involved in disposing of
excrement or corpses) makes people feel queasy. In many cultures, disgust goes beyond such
contaminant-related issues and supports a set of virtues and vices linked to bodily activities in
general, and religious activities in particular. Those who seem ruled by carnal passions (lust, gluttony,
greed, and anger) are seen as debased, impure, and less than human, while those who live so that
the soul is in charge of the body (chaste, spiritually minded, pious) are seen as elevated and
sanctified (Haidt, 2006; Rozin et al., 1999; see also a book by the former Pope: Ratzinger, 2004). From
this point of view, a philosophy that says if it feels good, do it is the philosophy of the devil (Haidt
and Graham, 2007).
On the website of the Moral Foundations Theory you can see listed a sixth foundation:
liberty/oppression. This foundation is about the feelings of reactance and resentment people feel
towards those who dominate them and restrict their liberty. Its intuitions are often in tension with
those of the authority foundation. The hatred of bullies and dominators motivates people to come
together, in solidarity, to oppose or take down the oppressor5. Theres some evolutionary evidence
for this pointing to egalitarian nomadic hunter-gatherer communities (Boehm, 1999), and even
deeper in chimpanzees, amongst whom it sometimes happens that subordinates gang up to take
down alphas, occasionally going as far as killing them (de Waal, 1982). However, this foundation is
provisional in that the MFT team is now in the process of developing multiple ways of measuring
concerns about liberty, and so they have not yet carried out the rigorous testing that went into their
research on the original five foundations and the original MFQ (Haidt, 2012). Considering this
situation and the fact that there arent any items provided by the webpage which we could use
directly, we decided to omit this foundation in our research.
While we will discuss the relationship between these moral foundations and voting behaviour later
(chapter 1.5), this approach helps to explain several behaviours which might seem incomprehensible.

Home, retrieved 22.07.2013 from http://www.moralfoundations.org/index.php?t=home

16

For instance, by considering the moral foundations of ingroup, authority, and purity, one could
understand why a person would be against homosexual marriages despite being caring and with a
sense of justice (protection of the straight ingroup, undermining of the authority of marriage, sense
of revulsion towards homosexual relations6). We can shed light on other events which affected
Europe such as the horse meat scandal or the case of Pussy Riot.
In January 2013 it was reported that horse DNA had been discovered in frozen beef burgers sold in
several Irish and British supermarkets (Meikle and McDonald, 2013). The scandal then spread to
other European countries and involved even European authorities. But while it had affected so many
countries, many Europeans were baffled at the outcry it generated in the UK and Ireland. And
rightfully so, using just the foundations of Harm and Fairness, since horse meat isnt harmful to
human health and while there is an aspect of cheating, the impact and severity is far less than other
episodes which we might experience (such as a dishonest door-to-door salesman). The reason
behind the outcry is that horse meat is considered a taboo food, therefore touching directly on the
Purity foundation and generating a stronger emotional and social response than if they had used a
different cheaper but socially acceptable type of meat.
Pussy Riot is a Russian feminist punk-rock protest group based in Moscow. Founded in August 2011,
it has a variable membership women ranging in age from about 20 to 33 (Carole, 2012). On February
21, 2012, five members of the group staged a performance on the soleas of Moscow's Cathedral of
Christ the Saviour7. Their actions were stopped by church security officials. By evening, they had
turned it into a music video entitled "Punk Prayer - Mother of God, Chase Putin Away!" 8 The women
said their protest was directed at the Orthodox Church leader's support for Putin during his election
campaign. On March 3, 2012, two of the group members, Nadezhda Tolokonnikova and Maria
Alyokhina, were arrested and charged with hooliganism. A third member, Yekaterina Samutsevich,
was arrested on March 16. Denied bail, they were held in custody until their trial began in late July.
On August 17, 2012, the three members were convicted of hooliganism motivated by religious
hatred, and each was sentenced to two years imprisonment (Elder, 2012). On October 10, following
an appeal, Samutsevich was freed on probation, her sentence suspended. The sentences of the other
two women were upheld 9. In late October 2012, Alyokhina and Tolokonnikova were separated and
sent to prison (Wilson, 2012).
6

The picture 1.1 is a direct testimony of the Purity foundation.

Pussy Riot gig at Christ the Savior Cathedral (original video), retrieved 15.07.2013
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=grEBLskpDWQ
8
- ", " Pussy Riot [Punk Prayer Mother of God,
Putin
Away
Pussy
Riot
in
the
Temple],
retrieved
15.07.2013
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GCasuaAczKY
9
Pussy Riot member Samutsevich sentence reduced to probation, retrieved 15.07.2013
http://www.rapsinews.com/judicial_news/20121010/264941012.html
7

17

from
Chase
from
from

The trial and sentence attracted considerable criticism10, particularly in the West. The case was
adopted by human rights groups including Amnesty International, which designated the women
prisoners of conscience, and by a wide range of musicians including Madonna, Sting, and Yoko Ono.
Public opinion in Russia was generally less sympathetic towards the women11. Again we can see a
conflict of moral foundations. The West makes its case based on the foundations of Care (they are
mistreating young women, one of them even has a little child) and Fairness (freedom of speech,
artistic freedom). Therefore it condemns the actions of the Russian system as immoral and sees the
members of the band as kind of heroines. Russians on the other hand criticize the band on the case
of the foundations of Ingroup (against the country), Authority (disrespect towards the president and
the head of church), and Purity (a sacrilege of one of the most important Orthodox churches and
religious symbols).
These and other cases are concrete examples of the difficulties we face with regard to moral
conflicts. Sometimes it is the different importance two or more countries give to moral foundations
(such as between Europe and Russia regarding the Pussy Riots, or Europe and the Muslim world on
the issues of Islam), other times its the cultural war that happens inside a single country (such as is
the case of the USA). Whatever the case, the Moral Foundations Theory was designed to help
understand the differences in perception, give them a moral stamp and serve as a bridge towards a
less conflictual cohabitation.

1.3 Why Five and not Ten? Moral Foundations Theory vs. Schwarzs Values
System and Moral Development
The Moral Foundations Theory isnt the first, nor the only theory that deals with morality. One
possible existing framework for broadening the moral domain is research on values, which Schwartz
(2007, p. 712) has defined as trans-situational goals that vary in importance and serve as guiding
principles in the life of a person or a group (for reviews, also see Feldman, 2003; Rohan, 2000).
Although there are numerous values (e.g. achievement, security, benevolence), they hold a varying
degree of importance. Not every value is important for everyone. Someone who might have grown in
a very unstable environment craves a strong sense of security, while someone else might have found
a way to deal with it and turn it into strength, essentially reducing the need for security. Hence, a
particular value may be very important to one person but unimportant to another. Schwartzs value
10

Press aghast at Pussy Riot verdict, retrieved 15.07.2013 from http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe19307077

11
Pussy Riot [Russians on the Pussy Riots case], retrieved 15.07.2013 from
http://www.levada.ru/31-07-2012/rossiyane-o-dele-pussy-riot; and
Pussy Riot [One-third of Russians believe in fairness of Pussy Riot trial], retrieved 15.07.2013 from
http://www.levada.ru/17-08-2012/tret-rossiyan-verit-v-chestnyi-sud-nad-pussy-riot

18

theory (1992, 2005) adopts this premise and asks whether such differences in the relations towards
values can affect the voting behaviour.
It starts by adopting a conception of values that specifies six main features that are implicit in the
writings of many theorists 12:
(1) Values are beliefs linked inextricably to affection. Values and feeling share a close bond, you
cant value something without feeling strongly attached to it. If you have a strong sense of
self-direction the difference between being in control of your life and being at the mercy of
others could be as big as that between life and death, between happiness and depression.
(2) Values refer to desirable goals that motivate action. If power is an important value to you,
you might move your life to obtain influential positions. It its universalism, you might end up
working for a charity. Values shape the direction we take in our life.
(3) Values transcend specific actions and situations. This is meant to distinguish values from
narrower concepts like norms and attitudes that usually refer to specific actions, objects, or
situations. So for example, to be smartly dressed for a gala wouldnt constitute a value.
(4) Values serve as standards or criteria. If something or someone violates our important value,
we judge it/him in a negative way as bad, illegitimate, worth avoiding, etc. On the other
hand, if its aligned to our important value, we judge it in a positive way as good, justified,
worth doing, etc. But the impact that values have in our everyday decisions is rarely
conscious. In most cases it becomes the centre of attention when theres a conflict between
two or more values.
(5) Values are ordered by importance relative to one another. While two people might have
the same set of values (lets say power, hedonism, and security), it is important to note also
the priority order they attribute to these values. For example, someone who puts power in
the first place would devote his life to the pursuit of influence, while someone who puts
hedonism in the first place could see influential positions as a way of achieving the money he
wants. That characterizes them as individuals. This hierarchical feature also distinguishes
values from norms and attitudes 13.
(6) The relative importance of multiple values guides action. Any attitude or behaviour
typically has implications (whether positive or negative) for more than one value. For
example, attending church might express and promote tradition, conformity, and security
values at the expense of hedonism and stimulation values. The trade-off among relevant,
competing values is what guides attitudes and behaviours (Schwartz, 1992, 1996). The
12

e.g., Allport, 1961; Feather, 1995; Inglehart, 1997; Kohn, 1969; Kluckhohn, 1951; Morris, 1956; Rokeach,
1973; Schwartz and Bilsky, 1987.
13
Schwartz, S. H. Basic Human Values, retrieved 17.07.2013 from http://www.ccsr.ac.uk/qmss/seminars/200906-10/documents/Shalom_Schwartz_1.pdf

19

contribution to action that values offer is tied to the relevance they might hold in the context
(how likely they are to be activated) and importance to the actor.
The above are features of all values, what they have in common. What distinguishes one value from
another is the type of goal or motivation that the value expresses. So Schwarzs values theory defines
ten broad values according to the motivation that underlies each of them. Why these ten values and
not others? Well, according to the theory, these values are likely to be universal because they are
grounded in one or more of the three universal requirements for human existence which they help
to cope with, such as the needs of individuals as biological organisms, the requisites of coordinated
social interaction, and the survival and welfare needs of groups14.
Now, as beings with a tendency to form groups we also opt for this road when we need to cope
successfully with the requirements of human existence. Thats because we wouldnt be able to
successfully cope with them on our own, as individuals. We need to transform these individual goals
into something collective, through articulation and communication, in order to gain cooperation in
their pursuit. To be socially desirable, these shared goals are then translated into values. From an
evolutionary viewpoint (Buss, 1986), these goals and the values they express have crucial survival
significance.
So if values are a socially acceptable translation of individual goals, we need to define these values in
terms of the broad goal they express, note their grounding in universal requirements, and refer to
related value concepts. And thats exactly what Schwartz does. To make the meaning of each value
more concrete and explicit, he lists in parentheses the set of value items included in the first survey
instrument to measure each value. Some important value items (e.g., self-respect) have multiple
meanings; they express the motivational goals of more than one value. These items are listed in
brackets15.
-

Self-Direction. Defining goal: independent thought and action choosing, creating, exploring.
Self-direction derives from organismic needs for control and mastery (e.g., Bandura, 1977;
Deci, 1975) and interactional requirements of autonomy and independence (e.g., Kluckhohn,
1951; Kohn & Schooler, 1983; Morris, 1956). (creativity, freedom, choosing ones own goals,
curiosity, independence)[self-respect, intelligence, privacy]

Stimulation. Defining goal: excitement, novelty, and challenge in life. Stimulation values
derive from the organismic need for variety and stimulation in order to maintain an optimal,
positive, rather than threatening, level of activation (e.g., Berlyne, 1960). This need probably

14

Schwartz, S. H. Basic Human Values, retrieved 17.07.2013 from http://www.ccsr.ac.uk/qmss/seminars/200906-10/documents/Shalom_Schwartz_1.pdf

15
Schwartz, S. H. Basic Human Values, retrieved 17.07.2013 from http://www.ccsr.ac.uk/qmss/seminars/200906-10/documents/Shalom_Schwartz_1.pdf

20

relates to the needs underlying self-direction values (Deci, 1975). (a varied life, an exciting
life, daring)
-

Hedonism. Defining goal: pleasure or sensuous gratification for oneself. Hedonism values
derive from organismic needs and the pleasure associated with satisfying them. Theorists
from many disciplines (e.g., Freud, 1933; Morris, 1956; Williams, 1968) mention hedonism.
(pleasure, enjoying life, self-indulgence)16

Achievement. Defining goal: personal success through demonstrating competence according

to social standards. Competent performance that generates resources is necessary for
individuals to survive and for groups and institutions to reach their objectives. Achievement
values appear in many sources (e.g., Maslow, 1965; Rokeach, 1973). As defined here,
achievement values emphasize demonstrating competence in terms of prevailing cultural
standards, thereby obtaining social approval. (ambition, success, capability, influence)
[intelligence, self-respect, social recognition]17

Power. Defining goal: social status and prestige, control or dominance over people and
resources. The functioning of social institutions apparently requires some degree of status
differentiation (Parsons, 1951). A dominance/submission dimension emerges in most
empirical analyses of interpersonal relations both within and across cultures (Lonner, 1980).
To justify this fact of social life and to motivate group members to accept it, groups must
treat power as a value. Power values may also be transformations of individual needs for
dominance and control (Korman, 1974). Value analysts have mentioned power values as well
(e.g., Allport, 1961). (authority, wealth, social power)[preserving my public image, social
recognition]

Both power and achievement values focus on social esteem. However, achievement values (e.g.,
ambitious) emphasize the active demonstration of successful performance in concrete interaction,
basically the drive to prove ones own worth to others, whereas power values (e.g., authority,
wealth) emphasize the attainment or preservation of a dominant position within the more general
social system, so more about who I have under me than what I have achieved.
-

Security. Defining goal: safety, harmony, and stability of society, of relationships, and of self.
Security values derive from basic individual and group requirements (Kluckhohn, 1951;
Maslow, 1965; Williams, 1968). There are two subtypes of security values. Some serve
primarily individual interests (e.g., cleanliness), others wider group interests (e.g., national
security). Even the latter, however, express, to a significant degree, the goal of security for

16

Though it is an important value, happiness is not included, because people achieve it through attaining
whatever outcomes they value (Sagiv and Schwarz, 2000)
17
Achievement values differ from McClellands (1961) achievement motivation. Achievement motivation
concerns meeting internal standard of excellence. It is expressed in self-direction values.

21

self (or those with whom one identifies). The two subtypes can therefore be unified into a
more encompassing value. (social order, family security, national security, cleanliness,
reciprocation of favours)[health, moderation, sense of belonging]
-

Conformity. Defining goal: restraint of actions, inclinations, and impulses likely to upset or
harm others and violate social expectations or norms. Conformity values derive from the
requirement that individuals inhibit inclinations that might disrupt and undermine smooth
interaction and group functioning. Virtually all value analyses mention conformity (e.g.,
Freud, 1930; Kohn & Schooler, 1983; Morris, 1956; Parsons, 1951). As I define them,
conformity values emphasize self-restraint in everyday interaction, usually with neighbours.
(obedience, self-discipline, politeness, honouring parents and elders)[loyalty, responsibility]

Tradition. Defining goal: respect, commitment, and acceptance of the customs and ideas that
one's culture or religion provides. Groups everywhere develop practices, symbols, ideas, and
beliefs that represent their shared experience and fate. These become sanctioned as valued
group customs and traditions (Sumner, 1906). They symbolize the group's solidarity, express
its unique worth, and contribute to its survival (Durkheim, 1912/1954; Parsons, 1951). They
often take the form of religious rites, beliefs, and norms of behaviour. (respect for tradition,
humility, devotion, accepting my portion in life)[moderation, spiritual life]

Tradition and conformity values are especially close motivationally; they share the vision that the
whole is greater than the sum of its parts, and as such the self should be subordinated in favour of
socially imposed expectations. They differ primarily in the objects to which one subordinates the self.
Conformity entails subordination to persons with whom one is in frequent interactionparents,
teachers, bosses. Tradition entails subordination to more abstract objectsreligious and cultural
customs and ideas. As a corollary, conformity values exhort responsiveness to current, possibly
changing expectations, while tradition values demand responsiveness to immutable expectations
from the past.
-

Benevolence. Defining goal: preserving and enhancing the welfare of those with whom one is
in frequent personal contact (the ingroup). Benevolence values derive from the basic
requirement for smooth group functioning (Kluckhohn, 1951; Williams, 1968) and from the
organismic need for affiliation (Korman, 1974; Maslow, 1965). Most critical are relations
within the family and other primary groups. Benevolence values emphasize voluntary
concern for others welfare. (help, honesty, forgiveness, responsibility, loyalty, true
friendship, mature love)[sense of belonging, meaning in life, a spiritual life].

Benevolence and conformity values both promote cooperative and supportive social relations.
However, benevolence values provide an internalized motivational base for such behaviour: I do so
because I feel its the right thing to do. In contrast, conformity values promote cooperation in order
22

to avoid negative outcomes for self: I do so because I dont want to be punished. Both values may
motivate the same helpful act, separately or together.
-

Universalism. Defining goal: understanding, appreciation, tolerance, and protection for the
welfare of all people and for nature. This contrasts with the in-group focus of benevolence
values. Universalism values derive from survival needs of individuals and groups. But people
do not recognize these needs until they encounter others beyond the extended primary
group and until they become aware of the scarcity of natural resources. People may then
realize that failure to accept others who are different and treat them justly will lead to lifethreatening strife. They may also realize that failure to protect the natural environment will
lead to the destruction of the resources on which life depends. Universalism combines two
subtypes of concernfor the welfare of those in the larger society and world and for nature
(broadmindedness, social justice, equality, world at peace, world of beauty, unity with
nature, wisdom, protection of the environment)[inner harmony, a spiritual life]

These values however are not just individual constructs living their own secluded life, but interact
among themselves creating a structure of dynamic relations. That is because by pursuing one value
we naturally influence our relation to others. For example, pursuing achievement values typically
conflicts with pursuing benevolence values. Seeking success for self tends to obstruct actions aimed
at enhancing the welfare of others who need one's help. But pursuing both achievement and power
values is usually compatible. Seeking personal success for oneself tends to strengthen and to be
strengthened by actions aimed at enhancing one's own social position and authority over others.
Another example: Pursuing novelty and change (stimulation values) is likely to undermine preserving
time-honoured customs (tradition values). In contrast, pursuing tradition values is congruent with
pursuing conformity values. As weve explained before, both motivate actions of submission to
external expectations.
When we pursue a value, it has practical, psychological, and social consequences. From a practical
point of view, choosing an action that would promote one value (e.g., participating in an orgy
stimulation) may literally contravene or violate a competing value (obeying the teachings of ones
religion on sexuality tradition). We might try to bring two opposing values together, but we would
end up feeling contradictory due to our individual psychological dissonances, and the society which
would point to practical and logical inconsistencies between our actions and other values we profess.
Of course, we can and do pursue competing values, but not in a single act. Rather, we do so through
different acts, at different times, and in different settings.
The best way to portray the similarities and differences among values is in a graphical way, as it is
done in Figure 1.1. Tradition and conformity are located in a single wedge because, as noted above,
they share the same broad motivational goal. Conformity is more toward the centre and tradition
23

toward the periphery. This signifies that tradition values conflict more strongly with the opposing
values. The expectations linked to tradition values are more abstract and absolute than the
interaction-based expectations of conformity values. They therefore demand a stronger, unequivocal
rejection of opposing values.
To portray values as organized along
two

bipolar

dimensions

lets

us

summarize the oppositions between

competing values. As Figure 1.1 shows,
one dimension contrasts openness to
change

(top-left

corner)

and

conservation (bottom-right corner)

values. This dimension captures the
conflict between values that emphasize
independence of thought, action, and
feelings and readiness for change (selfdirection, stimulation) and values that
emphasize

order,

self-restriction,

preservation of the past, and resistance

to

change

(security,

Figure 1.1: Theoretical model of relations among ten motivational types of

conformity, value (Schwartz, 1992, 2005)

tradition). The second dimension contrasts self-enhancement (bottom-left corner) and selftranscendence (top-right corner) values. This dimension captures the conflict between values that
emphasize concern for the welfare and interests of others (universalism, benevolence) and values
that emphasize pursuit of one's own interests and relative success and dominance over others
(power, achievement). Hedonism shares elements of both openness to change and selfenhancement, hence the dotted lines that mark its border.
But why portray the values in a circle, or as a pie? Although the theory presents and operates with
ten values, it theorises that, at a more basic level, values form a continuum of related motivation.
This continuum is what gives rise to the circular structure. To clarify the nature of the continuum,
Schwartz notes the shared motivational emphases, the common base, of adjacent values:
(a) power and achievement social superiority and esteem;
(b) achievement and hedonism self-centred satisfaction;
(c) hedonism and stimulation a desire for affectively pleasant arousal;
(d) stimulation and self-direction intrinsic interest in novelty and mastery;
(e) self-direction and universalism reliance upon one's own judgment and comfort with the
diversity of existence;
24

(f) universalism and benevolence enhancement of others and transcendence of selfish

interests;
(g) benevolence and tradition devotion to one's in-group;
(h) benevolence and conformity normative behaviour that promotes close relationships;
(i) conformity and tradition subordination of self in favour of socially imposed expectations;
(j) tradition and security preserving existing social arrangements that give certainty to life;
(k) conformity and security protection of order and harmony in relations;
(l) security and power avoiding or overcoming threats by controlling relationships and
resources.
Therefore, the closer any two values are to each other (whether from the left or from the right), the
more similar their underlying motivation. On the other hand the more distant, the more antagonistic
their motivation (being the most antagonistic when they mirror each other).
The idea that values form a motivational continuum has a critical implication: the division of the
domain of value items into ten distinct values is an arbitrary convenience. These values arent set on
stone but we can divide them into more or less fine-tuned distinct values according to the needs and
objectives of our analysis. To do that we always need to keep in mind the circular structure, because
it implies that the whole set of ten values relates to any other variable in an integrated manner 18.
The measurement of possible values which was done, that eventually led to this smaller set of core
values was justified by pointing to the fundamental social and biological needs of human beings
(Graham, Haidt and Nosek, 2009). Like Schwartz, Moral Foundations Theory (Haidt & Joseph, 2004;
Haidt & Graham, 2007) also tries to reduce the panoply of values, but with a different approach: they
began not by measuring moral values and factors in analyzing them, but by searching for the best
links between anthropological and evolutionary accounts of morality. This link would be a strong
argument against the weakest point of Schwartzs theory, and that is the arbitrary approach with
which the values were chosen. If a moral foundation derives from innate psychological mechanisms
that co-evolved with cultural institutions and practices (Richerson & Boyd, 2005), then the name or
the society doesnt matter, because anywhere in the world it would be based on the same innate
mechanisms. To avoid confusion, the innate mechanisms that we are talking about here dont mean
they are universal and unchanging. These mechanisms are innate but modifiable (Marcus, 2004) and
so they provide parents and other socializing agents the moral foundations to build on as they
teach children their local virtues, vices, and moral practices. (The term virtues is more preferable to
values because of its narrower focus on morality, and because it suggests more strongly cultural
learning and construction.)
18

Schwartz, S. H. Basic Human Values, retrieved 17.07.2013 from http://www.ccsr.ac.uk/qmss/seminars/200906-10/documents/Shalom_Schwartz_1.pdf

25

While both Schwartzs values system and Moral Foundations Theory share a refusal of morality
centred only on harm and fairness currently represented in moral psychology scales, theres a
fundamental difference in the roots of the two (and weve touch on this a minute ago): while Moral
Foundations Theory opts for an evolutionary and anthropological approach in order to identify the
moral foundation, Schwartz begins with an a-theoretical explanatory factor-analytic approach, using
Western populations. This brings a risk that some common moral concerns or intuitions will be
missed. For example, reciprocity, loyalty to ones team or tribe, and concerns about bodily and
spiritual purity are ubiquitous in anthropological accounts of morality, yet they do not appear among
Schwartzs 10 values (Graham et al., 2011). Even if Westerners care quite a bit about reciprocity (see
Cialdini, 2001, Chapter 2), they might not list it when asked about their most important transsituational goals. The reason why a-theoretical descriptive approaches are limited in their ability to
explain why people hold the values they do is also because Individuals are often unable to access the
causes of their moral judgments (Haidt & Kesebir, 2010; Wilson, 2002). Furthermore, most efforts to
identify the range of values begin with long lists of possible values, covering everything from
cleanliness to hedonism, and then use factor analysis of endorsement ratings to identify a smaller set
of core values (Rokeach, 1973; Schwartz, 1992), all of this leading to the above mentioned arbitrary
nature of the identified values.
On the other hand, while it might seem that we are being too hard on Schwartzs values system there
are definitely positive points about it. When comparing to Moral Foundations Theory his list of 10
value-types works better at classifying all values and looking at their relationships, and one quadrant
of his multidimensional plot of values includes the main values related to the Harm and Fairness
foundations (e.g., social justice, protection of the environment) whereas an adjacent quadrant is a
good catalogue of the values related to Ingroup, Authority, and Purity (e.g., national security,
obedience, cleanliness), (Graham et al., 2009). On a more general level, values research has much to
offer the empirical study of morality and is too often ignored by moral psychologists. Clearly, many
values are moral values, even if morality is defined only in terms of welfare and fairness concerns
(e.g., benevolence and universalism), (Graham et al., 2011).

1.4 Moral Foundations Theory and the Big Five Trait Taxonomy
Personality has been conceptualized from a variety of theoretical perspectives, and at various levels
of abstraction or breadth (John, Hampson, & Goldberg, 1991; McAdams, 1995). Each of these levels
has made unique contributions to our understanding of individual differences in behaviour and
experience. However, the number of personality traits, and scales designed to measure them,
escalated without an end in sight (Goldberg, 1971). Researchers, as well as practitioners in the field
of personality assessment, were faced with a bewildering array of personality scales from which to

26

choose, with little guidance and no overall rationale at hand. What made matters worse was that
scales with the same name often measure concepts that are not the same, and scales with different
names often measure concepts that are quite similar. Although diversity and scientific pluralism are
useful, the systematic accumulation of findings and communication among researchers became
difficult amidst the Babel of concepts and scales.
After decades of research, the field approached consensus on a general taxonomy of personality
traits, the Big Five personality dimensions. These dimensions do not represent a particular
theoretical perspective but were derived from analyses of the natural-language terms people use to
describe themselves and others. Rather than replacing all previous systems, the Big Five taxonomy
serves an integrative function because it can represent the various and diverse systems of
personality description in a common framework. It thus provides a starting place for vigorous
research and theorizing that can eventually lead to an explication and revision of the descriptive
taxonomy in causal and dynamic terms.
It wasnt an easy path as many of the discoveries and clarifications of the Big Five dimensions
involved several investigators. Starting from the list of 22 of Cattells (1943) variables, Fiske (1949)
built descriptions which were considerably simpler. This work involved a lot of self-rating, ratings by
peers, and ratings by psychological staff members, and the factor structures which derived from this
work turned out to be highly similar and resembled what would later be known as the Big Five.
Someone needed to clarify Fiskes factors, and the people who took up that job were Tupes and
Christal (1961). They took eight different samples, ranging from airmen with no more than highschool education to first-year graduate students, reanalyzed correlation matrices between them, and
included ratings by peers, supervisors, teachers, or experienced clinicians in settings as diverse as
military training courses and sorority houses. In all the analyses, Tupes and Christal found five
relatively strong and recurrent factors and nothing more of any consequence (1961, p. 14).
This five-factor structure has been replicated by Norman (1963), Borgatta (1964), and Digman and
Takemoto-Chock (1981) in lists derived from Cattell's 35 variables. Following Norman (1963), the
factors were initially labelled:
(I) Extraversion or Surgency (talkative, assertive, energetic)
(II) Agreeableness (good-natured, cooperative, trustful)
(III) Conscientiousness (orderly, responsible, dependable)
(IV) Emotional Stability versus Neuroticism (calm, not neurotic, not easily upset)
(V) Culture (intellectual, polished, independent-minded)
These factors eventually became known as the Big Five (Goldberg, 1981) not because theres
something big or great about them, but to emphasize that each of these factors is extremely
broad. As such, the Big Five Trait Taxonomy doesnt imply that differences in personality can be
27

reduced to only five traits. Rather these five dimensions represent personality at the broadest level
of abstraction, and each of the five dimensions encompasses a larger number of different, more
concrete personality characteristics.
However, despite the extensive research that was done, the Big Five Trait Taxonomy hasnt been
accepted by all researchers in the field as a taxonomic superstructure (e.g., Block, 1995; Eysenck,
1992, 1997; McAdams, 1992; Pervin, 1994). It seems that one problem is the perception that there is
no single or commonly accepted Big Five, which is evident in questions such as which Big Five? or
whose Big Five? (John, 1989). For example, in different studies the first factor has appeared as
confident self-expression, surgency, assertiveness, social extraversion, and power (see John, 1990,
Table 3.1). Agreeableness has been labelled social adaptability, likability, friendly compliance,
agreeableness, and love. The Conscientiousness factor has appeared under the names of
dependability, task interest, will to achieve, impulse control, and work. Neuroticism versus Emotional
Stability has also been called emotionality, ego strength (anxiety), dominant-assured, satisfaction,
and affection. Finally, Openness has also been labelled inquiring intellect, culture, intelligence,
intellect, intellectual interests, and intellection (Oliver and Srivasta, 1999).
If there are more versions of the same questionnaire, which one is to be chosen and why? Luckily, in
Italy theres already a version of the questionnaire which has been translated and tested so many
times, that many authors consider it to have a practical validity (Caprara, Barbanelli, and Borgoni,
2005). The five big factors this version operates with are Energy, Agreeableness, Conscientiousness,
Emotional Stability, and Mental Openness. In the questionnaire developed in the 90s they had
identified two sub-dimensions for every factor which refer to different aspects of the same
dimension. For every sub-dimension (which is formed by 12 items) half of the items are formulated in
a positive way in regards to the name of the scale, while the other half is formulated in a negative
way, in order to control eventual response sets. On top of this they added a sixth scale Lie (L) which
consists of 12 items and its purpose is to offer a measurement of the tendency of the respondent to
provide a false profile of himself. In total therefore, the BFQ consists of 132 items.
Another way of measuring the Big Five (and the way we used in this research, see chapter 4.2.2 for
more details) is through adjectives. Among the many tools based on adjectives which you can find in
the literature (see for example Briggs, 1992) let us pay particular attention to the Big Five Observer
(B.F.O., Caprara, Barbaranelli, and Borgogni, 1994), which was originally developed in the Italian
language context. The B.F.O. is a list of 40 pairs of bipolar adjectives which represent the result of a
research based on the psycholexical approach to the study of personality. The identification of the
adjectives which constitute the B.F.O. build on the results of the study by Caprara and Perugini (1990;
1994) who identified 492 adjectives from the Italian lexicon which were the most useful to describe
personality. For the choice of the adjectives relative to the 5 factors they followed an approach
28

defined by Goldberg (1992) cluster sampling which is based on the selection of the items which are
most representative of the main core of every factor. Following such strategy, from a list of 492
adjectives 3 expert judges selected for every factor the 20 adjectives that can be unambiguously
attributed to each of them. For every factor there were then selected the 8 adjectives which
presented the highest correlation coefficients with the total of the scale. For this analysis they used
the data from the study by Caprara and Perugini (1994) on the Italian lexicon. Lastly, for each
adjective selected in this way they identified an antonym using a dictionary of synonyms and
antonyms (Gabrielli, 1967), and giving preference to the antonyms already present in the original list
of 492 adjectives.
There are at least 3 advantages presented by the measurements based on adjectives:
a) the set of possible descriptors is finite, being represented by all the adjectives which are part
of the vocabulary;
b) the adjectives are tied directly to the behaviour through the lexical hypothesis;
c) the adjectives constitute a fast and easy assessment method: a list of 100 adjectives can
easily be compiled in 10-15 minutes.
Along with these advantages there are also some limitations:
a) adjectives dont allow one to perceive all the facets and articulations of personality;
emblematic is the case of Mental Openness, the facets of which are usually
underrepresented in the domain of the adjectives (Goldberg, 1990; McCrae, 1990);
b) adjectives can be vague and unclear, risking to be utilized in an improper and incoherent way
(Block, 1995; Goldberg and Kilowksji, 1985): for this reason the results can be less stable
throughout different languages and cultures (Caprara, Barbaranelli, and Borgogni, 1996).
Moral Foundations Theory and the Big Five Trait Taxonomy can be actually used together in an
integrative way. This was researched for example in a study by Hirsh, DeYoung, Xu, and Peterson
(2010), who used the MFQ to test the reasons for the lack of findings of associations of
Agreeableness with political attitudes. In this way they found a positive correlation between the
foundations of Care and Fairness with Agreeableness and Compassion. Ingroup, Authority, and Purity
showed a positive correlation with Conscientiousness, Orderliness and, to a certain degree,
Politeness (significant only for Authority; quite interesting was the fact that it did not correlate with
Fairness). Authority and Purity then showed a negative correlation with Openness-Intellect and
Intellect. These findings show the notion that Compassion more closely reflects egalitarianism (a
broad dimension which in MFT encompasses Harm and Fairness), whereas Politeness is more closely
related with order-traditionalism (for Ingroup, Authority, and Purity).

29

1.5 Moral Foundations Theory, Voting Behaviour, Political Attitudes, and

Political Ideology
Although Moral Foundations Theory has been out for a couple of years, there arent many studies
which look at the correlations between MFT and voting behaviour or political attitudes. Most of the
time research is done in relation to political ideology, more concretely, the self-proclaimed
adherence to liberal, libertarian, and conservative groups or with a five-point scale from strongly
liberal to strongly conservative.
While we may be tempted to proclaim that liberal = left = Democrat, and conservative = right =
Republican, that equation wasnt true before 1970, when both parties were broad coalitions.
However, since the 1980s, when the South changed its party allegiance from Democratic to
Republican, the two parties have become sorted almost perfectly on the left-right axis. Data from the
American National Election Survey shows this realignment clearly; the correlation of liberalconservative self-identification with Democratic/Republican party identification has increased
steadily since 1972, accelerating sharply in the 1990s (Abramowitz and Saunders, 2008). Of course,
not everyone fits neatly into this one-dimensional spectrum, and of those who do, most are
somewhere in the middle, not near the extremes (Haidt, 2012, p. 345).
However, recent studies have been carried out by Koleva, Graham, Iyer, Ditto, and Haidt (2012)
about how moral foundations predict support for specific policies on a wide range of political issues,
including death penalty, abortion, gun control, immigration, flag burning, and terrorism. As seen in
their first study, focused on gut-level disapproval ratings, Purity emerged as the foundation that best
predicted disapproval on culture-war issues. It was by far the best predictor of disapproval for issues
dealing with sexuality (casual sex, and using pornography), relationships and marriage (same-sex
relations, same-sex marriage, and babies outside marriage), and the sanctity of life (abortion,
euthanasia, stem-cell research, and cloning). Purity was also the strongest predictor of disproval of
gambling and flag-burning. Lastly, betas for Purity were generally much higher than those for the
other foundations (greater than .30 for 6 issues).
Harm was the strongest predictor for increased disapproval of medical testing on animals and the
death penalty. Harm was also the second best-predicting foundation (after Purity) for disapproval of
cloning animals.
Lastly, although Fairness, Ingroup, and Authority were statistically significant predictors of moral
disapproval for many issues, they were not the top predictors for any of them. Ingroup was the
second strongest foundation, after Purity, in predicting flag-burning. None of the betas for Fairness
were above .07, and for Authority only one beta (predicting death penalty) was above .10.
Importantly, for nine of the thirteen issues, moral disapproval was best predicted by a moral
foundation, and not by political ideology (at least in terms of the absolute values of the betas).
30

Moreover, for two of the four issues best predicted by ideology, a moral foundation came in as close
second. Only moral disapproval for the death penalty was clearly predicted better by political
ideology than any of the moral foundation indices.
These results suggest that peoples positions on these topics are not entirely driven by their
ideological team memberships. Clearly, political orientation does account for substantial unique
variance in most of the issues examined. But the fact that endorsement of moral foundations
explained a great deal of variance in attitudinal position beyond the liberal-conservative dimension
allows us to reject the null hypothesis that any side of any issue could be adopted by either team.
A second implication is that there is a great deal of texture to many of these political issues, and
sometimes the moral concern that is most visible on the surface may not be the only one at work.
Jost, Glaser, Kruglanski, and Sulloway (2003) may be correct that resistance to change and
acceptance of inequality are two common threads, but the study shows the operation of multiple
moral threads, to varying degrees across the varying issues. For example, opposition to pornography
seems to be related primarily to purity concerns; no other predictor is a close second. In contrast,
opposition to flag burning is both more partisan and more complex. As one might expect, political
ideology and the Ingroup foundation were solid predictors on this issue, but the independent and
sizable contribution of the Purity foundation suggests that individual differences in the tendency to
hold objects sacred is at work too. People with low scores on this foundation may have difficulty
understanding why anyone would want to amend the U.S. Constitution to protect a piece of cloth
from harm, while people who score high might be baffled by the pointless profanity of destroying a
symbol of the nation.
Interestingly, in some cases the most obvious foundation was not a strong unique predictor of
attitudes. For example, political arguments about the morality of abortion, cloning, and research
using stem cells are often dominated by claims about harm or potential harm; yet for all three issues,
Purity scores were far better predictors of moral disapproval than harm scores. This suggests that
rationales given for or against a given position may sometimes be only loosely connected to the
intuitions that motivated the attitude in the first place (Haidt, 2001; Nisbett & Wilson, 1977).
In addition, in the absence of information about a persons political orientation, one can make
relatively textured predictions of peoples attitudes on culture war issues using moral foundations
theory, and Purity scores in particular. Furthermore, moral foundations theory helps us go beyond
prediction and understand some of the underlying moral threads that hold political opinions
together.
In the second study they went beyond abstract scale responses by examining the ability of the five
moral foundations to predict support for specific policies on culture war issues, and once again the
foundations proved useful in predicting and interpreting responses. And while in the second study
31

support for specific policies the Purity foundation wasnt so strongly influential, both studies speak
most clearly to the importance of physical and spiritual purity as concerns related to many social
controversies. Purity scores were most strongly associated with issues related to sexuality and
relationships (same-sex relations and marriage, casual sex, pornography, and having a baby outside
of marriage) and the sanctity of life (abortion, cloning, euthanasia, and stem-cell research).
Interestingly, in addition to the strong unique effect of political ideology, the moral reprehensibility
of the death penalty appeared to be driven not by Purity (the sanctity of life), but by Harm, perhaps
suggesting that opponents of the death penalty are more likely to imagine the harm committed in
the moment of execution (or the potential harm of wrongful convictions), rather than the harm
committed by the murderer in the first place. However, euthanasia, which also involves state
sanctioned killing (and, like the death penalty, might engender concerns over wrongful use) remains
firmly linked to Purity and only very weakly to Harm. This dominating importance of Purity concerns
is surprising. Conceptually and empirically, this moral foundation is closely related to religiosity. Still,
the low church attendance reported by our participants implies relatively low levels of religiosity.
Thus, it is not religious beliefs in themselves, but perhaps some more general moral sensitivity to
issues of sanctity, self-transcendence, even self-control, that may drive these results.
Not surprisingly, the Ingroup foundation held together views on foreign policy issues, such as
defence spending, the use of forceful interrogation/torture, and confronting terrorism. It appears
that these three draw on a common set of moral intuitionsabout strengthening the group as it
confronts its enemieseven though on the surface these issues bring up very different concerns, e.g.
budgetary deficits, human rights, and foreign relations. No wonder, then, that Ingroup scores were
also a strong predictor (along with Purity) of positions on flag-burning, for those who think it a moral
imperative to strengthen the nation would most want to honour and protect the sacred symbol of
the nation.
The Harm foundation appeared to cast a moral net over the death penalty, medical testing on
animals, gun control, and global warming. Disapproval for the first two might be driven by an
overarching concern with any groupprisoners or animalsthat has no voice and is thus vulnerable
to human error or inhumane treatment. The fact that support for stricter gun control and emissions
standards also related to the Harm foundation suggests that hurting the environment, hurting an
animal, and hurting a human are all evaluated (by some people) by the same criterion, perhaps
suffering. Interestingly, global warming was also significantly predicted by Purity scores, which may
mean that many of our participants perceive nature as sacred.
Lastly, it was surprising that in both studies, Fairness was the weakest foundation predictor of moral
disapproval and issue positions. According to Jost et al. (2003) one of the central psychological
dimensions that distinguish liberals and conservatives is opposition to or relative tolerance for
32

inequality. Therefore, it is possible that variability on the fairness dimension is already well captured
by ones liberal-conservative identification. As a result, the Fairness foundation did not emerge as a
strong moral predictor of political opinions, once the effects of ideological self-placement were
statistically controlled (Koleva, et al., 2012).
Clifford and Jerit (2013) went deeper and analyzed how moral foundations influence the debate and
opinion on stem cell research. They found that elites on opposing sides of the stem cell debate used
distinctive patterns of moral words in an effort to influence the public. Proponents of stem cell
research have focused almost exclusively on Harm language to bolster their position. Opponents
employed Harm language, general moral language, and to a lesser degree, Purity language. In spite of
the strong relationship between the Purity foundation and stem cell attitudes at the individual level,
Purity language was surprisingly uncommon in the debate. This finding has important implications for
the rhetorical landscape in the United States. If partisan political actors invoke only the most widely
endorsed foundations, elite rhetoric may come to be dominated by Harm and Fairness appeals.
Lets go back to Moral Foundations Theory and ideology. Using the 6 foundations goggles (the ones
which include Liberty/oppression) we can shed some light on the relationship between ideology,
(American) parties and MFT. For example the various moralities found on the political left tend to
rest most strongly on the Care/harm and Liberty/oppression foundations. These two foundations
support ideals of social justice, which emphasize compassion for the poor and a struggle for political
equality among the subgroups that comprise society. Social justice movements emphasize solidarity
they call for people to come together to fight the oppression of bullying, domineering elites. (This is
why there is no separate equality foundation. People dont crave equality for its own sake; they fight
for equality when they perceive that they are being bullied or dominated, as during the American
and French revolutions, and the cultural revolutions of the 1960s.) 19
Everyone left, right, and centre cares about Care/harm, but liberals care more. Across many
scales, surveys, and political controversies, liberals turn out to be more disturbed by signs of violence
and suffering, compared to conservatives and especially to libertarians (Iyer, Koleva, Graham, Ditto,
and Haidt, 2011).
Everyone left, right, and centre cares about Liberty/oppression, but each political faction cares in
a different way. In the contemporary United States, liberals are most concerned about the rights of
certain vulnerable groups (e.g., racial minorities, children, animals), and they look to government to
defend the weak against oppression by the strong. Conservatives, in contrast, hold more traditional
ideas of liberty as the right to be left alone, and they often resent liberal programs that use
19

If you see a child in pain, you feel compassion. Its like a drop of lemon juice on the tongue. Haidt (2012)
argues that witnessing inequality is not like this. It rankles us only when we perceive that the person is suffering
(Care/harm), being oppressed by a bully (Liberty/oppression), or being cheated (Fairness/cheating). For an
argument against him and in favour of equality as a basic foundation, see Rai and Fiske (2011).

33

government to infringe on their liberties in order to protect the groups that liberals care about
most20. For example, small business owners overwhelmingly support the Republican Party 21 in part
because they resent the government telling them how to run their businesses under its banner of
protecting workers, minorities, consumers, and the environment. This helps explain why libertarians
have sided with the Republican Party in recent decades. Libertarians care about liberty almost to the
exclusion of all other concerns (Iyer et al., 2011), and their conception of liberty is the same as that of
the Republicans: it is the right to be left alone, free from government interference.
The Fairness/cheating foundation is about proportionality and the law of karma. It is about making
sure that people get what they deserve, and do not get things they do not deserve. Everyone left,
right, and centre care about proportionality; everyone gets angry when people take more than they
deserve. But conservatives care more, and they rely on the Fairness foundation more heavily, once
fairness is restricted to proportionality. Liberals dont eject items such as everyone is pulling their
own weight, or employees who work hardest should be paid the most, but they are ambivalent.
Conservatives, in contrast, endorse items such as these enthusiastically (Haidt, 2012, p. 181-183).
Liberals may think that they own the concept of karma because of its New Age associations, but a
morality based on compassion and concerns about oppression forces you to violate karma
(proportionality) in many ways. Conservatives, for example, think its self-evident that responses to
crime should be based on proportionality, as shown in slogans such as Do the crime, do the time,
and Three strikes and youre out. Yet liberals are often uncomfortable with the negative side of
karma retribution. After all, retribution causes harm, and harm activates the Care/harm
foundation. A recent study even found that liberal professors give out a narrower range of grades
than do conservative professors. Conservative professors are more willing to reward the best
students and punish the worst (Bar and Zussman, 2011).
The remaining three foundations Loyalty/betrayal, Authority/subversion, and Sanctity/degradation
show the biggest and most consistent partisan differences. Liberals are ambivalent about these
foundations at best, whereas social conservatives embrace them. (Libertarians have little use for
them, which is why they tend to support liberal positions on social issues such as gay marriage, drug
use, and laws to protect the American flag.)
In conclusion, Moral psychology can help to explain why the Democratic Party has had so much
difficulty connecting with voters since 1980. Republicans understand the social intuitionist model

20

Berlin (1997/1958) referred to this kind of liberty as negative liberty the right to be left alone. He pointed
out that the left had developed a new concept of positive liberty during the twentieth century a conception
of the rights and resources that people needed in order to enjoy liberty.
21
In a poll released the 26th of October, 2004, the Pew Research Center found that small business owners
favoured Bush (56%) over Kerry (37%). A slight shift leftward in 2008 ended by 2010. See summary on
HuffingtonPost.com by searching for Small business polls: Dems get pummelled.

34

better than Democrats. Moral Foundations Theory can explain one of the great puzzles that has
preoccupied Democrats in recent years: Why do rural and working-class Americans generally vote
Republican when it is the Democratic Party that wants to redistribute money more evenly?
Democrats often say that Republicans have duped these people into voting against economic selfinterest. (That was the thesis of the popular 2004 book Whats the Matter with Kansas?, Frank) But
from the perspective of Moral Foundations Theory, rural and working-class voters were in fact voting
for their moral interest. They dont want their nation to devote itself primarily to the care of victims
and the pursuit of social justice. Until Democrats understand the Durkhemian vision of society and
the difference between a six-foundation morality and a three-foundation morality, they will not
understand what makes people vote Republican (Haidt, 2012, p. 183-186).

35

2 Psychological Determinants of the Vote

2.1 Personalisation of Politics
Personalisation of political communication is usually understood as a process of increased interest
of the media in politicians as individuals, rather than in political groups, parties and ideology (Kaase,
1994). Strictly speaking what we understand as personalisation is the focused attention that media
give to the personality characteristic of politicians (Reinemann and Wilke, 2001). Rahat and Sheafer
(2007) suggest the following distinctions between three types of personalisation:
-

Institutional: e.g. increased emphasis on candidates caused by the change of intraparty

mechanisms

Medial: change of presentation of politics in the media

Behavioural: change in behaviour of politicians and perception of politics by the audience

Lisabeth van Zoonen (2005) sees three reasons for the rise of interest in political individuality:
1) in an environment overcrowded with text and images, personalisation allows one to
effectively condense the information that the recipient needs for their political decisionmaking;
2) individuality fits better into the dominant cultural framework of entertainment and its
genres;
3) a politician therefore needs to constantly switch between the different demands of politics
and entertainment, so as to maintain his position.
As a result, politicians care more and more about their appearance and self-presentation before their
voters, they create their medial image John Corner describes this phenomenon with the term
mediated persona (Corner, 2003), some theorists then speak about celebritization of politics (Street,
2003; Louw, 2005).
Empirical studies addressing the issue of personalisation diverge in their conclusions. The tendency
of the media to personalization was shown by Martin P. Wattenberg (1999) in his analysis of the
coverage of the election campaign for the presidential elections in the American press. According to
him, in the period between 1952 and 1980 the number of articles where concrete candidates were
mentioned significantly increased, whereas at the same time in the media, the number of direct
connections between candidates and their political parties decreased. On the other hand, other
research from the American environment, an analysis of election coverage of the years 1888, 1908,
1928, 1948, 1968, and 1988 by the authors Sigelman and Bullock (1991), showed that the increase of
interest in the personality of politicians by the media was only slight.
Analysis of the European (mostly German) personalization environment as a trend does not seem to
confirm this tendency. Kasse (1994) in a study of media coverage of the 1990 elections refers to the
specificity of the German political system which enables individuals to excel only in a limited manner.
36

Reinemann and Wilke (2001) find a slight increase of personalization in the German press in the
years between 1948 and 1998; however in later studies (2007) they revise their conclusions. In
connection with the introduction of American-style television debates in the campaigns of 2002 and
2005 they notice a much higher interest of the press about the personality of the politicians, thereby
de facto confirming the influence of television on the work of other media types. A skeptical view is
provided by a comparative study of media coverage of the national elections in Austria, Great Britain,
Germany, Netherlands, Switzerland, and France by Hanspeter Kriesi (2011), according to whom
personalization is tied more to concrete elections and concrete politicians (Hjek, 2012).
Theres widespread acceptance among researchers that the personalization of politics in Italy is a
reality. Caprara, Schwartz, Vecchione, and Barbaranelli (2008) have shown that in Italy (and as such
probably in the West) politics is individualized in two senses: personal characteristics both of
candidates and of voters play major roles in determining political preferences. In order to simplify
their perception about the candidates, voters often use dispositional heuristics, where they process
information in a schematic fashion (Conover and Feldman, 1986) which then influences their voting
intention.

stkov (2006) mentions that this personalization in Italy was even institutionally

established with a law that compels parties to put the name of the candidate for the position of
Prime Minister on the candidate list. As such we need to look more concretely into the individual
characteristics of the party leaders and voters that might influence the vote.

2.2 The Big Five Trait Taxonomy

A way in which personality and politics may interface is in the convergence of personality profiles of
voters and their choice of political party. In a study of the elections in 2001 that used a standard
questionnaire the Big Five Questionnaire (BFQ; Caprara, Barbaranelli, Borgogni, and Perugini,
1993) to assess the Big Five across a large sample of Italian voters, specific personality profiles
were associated significantly with preference for either of two political coalitions of that time: the
centre-lefts Ulivo and the centre-rights Casa delle Libert. These two coalitions, although
encompassing most of the political spectrum, were composed of heterogeneous arrays of former
political adversaries. They functioned as expedient, pragmatic electoral units commonly identified as
centre-left and centre-right. Despite considerable overlap in the demographic structure of
supporters of both coalitions, those who endorsed the platform of the centre-right coalition scored
higher than their counterparts on Energy and Conscientiousness, whereas those who preferred the
centre-left coalition showed higher degrees of Friendliness and Openness (Caprara and Zimbardo,
2004). One should note that these findings accord with other research outcomes that highlight a
positive relation between Openness and liberal ideologies (McCrae, 1996).

37

There was no correlation between voter personality traits and preferred political coalition indeed
they were independent of any apparent influences of age, gender, or education. But when these
demographic factors were statistically controlled, Caprara, Barbaranelli, and Zimbardo (1999) found
that the trait profiles of the two sets of party voters mirrored to a considerable extent the primary
aims and media images conveyed by the two leading coalitions and their leaders, respectively.
Whereas the centre-right campaigned mostly on entrepreneurship and business freedom and
Berlusconis image was commonly identified with Energy, the centre-left campaigned mostly on
solidarity and social welfare, with Prodis image commonly identified with Friendliness. Their
followers, likewise, were high on those same traits and differed from each other on traits that
matched the different programmes of the two coalitions. The initial supposition of Caprara,
Barbaranelli, and Zimbardo (2002) regarding a kind of correspondence between self-presentation
and political preference was corroborated by a subsequent study in which partisans of these two
coalitions reported their own personality using the same list of Big Five markers they had been using
to assess the perception of the personalities of the main politicians. Citizens oriented toward the
centre-right showed a significantly higher degree of Energy and Conscientiousness than citizens who
preferred the centre-left. Furthermore, a greater similarity was found between voters self-reported
personality and their appraisals of politicians belonging to their preferred coalitions than with their
appraisals of the politicians of the opposite coalitions.
Caprara and his colleagues reasoned that either citizens political preferences are in accord with their
self-reported personality, with voting serving an expressive function with regard to self-perception,
or that citizens assimilate their preferred candidates personalities to their own. In both cases,
personality characteristics that are reported and inferred may be critical to strengthening the bond
between voters, parties, and candidates. It may be that followers own self-appraisals and their
perceived similarity to leaders both tend to be positively biased because of egocentric favouritism or
ingroup positivity biases (Capozza & Brown, 2000; Greenwald, 1980; Sears, 1982; Tajfel, 1981).
Alternatively, it may be that the positive effect associated with voter appraisal of their personality
and that of their leaders serves as a catalyst that further strengthens consent and appeal (Caprara
and Zimbardo, 2004).
Fast-forward to the February 2013 election. When analyzing the traits of the leaders, the method
used did not operate with five traits, but just four:
-

Energy: the capacity of the person to influence reality

Competence: knowledge of the person about reality

Empathy: the relationship that the person has with others, his ability to understand and
share emotional experiences

Honesty: the respect of the person for shared rules, his sincerity and transparency
38

Having measured the perception of the candidates traits of the two major coalitions in the past four
elections there are some interesting points to be seen. For example Bersani is the centre-left
candidate who scored the best in Competence and Honesty (scoring much higher also than his rival
Berlusconi), he also scores higher than Berlusconi in Empathy, but Berlusconi scores much higher in
Energy giving him the image of being a stronger leader (Barisione, Cattellani, and Garcia, 2013).
However, more interesting is the comparison between all the four main leaders. Barisione et al.
(2013) asked for every candidate: Tell me if according to you [name of the candidate] is a strong
leader [measuring energy], is prepared [competency], understands the problems of the people
[empathy], is honest [honesty]. The answers of a lot and quite a lot were put together as a
percentage value of the whole. See Figure 2.1:
90
80
70
60

Grillo

50

Bersani

40

Monti

30

Berlusconi

20
10
0
Energy

Competence

Empathy

Honesty

Figure 2.1: Traits attributed to the main party leaders (Barisione et al., 2013)

We can see that Grillo is regarded as a very strong leader, but still not as strong as his centre-right
adversary. Where he falls back is in terms of competence quite understandably considering hes an
ex-comedian. The primacy in competence is reserved for Monti, university professor and ex-prime
minister. But while Monti might be extremely competent, hes perceived by Italians as greatly lacking
in empathy and not understanding the real problems of the people (this is where Grillo shines). Lastly
it is interesting to observe how in honesty everyone but Berlusconi scores roughly the same.

2.3 Values
If we look at personality as a self-regulating system which allows people to be aware of themselves,
to reflect about their own experience and to interact with the environment based on personal
criteria and goals (Caprara and Cervone, 2000), we can assign values a decisive role in showing the
principles according to which voters make their choice.

39

The model and measuring tool predominantly used in Italy is the one provided by Schwartz (1992).
As weve presented in chapter 1.3, Schwartz operates with a set of 10 values: self-direction,
stimulation, hedonism, achievement, power, security, conformity, tradition, benevolence, and
universalism. These values are not just individual constructs living their own secluded life, but
interact among themselves creating a structure of dynamic relations. These values are graphically
portrayed in a circle (a pie), and the closer any two values are to each other (whether from the left
or from the right), the more similar their underlying motivation. On the other hand the more distant,
the more antagonistic their motivation (the most antagonistic being when they mirror each other).
Unfortunately there is no research about voters values in relation to the 2013 general election. Our
only option therefore is to go one election back (to 2008) and look at those results (Caprara,
Schwartz, Vecchione, and Barbaranelli, 2008). Data coming from thousands of men and women all
around the country showed that centre-left voters tended to place more importance than centreright voters in values that go beyond the benefit of the self (benevolence and universalism). Centreright voters on the other hand show a stronger disposition for the promotion of self, represented as
power and security.
Another interesting approach was to look at values priority. Voters gave their opinion on sentences
such as For me its important that my country is safe, or In my opinion the country should be on
guard against menaces from outside and inside. In this way we got a values priority order, which
can be found in Table 2.2:
Values
Conformity

Centre-right
4th

Priority order
Centre-left
5th

Tradition

6th

7th

Benevolence

5th

2nd

Universalism

2nd

1st

Self-direction

3rd

3rd

Stimulation

9th

8th

Hedonism

8th

6th

Success

7th

9th

Power

10th

10th

1st

4th

Security

Table 2.2: Priority order of the ten values for the two major Italian political views (Vecchione, Tullio, and
Caprara, 2010)

40

Another interesting aspect would be to look at the relationship between traits and personal values.
Traits and values tell us different things about personality functioning. Each may be particularly
relevant to different aspects of the political process (Caprara, Schwartz, Capanna, Vecchione, and
Barbaranelli, 2006). Traits are enduring dispositions, whereas values are enduring goals. Traits
describe what people are like; values refer to what people consider important. Traits vary in the
frequency and intensity of their occurrence; values vary in their priority as standards for judging
behaviour, events, and people. People believe their values are desirable on a general level, whereas
traits may be positive or negative. People may explain behaviour by referring to traits or to values,
but they refer to values when they wish to justify choices or actions as legitimate or worthy (Bilsky
and Schwartz, 1994; Roccas, Sagiv, Schwartz, and Knafo, 2002).
The results from Capraras et al. study (2006) suggest that the emphasis of the centre-left
programmes on solidarity and collective well-being and on education and tolerance of diversity made
it more attractive to "friendly" and "open" people (ergo, it correlated with the traits Agreeableness
and Openness). The emphasis of the centre-right programmes on individual entrepreneurship and
business freedom probably made that coalition more attractive for "energetic, dominant" people
(Energy trait) and made voting for it more self-expressive. All in all however, values take primacy over
traits in predicting voting.

2.4 Issue voting

The term issue voting refers to when voters vote in elections based on political issues (Denver and
Hands, 1990; Nicholson, 2005). According to the theory of issue voting, voters compare the
candidates' respective principles (hence we go back to personalisation of politics) with their own in
order to decide for whom to vote (Denver and Hands, 1990; Campbell, 1964). In any case, it doesnt
mean that a voter needs to have an in-depth knowledge of how a candidate stands on every issue,
but rather a sense of which candidate they agree with the most (Denver and Hands, 1990; Nicholson,
2005). Voters use many different tactics to rationalize their view on a particular issue. Some people
look at what has happened in the past and predict how they think a particular issue will affect them
in the future (Denver and Hands, 1990). In order for a person to be an issue voter, they must be able
to recognize that there is more than one opinion about a particular issue, have formed a solid
opinion about it and be able to relate that to a specific political party (Moore, 1999). According to
Campbell, only 40 to 60% of the informed population even perceives party differences, and can thus
partake in party voting (Campbell, 1964). This would suggest that it is common for individuals to
develop opinions of issues without the aid of a political party.

41

Issue voting is also relevant in Italy. Among the various issues that made it into the electoral
campaign of the February 2013 general election we would like to focus on one: the issue of IMU
(Imposta municipale unica). But in order to talk about IMU, we have to start all the way back with ICI
(Imposta comunale sugli immobile). ICI was a fixed tax on property and terrains that was established
in 1992. During the party leader debate of the 2006 general election, Berlusconi surprisingly
proposed a cancellation of this tax. This proposal was considered one the more important reasons
for the run-up of the centre-right party, which ended up second by only a handful of votes. When
they finally won the elections in 2008 they cancelled the tax, but at the same time introduced a new
one: IMU. IMU was supposed to tax all real estate properties excluding the first house (the one
where the owner resides), starting from 2014. When Mario Monti became Prime Minister in a time
of crisis, looking for ways in which to placate the European Central Bank, he anticipated IMU to 2012
and, more importantly, he extended the tax to the first house. The centre-right parties (mainly
Berlusconi) promoted the abolition of IMU during the campaign, with slogans, too, in which we could
find some Moral Foundations message (home is sacred). Less clear was the standpoint of the
centre-left (Bellucci, 2013). But how did the voting go?
52% were in favour of the abolition of IMU22. There are some interesting findings connected to socioeconomic factors. For instance, voters from the north of the country were less likely to be in favour
of banning the tax than voters from the centre or south (-10 vs. +10 and +12, respectively23), the
higher the education, the less likely to be against the tax (+10 elementary, +3 middle school, -4 high
school, -8 university), but the most interesting point is to see the standpoint towards the abolition
based on the number of houses one owns. We could think that the people who own just one house
would be the most against it, since they werent supposed to pay anything, and all of the sudden
they have to, but results show the contrary. Those who are for the abolition of the tax are people
who own three or more houses (+9; quite understandable since they are those who pay the most),
and those who own none (+10). People who own just one or two houses, are on average against (!)
banning the tax (-3 and -5 respectively).
The last part that Bellucci (2013) analyzed in his work is IMU and ideological orientation and political
affiliation. The standpoint towards the abolition of IMU when compared with ideological orientation
is -16,7 left, -5,7 centre, +18,8 right, +3,4 non-aligned. When compared with the party voted for, the
result is -15,6 PD (Democratic Party), -9,3 Civic Choice, -0,8 M5S (Five Star Movement), +26,5 PDL
(People of Freedom).

22

Voters were asked about their viewpoint on the abolition of IMU by placing themselves on a 7-point scale,
where 1 meant Ban IMU even at the cost of reducing the resources of the city and 7 IMU should be kept to
guarantee the services offered by the city. The 52% are those who placed themselves in 1-3.
23
These numbers indicate the difference in percentage points from the average.

42

2.5 Ideological Orientation

Left-right continuum is arguably the most important policy dimension shaping vote choice. This
observation builds on literature suggesting that ideology plays a central role in contemporary
democratic politics. Theres a vast amount of evidence that the left-right continuum shapes party
competition (Laver and Budge, 1993; Budge and Robertson, 1987; Huber and Inglehart, 1995;
Knutsen, 1998); that it determines legislative voting (Poole and Rosenthal, 1997) and government
spending priorities (Blais, Blake, and Dion, 1993); and that it affects coalition outcomes (Warwick,
1992).
So whats the ideological situation of Italy? Italy experienced an interesting phenomenon, where
after many decades of having a centre party in government (UC, Unione Cristiana), there followed a
certain emptying of the centre. As Vassallo (2006) shows, the five points from left to right passed
from being represented in 1994 as roughly 21% - 20% - 22% - 23% - 13% (very similar selfidentification for all points, but for the right) to 15% - 27% - 15% - 28% - 13% (forming a sort of two
peaks) in 2004. Baldassari (2013) shows us that in 2006 the values moved to 17% - 29% - 19% - 22% 12%, and in 2013 to 15% - 25% - 27% - 24% - 12%. This might show a strengthening of the centre, but
while it might work on the ideological level, it did not show in the results (where the main openly
centrist party failed the elections, as will be shown in chapter 3).
The quota of non-aligned remained stable at around 15% of those asked to place themselves on the
left-right continuum, and as in the past, not aligning is an expression of a refusal of tout court politics,
more than an indicator of new political affiliation. Indeed amongst those who did not vote, 34%
declared to be non-aligned.
When looking at the voters who place themselves on the left-right continuum, one thing to be noted
is that while there might be some differences between them when expressing their opinions on
issues (such as immigrants, traditional families, etc.), they are never on the opposite sides of the
barricades. So while right-wing voters are favourable to keeping the traditional family, lowering the
taxes, and reducing the number of immigrants, left-wing voters hold more moderate opinions, but
arent favourable to new types of marriages, increasing services, or increasing the number of
immigrants (when looking at the data, on a scale from 1 to 7 the differences between the two poles
would be of just one point).

2.6 Social Identity

The social identity theory was originally formulated by Henry Tajfel and John Turner in the 1970s and
the 1980s (Turner and Reynolds, 2010) as a way in which to explain intergroup behaviour (Tajfel and
Turner, 1979; 1986; Turner, 1999). A social identity can be described as the portion of an individuals
self-concept derived from perceived membership in a relevant social group (Turner and Oakes,
1986). It predicts certain intergroup behaviours on the basis of perceived group status differences,
43

the perceived legitimacy and stability of those status differences, and the perceived ability to move
from one group to another (Tajfel and Turner, 1979; Turner, 1999). The social identity theory
suggests that individuals care not only about their own benefits but also about the benefits to their
affiliated group members. Benefits can be of a symbolic nature, such as respect and perceived status
(Huddy, 2003).
The question now is how effectively can we use social identity as a prediction of voting behaviour?
Unfortunately we dont have access to relevant data from the last Italian election, but we might look
for clues somewhere else. Ben-Bassat and Dahan (2008) led an experiment to examine directly the
effect of social identity on voter turnout in local elections in Israel. They found strong empirical
support for social identity voting behaviour: Arabs would often vote for a candidate with the same
surname (ergo, belonging to the same clan), concretely a share of votes of 31,5 (SD 25,01) vs. 18,1
(18,21) as the share of votes to candidates in ballot boxes that dont contain their last name. They
found also that voter turnout in Arab municipalities was significantly higher than in Jewish
municipalities (which have relatively similar social structures to typical Western communities),
concretely in local elections there was 61,0% turnout for Jewish municipalities and 89,2% for Arab.
The situation is a little bit different in national elections where members of Jewish municipalities
seem to get more active, changing the voter turnout to 72,4% for Jewish municipalities and 63,1% for
Arab.

44

3 Voting Choice in Italy

3.1 Milestones in the History of Italian Politics from the 90s Till the Present
Days
The Italian writer Alberto Arbasino (1998) named his book Italian Landscapes with Zombies. Here
he describes with a certain degree of irony and desperation the Italian reality as a consequence of
the incessant return of unburied corpses of the Italian past (near and far), which usurp everything
alive, new, independent and meaningful. Absurd waves of immigration from Albania, created to a
large extent by the false gloss of Berlusconis TV, considered in Albania a sort of message from the
real world, the eternal hypocrisy and transformism of the Italian political class, a bringing of banality
to all ideals, myopia of the intellectuals, the devastating hegemony of television garbage everything
which is in these situations new, both politically and morally, is soon enough overrun by corpses of
the unburied past and reduced into another form of the old status quo.
Talking about being overrun by the past, a wonderful book by the Italian critic Alfonso Berardinelli
(1998) Italian Self-Portrait 1945-1998 divides Italian history into four parts: naturally without a
homeland, fascism behind the back, great transformation, and change or eternal return. Berardinelli
expresses the same pessimism as Arbasino: the past in Italy always wins again, past biases hold tight
the present and force it to look like the past more than it would be acceptable in a democracy.
Several contemporary political interpretations can be read with this same key.
But first things first lets start from the very beginning. After the Second World War Italy was
transformed from a monarchy to a parliamentary republic (from the year 1946). Not only did the
experience with the fascist regime of Benito Mussolini influence the accepted form of government,
but it also influenced the level of decentralization of the political system 24 (Kuta, 2013). The great
constitutional changes came later with an event, which serves as a threshold that scholars and public
opinion now conventionally use to distinguish between a First Republic during the period from 1948
to 1993 and a Second Republic after 1993 (Grilli di Cortona, 2007). The year 1993 is conventionally
taken as a watershed because this was the year of the popular referendum that led to abolition of
the emblematic proportional electoral system of the First Republic and its substitution by a quasimajoritarian system, which, starting in 1996, led to alternation in government between a centre-left
and a centre-right coalition (Fabbrini, 2006). In its turn, the quasi-majoritarian electoral system of
1993 was replaced in 2005 by a proportional electoral system.
During the First Republic, Italy was a member of the family of consensual democracies because it was
characterised by an ideological polarisation of a systemic nature between a communist bloc and an
anti-communist bloc, at least until the 1980s. Such a division could not allow for alternation in

24

Although the real political and economical decentralization happened in the late 90s.

45

government between alternative parties or party groupings. This ideological cleavage co-existed with
religious, social and territorial divisions stretching back at least as far as the beginnings of the
countrys history as a unified state. It was believed by the main political elites that such a multiple
system of cleavages could only be managed by means of a cautious and inclusive policy of mediation
and compromise between the main political forces that had emerged from the Resistance, in
particular Christian Democracy (Democrazia Cristiana, DC) and the Italian Communist Party (Partito
Comunista Italiano, PCI). However, for international reasons related to the geo-political divide
between the super-powers that defeated Nazism, it was impossible for the PCI to hold government
positions. Accordingly, a policy of consociation was pursued in the legislature, which, not accidentally
has long been celebrated as the central institution of the system of government (Cotta, 1990).
Consensual democracy allowed the country to consolidate its republican institutions, and thus enjoy
a period of extraordinarily rapid social and economic development and growth. Italy (unlike Greece,
for instance) not only escaped the tragedy of civil conflict in the immediate post-war period, but also
managed progressively to modernise itself, becoming a fully industrialised country (Woolf, 2007).
Nevertheless, consensual democracy has imposed a high price on the country. It has institutionalised
a common sense impermeable to the ideas of competition and individual responsibility (Luiss, 2008)
and it has justified attitudes towards corruption unheard of in other advanced industrialised
countries (Della Porta and Mny, 1995). Economic development ended up undermining the sociocultural foundations of the consensual model of democracy. After all, this model was not
underpinned by ethnic, linguistic or religious differences (as in Belgium, in Austria for a long time,
and in Israel), which are rather insensitive to cultural and economic changes, but by ideological
divisions, which are in contrast rather responsive to such changes. Although the economic
modernisation of Italy undermined the material bases of the consensual model, it was the changes in
the international system that brought this process to its final conclusion (Fabbrini and Della Sala,
2004).
Still, the decline of the old ideological conflict did not prevent it from being resurrected for reasons
of electoral advantage even in the post-Cold War period (as weve foreshadowed at the beginning of
this chapter). In contrast to what happened in other countries with a similar history of ideological
division like Spain, for example (Prez-Daz 1999), where the leaders of the main parties agreed to
break with the past in order to concentrate on projects for the future in Italy the past has never
really been superseded. Rather, the cleavages of post-unification Italy (for example the divide
between the North and the South of the country, or between church and state) have continued to be
employed by political leaders to fuel political conflict and to justify their social role. Once the fall of
the Berlin Wall in November of 1989 and the demise of the Soviet Union in August of 1991 had
undermined the international basis of the ideological polarisation, the most active sections of the
46

citizenry were able, in the face of the legislative inactivity of the governing parties, to launch a series
of referenda ushering in a period of reform in Italian democracy.
Political change through popular referenda has become a sort of established pattern in Italy (Barbera
and Morrone, 2003). Indeed, it is worth recalling that, in 2008, the threat of a popular referendum
drove the main political parties to overcome the logic of quarrelsome or negative coalitions, i.e.
coalitions formed to oppose someone rather than to promote a coherent political programme. It was
the anticipation of the effects of the referendum which in 2008 set in motion, first on the centre-left
and then on the centre-right, a dynamic of amalgamation around two new parties, the Democratic
Party (Partito Democratico, PD) and the People of Freedom (Popolo della Libert, PdL). However,
whereas the electoral reforms of 1991 and 1993 abandoned the consensual model of democracy
(driven by a search for the alternation in government that has finally became a reality since 1996),
the absence of a subsequent comprehensive institutional reform, in combination with a widespread
corporatist style of interaction of the pressure groups representing socio-economic interests, has not
yet allowed for the consolidation of a coherent model of competitive democracy (Fabbrini, 2009).
Not only that. The mani pulite (clean hands) action that led to the explained change from the First
to the Second Republic did not solve Italian problems because it was itself was a moral and political
problem. According to some authors (Blohradsk, 1999) the action Clean Hands wasnt a purifying
process, but a tragedy full of mistakes and lies. Police and judicial actions against the party system
filled the Italian public opinion with the impression that a crisis of the democratic society (which was
definitely the situation of the First Republic) could be solved through criminalization, ritual
decimation, and the humiliating decimation of its subjects. This event combined with a lack of
nationally shared civic virtues (beliefs which legitimate the democratic system and its abstract
principles) leads to a situation where the Italian citizen doesn't believe in the ability of the state to
force other citizens to respect a law, and, as such, doesn't have a motivation to respect it himself. He
is afraid of entering open games where he needs to test himself against others, because he doesnt
believe that they are playing according to the rules.
Nonetheless, Clean Hands did have an effect in changing the political reality. New coalitions have
been formed, meshing prior political antagonists into pragmatically organized entities, under new
banners, broadly appealing slogans, and contingently varying policies. Formerly, the conservativeright and the liberal-left differed on many sociological variables. For example, women, older people,
those with higher incomes and more professional or white-collar occupations, tended to vote for the
centre or the right. The new Italian coalitions cut across such traditional boundaries (Caciagli &
Corbetta, 2002).
The established order of Christian Democrats, Socialists, and Communists collapsed in the 1990s
after 40 years. Two main coalitions replaced them, centre-left and centre-right. Some former
47

Christian Democrats, ex-Socialists, ex-Republicans, and all the ex-Communists joined the centre-left.
The remaining Christian Democrats, Socialists, ex-Liberals, heirs of the neo-Fascists, and a separatist
movement from Northern Italy migrated to the centre-right. The centre-right coalition captured the
1994 election, but lost to the centre-left in 1996. The centre-left ruled the country until the next
elections in 2001, when the centre-right returned to power.
As in many other European countries, right and left in Italy had lost most of their traditional ethos.
Both coalitions championed the principles of liberal democracy. However, the centre-right
emphasized entrepreneurship and the market economy as a means to generate wealth and provide
people with the resources to protect their security. It also emphasized security, limited government,
and family and national values. In contrast, the centre-left continued to advocate the merits of the
welfare state, expressed strong concern for social justice, and emphasized pluralism and equality
(Bobbio, 1994; Caciagli & Corbetta, 2002; Veneziani, 1994) (Caprara et al., 2006).

3.2 Current Political System in Italy

3.2.1 The Legislative Branch
The legislative branch is composed of two chambers. The lower house in the Italian political system is
the Chamber of Deputies (Camera dei Deputati). It has 630 members elected by all Italian citizens
older than 18. 617 members are elected by proportional representation from party lists for each of
26 districts. Lombardy has three constituencies, Piedmont, Veneto, Latium, Campania and Sicily each
have two constituencies, and all the other 13 regions have one. Another Deputy is elected in the
Aosta Valley (Valle dAosta, a mountainous region in north-western Italy which was historically
autonomous) (Kuta, 2013).
A peculiarity of the Italian Parliament is the representation given to Italians who are permanently
living abroad (about 2.7 million people). Therefore, as well as the 618 nationally elected Deputies,
there are 12 elected in four distinct foreign constituencies.
The term of office of Deputies is five years, but Parliament may be dissolved by the President before
then if it proves impossible to form a stable government (this has happened six times since the war),
(Darlington, 2013).
The election system for the Chamber of Deputies is new and complex. In its newest form, it dates
only from 2005, and was used for the first time for the elections of 2006; its complexity derives from
the fact that it combines a proportional representation system (a version of which produced so many
weak post-war governments) with a prize for the coalition securing the largest number of votes (so
that the resulting government has a stronger basis than would otherwise be the case).

48

Out of the 617 mandates, the first 340 are given on a national basis to the winner, be it a party or
coalition. If its a collation, the mandates are distributed among the parties using the dHont Method
(where you divide the results by whole numbers, starting from 1; see below). This corresponds
roughly to a 54% majority, and these mandates are given even if the represented number is not
reached, thus serving as a sort of prize for the winner, who will always hold at least 54% of the
seats.

Explaining dHonts Method

Lets assume that there are four parties competing for 8 seats. Party A obtains 100.000 votes,
Party B 80.000, Party C 30.000, and Party D 20.000. We put all the parties in a table, divide the
number of votes by whole numbers starting by 1, and then take the 8 highest results of this
division and assign the seats.

/1
/2
/3
/4
/5
/6
/7
/8 Seats won (*)
Party A 100,000* 50,000* 33,333* 25,000* 20,000 16,666 14,286 12,500
4
Party B 80,000* 40,000* 26,666* 20,000 16,000 13,333 11,428 10,000
3
Party C 30,000* 15,000 10,000 7,500 6,000 5,000 4,286 3,750
1
Party D 20,000 10,000 6,666 5,000 4,000 3,333 2,857 2,500
0
The remaining 277 mandates are distributed among the other parties, who took part in the elections,
using the method of the electoral quota, and the undistributed mandates using the method of the
highest residue (or best loser)25 (Kuta, 2013).
To obtain seats, some thresholds must be surpassed on a national basis as follows:
-

a minimum of 10% for a coalition (if this requirement is not met, the 4% limit for single
parties apply)

a minimum of 4% for any party not in a coalition

a minimum of 2% for any party in a coalition (however, the first party in a coalition that rates
below 2% is also assigned seats).

The Chamber of Deputies currently sits in a palace: the Palazzo Montecitorio.

The upper house in the Italian political system is the Senate, which has equal legislative rights to the
Chamber of Deputies. It has 315 members elected by all Italian citizens older than 25. 309 members
are elected by a system of proportional representation based upon party lists for the 20 regions of
Italy.
As mentioned earlier, an oddity of the Italian Parliament is the representation given to Italians
abroad. Therefore, as well as the 309 nationally elected Senators, there are 6 elected in four distinct
foreign constituencies. The term of office of elected Senators is five years.
25

Mandates are distributed to each party and coalition dividing the number of obtained votes by the number
of votes needed to gain a mandate. If there are some undistributed mandates left, these residual mandates are
given to the parties with the most unused votes.

49

As well as these 315 elected Senators, the Senate includes former Presidents and appointed Senators
for life (no more than five) by the President of the Republic according to special constitutional
provisions (Darlington, 2013). However it has not been clarified if each president has the power to
designate up to five senators or if five is the total number of senators for life who might sit in the
Senate (Central Intelligence Agency, 2013).
The electoral system for the Senate is very similar to the one for the Chamber of Deputies, but it is in
many ways transferred from a national to a regional basis. Therefore the thresholds (which are
different) are applied on a regional basis as follows:
-

a minimum of 20% for a coalition

a minimum of 8% for any party not in a coalition

a minimum of 3% for any party in a coalition (there is no exception for the first party in a
coalition below this threshold, as in the lower house)

The coalition that wins the largest number of seats in a region is automatically given 55% of that
region's seats, if it has not reached that percentage already (Darlington, 2013). The remaining 45% of
the mandates are distributed at a regional level among the other parties using the proportional
representation (meaning that the number of mandates given is proportionate to the number of votes
received), (Kuta, 2013). In contrast to the situation for the Chamber of Deputies, there is no
mechanism to guarantee a nation-wide majority in the Senate.
So the real oddity in this electoral system is the lack of a 'prize' in the Senate. As widely confessed by
Roberto Calderoli (a Senator from the Northern League and the creator of this electoral law), the
new electoral system was written and approved during the last months of the Berlusconi
Government in order to put the new winning coalition (at that time the Centre-Left coalition was
substantially ahead in the opinion polls) in trouble with a weak majority in the Senate. In Italy, this
electoral law is infamous and well known by everybody for its amusing nickname, the porcata (a
rather rude way to say a load of rubbish) and this is the name that television and newspapers often
use to refer to it.
The Senate currently sits in a palace: the Palazzo Madama (Darlington, 2013).
The legislative initiative is held by the government, any member of parliament and of an institution
established by the constitution (art. 71 of the constitution). A proposal for a new law can come also
from civil initiative, if its signed by at least fifty thousand citizens. A discussion of the law then
happens in both chambers, and one chamber cant outvote the other. The president declares the
passing of laws. A law can be revised by the electors through a referendum 26 if the request has been

26

A referendum is valid (meaning, a law is cancelled), if the majority of electors at a 50% attendance vote for
the annulment of the law.

50

made by at least 500 thousand electors or five regional councils (art. 75 of the constitution) 27 (Kuta,
2013).
3.2.2 The Executive Branch
Under the constitution of 1948, the head of state is the President of the Republic. He is elected for
seven years in a secret ballot by a two-thirds majority of the Parliament sitting jointly with 58
regional delegates. If after three rounds of voting no candidate can secure a two-thirds majority,
then for further rounds a simple majority will suffice.
The Italian President of the Republic represents the state externally (authorization of diplomats,
ratification of international treaties; art. 87 of the constitution) and internally (guarantee of the
legislation process, president of the Supreme Defence Council, of the Superior Judicial Court; art. 87
of the constitution). Among the less common responsibilities of the president are his authority to call
referenda and authorizing the presentation of proposed governmental decrees to Parliament. The
President also formally dissolves one or both chambers of the parliament after consulting with both
chairmen. The President isnt politically accountable; he can be dismissed only through constitutional
prosecution by the parliament in a joint session with an absolute majority of votes (Kuta, 2013).
The current President of the Republic is Giorgio Napolitano, who is a former Communist Party
member. He was elected first in 2006, and then in April 2013, Napolitano was re-elected for an
unprecedented second term at the age of 87. This reflected the inability of the deadlocked
Parliament elected two months previously to select a different President (Darlington, 2013).
Day to day power is exercised by the government. The government in Italy must receive support
from both chambers of the parliament. Any of the two chambers can revoke its support (art. 94 of
the constitution). In order to do so an official request by a tenth of the members of the chamber is
necessary. The government functions as a collective organ which is accountable for its work as a
whole (Kuta, 2013). The head of the government is the President of the Council/Prime Minister who
is nominated by the President of the Republic (one needs to be careful with the term President in
Italy) and confirmed by the Parliament (art. 92 of the constitution).
It is the President of the Council/Prime Minister who proposes the other ministers (formally named
by the President of the Republic). The Government ministers make up the Council of Ministers. Viceministers - called Sottosegretari (Undersecretaries) - are not formal members of the Council.
In Italy, anyone can be appointed a minister, with no requirement to be a member of Parliament or a
political party. Indeed, when Mario Monti became President of the Council/Prime Minister, he
ensured that all his 17-strong cabinet were technocrats with more than a third of them professors.

27

This doesnt apply to laws which deal with taxes, the budget, amnesty, abolition and aggregation, and
international treaties.

51

Italian Governments are notoriously unstable. In fact, since 1945 only one has served a full five-year
term of office (Darlington, 2013).
3.2.3 The Judicial Branch
The Constitutional Court of Italy (the countrys supreme court) is a post-war institution. It is
composed of 15 judges: one-third appointed by the President, one-third elected by Parliament, and
one-third elected by the ordinary and administrative supreme courts (Darlington, 2013); judges serve
up to 9 years.
The other senior court is the Court of Cassation, which is organized into penal, civil, administrative,
and military divisions, each with a president and several judges (Central Intelligence Agency, 2013).
Given the conflict and corruption in the Italian political system, the courts in Italy find themselves
embroiled in political issues in a manner largely unknown elsewhere in Europe. So it was the courts
who played a major role in provoking the fundamental political restructuring and realignments of the
early 1990s as a result of the exposure of the corruption-based system called Tangentopoli (Italian
for bribesville) that dominated the country until the Mani pulite (clean hands) investigation
delivered it a (possibly fatal) blow in 1992. The clean hands operation exposed corruption at the
highest levels of politics and big business. Several former prime ministers were implicated and
thousands of businessmen and politicians were investigated (Darlington, 2013).Italian General
Election, February 2013
3.2.4 Electoral campaign
The severity of the global economic crisis strongly penalized governments in all the elections which
were held recently in South Europe. Displeasure, fear, and uncertainness about the future
determined the electoral defeats of the governing parties and gave voice to new protest forms, both
from the right as from the left. Italy was no exception (Bellucci and Segatti, 2013). Following the
European sovereign debt crisis, Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi resigned from his position in
November 2011. He was replaced as Prime Minister by the Senator for Life Mario Monti, who took it
up to create a technocratic government.
In December 2012, Berlusconi announced his intention to run for Prime Minister for a fourth time.
Shortly after, his party, People of Freedom (PdL), withdrew its endorsement for Monti's Cabinet and
Monti announced that he would resign (Frye, 2012) after sending the annual budget to parliament,
which was expected by Christmas. The Constitution of Italy then requires an election to be held
within 70 days of the dissolution of parliament by President Giorgio Napolitano. Monti's resignation
came after he said that, following the PdL's withdrawal, he "matured [to] the conviction that we
could not continue like this any longer," (Thuburn, 2012).

52

During Monti's mandate, Italy faced tax increases and state spending cuts, as well as reforms
intended to improve the competitiveness of the Italian economy (Scherer, 2012). On the other hand,
PdL parliamentary party leader Angelino Alfano told parliament on 7 December that Italy's debt,
unemployment, and tax rates had risen in contrast to the economy since Monti had become prime
minister. In approximately one year since Monti had taken office, unemployment had risen by almost
two percent (Black, 2012). Previously Monti had controversially told the rising tide of unemployed
youths to forget about a steady job for life, saying such is "monotonous [anyway and] it's nice to
change and take on challenges." He also called for changes to Article 18 of the 1970 Workers Statute
that forbids companies with over 15 employees from sacking an employee without a "just cause",
saying that it "can be pernicious for Italy's growth." 28 Indeed these became some of the main topics
of the election campaign of several parties (Kuta, 2013).
The same reforms and austerity-focused policies which upset many Italians are perceived to have
improved international confidence in Italy29. Monti was supported by other Eurozone leaders, such
as Germany's Angela Merkel and former French President Nicolas Sarkozy (Hewitt, 2012). Merkel's
spokesman, Georg Streiter, said that she had "always worked well" with Monti and "had a
relationship of esteem"; however, when asked about Berlusconi, he said it was not up to him to
decide domestic politics of other countries 30. German Finance Minister, Wolfgang Schuble, added
that he did not foresee "any destabilisation in the eurozone [but] expect[ed] Italy to keep going
forward by respecting its European commitments."31 In reaction, financial markets fell on speculation
of further instability (Nazareth, and Cimino, 2012)32; while, specifically, Italian 10-year bond yields
rose by 0.4% to reach 4.87% and the Italian stock exchange's flagship index dropped by over 3.5% 33.
From the summer of 2012, a number of parties and movements from the so-called "Third Pole" of
the political spectrum, including Pier Ferdinando Casini's Union of the Centre (UdC), Gianfranco Fini's
Future and Freedom (FLI), Luca Cordero di Montezemolo's Toward the Third Republic (VTR), as well
as a number of other politicians from both PD and PdL, pushed for the direct involvement of Mario
28

Monti tells young Italians to forget steady job for life. Retrieved 28.08.2013 from
http://www.lagazzettadelmezzogiorno.it/english/monti-tells-young-italians-to-forget-steady-job-for-lifeno490165/
29
What Italys Election Result May Mean for the Markets and your Investment Portfolio? Retrieved 28.08.2013
from http://www.thomaswhite.com/pdf/Italian-election-results-and-your-investment-portfolio.pdf
30
Berlin
praises
Monti,
no
comment
on
Berlusconi.
Retrieved
28.08.2013
from
http://www.lagazzettadelmezzogiorno.it/english/berlin-praises-monti-no-comment-on-berlusconi-no575919/
31
Berlin
expects
Italy
to
respect
commitments.
Retrieved
28.08.2013
from
http://www.lagazzettadelmezzogiorno.it/english/berlin-expects-italy-to-respect-commitments-no575906/
32
European markets spooked by Monti resignation announcement. Retrieved 28.08.2013 from
http://www.lagazzettadelmezzogiorno.it/english/european-markets-spooked-by-monti-resignationannouncement-no575890/
33
Italian
spread
soars,
markets
slump
on
Monti
announcement.
Retrieved
from
http://www.lagazzettadelmezzogiorno.it/english/italian-spread-soars-markets-slump-on-montiannouncement-no575952/

53

Monti in an election. Monti's statement that he would resign after the budget was passed, was
suggested by Reuters to be indicative of him seeking to run for office.
Monti also told a press conference in France that "populism" was dangerous, and he further said that
a failure to pass the budget "would render more serious the government crisis, also at a European
level" and that his resignation would then be "irrevocable." The two largest parties in parliament, the
PdL and the Democratic Party (PD) said they would be willing to work together to expedite the
passage of the budget. PD Secretary Pier Luigi Bersani said: "Faced with the irresponsibility of the
right that betrayed a commitment it made a year ago before the whole country... Monti responded
with an act of dignity that we profoundly respect." PD Deputy Secretary Enrico Letta said of the PdL's
withdrawal from the government that "the financial markets will judge this latest outburst by
Berlusconi and they certainly will not judge it positively." Bersani had won the centre-left primary
election shortly before PdL withdrew from the government (Hewitt, 2012). Following a defeat in the
primary, Mayor of Florence Matteo Renzi ruled out an approach, in writing, from Berlusconi's PdL to
join the party during the election. In the following weeks, both PD and Left Ecology Freedom (SEL)
announced their intention to hold primary elections for MP candidates on 29 and 30 December.
The possibility of Monti getting directly involved in the election was seen as increasingly likely after
the government crisis in December later that year, as Monti was invited to a European People's Party
meeting at which Berlusconi was present too. A few days later, Monti published a political agenda for
Italy, dubbed the "Monti agenda", and offered it to all political parties. After the Third Pole promptly
agreed to use it as their own platform for the upcoming elections, talks started regarding a direct
involvement of Monti as premiership candidate. On 28 December 2012, following a 4-hour meeting
and after being publicly backed by the Vatican regarding a potential bid, Monti publicly announced
his candidacy as head of the Third Pole, which ran in the Senate as a unique component provisionally
named "Monti's Agenda for Italy", and in the Lower House as a coalition of several components 34.
Berlusconi said the platform his party would run on included opposition to Monti's economic
performance, which he said put Italy into a "recessive spiral without end." He also told the media, on
the sidelines of AC Milan's practice session (the football club he owns along with Mediaset, the
largest media outlet in the country): "I race to win. To win, everyone said there had to be a tested
leader. It's not that we did not look for one. We did, and how! But there isn't one... I'm doing it out of
a sense of responsibility." Berlusconi and Five Star Movement (M5S) leader Beppe Grillo criticised the
eurozone and Germany's influence on European policy. Grillo wrote that the average Italian "is
literally terrified about the prospect of five more years of Monti-like rule." (Scherer, 2012)

34

Mario Monti to lead Italy centrist coalition. Retrieved 28.08.2013 from http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/worldeurope-20859926

54

On 8 December 2012, a new political party was formed around a think tank named Fermare il Declino
(Stop the Decline), on an initiative by the economic journalist Oscar Giannino and supported by
various economists. On 19 December 2012, the name FARE per Fermare il Declino ("ACT to Stop The
Decline") was chosen, and a list was presented with Oscar Giannino as PM candidate. The party's
programme35 was also introduced, roughly attempting to reduce the role of the State in the
economy, reduce the national debt through disposing of redundant assets, and to propose market
liberalizations and privatizations.
On 29 December 2012, a new coalition, Civil Revolution (RC), was formed with the support of Italy of
Values (IdV), Orange Movement (MA), Federation of the Left (FdS), and Federation of the Greens
(FdV). It was led by the celebrated magistrate, Antonio Ingroia and Mayor of Naples, Luigi de
Magistris. FdS co-leader Paolo Ferrero said it would be a "Fourth Pole" that would bring new hope for
the left36. Civil Revolution attempted to solicit M5S to join them, saying "the door is open." Grillo,
however, turned them down, writing on his blog "... the door is open for M5S? Well, thank you, but
close the door again, please." 37
On 7 January 2013, Berlusconi announced that he had penned a coalition agreement with Lega Nord
(LN); as part of it, PdL would support Roberto Maroni's bid for the presidency of Lombardy, and he
would run as "leader of the coalition", but suggested he could accept a role as Minister of Economy
under a cabinet headed by another People of Freedom member, such as Angelino Alfano. Later that
day, LN leader Maroni confirmed that his party would not support a new candidacy of Berlusconi as
Prime Minister in the case of an electoral win38.
3.2.5 Party system
Many parties joined the fight for power in this election, and it should be our task to present them a
bit more deeply, rather than just mentioning them by name. Theres a tradition of many parties,
which then join in pre-electoral coalitions. This tradition goes back all the way to the First Republic,
the number of parties multiplied with the beginning of the Second Republic, and finally the year 2005
institutionalized a certain degree of bipolarism (Kuta, 2013). In our analysis we will avoid presenting
all the parties, and focus just on the main ones.
35

Fare per Fermare il Declino Programma [Act to Stop the Decline Program]. Retrieved 28.08.2013 from
http://www.interno.gov.it/mininterno/export/sites/default/it/assets/files/25_elezioni/57_FARE_PER_FERMAR
E_IL_DECLINO.PDF
36
Rivoluzione Civile raccoglie oggi lappoggio di Rifondazione Comunista in Umbria [Civil Revolution obtains
today the support from Communist Re-establishment in Umbria]. Retrieved 28.08.2013 from
http://tuttoggi.info/articolo/51000/
37
Elezioni 2013, Beppe Grillo risponde allapertura di Antonio Ingroia: Chiuda pure la porta, suo movimento
una foglia di fico [Elections 2013, Beppe Grillo replies to the opening of doors by Antonio Ingroia: Feel free to
close the door, your movement is a fig leaf]. Retrieved 28.08.2013 from http://www.huffingtonpost.it/
2012/12/29/grillo-ingroia-chiuda-pure-la-porta_n_2381357.html?1356807443&utm_hp_ref=italy
38
Silvio Berlusconi wont stand for PM. Retrieved 28.08.2013 from http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/worldeurope-20932312

55

The Democratic Party is a social-democratic political party. It was founded on the 14th of October
2007 as a merger of various left-wing and centrist parties which had been part of The Union in the
2006 general election. While several parties merged into the Democratic Party, its bulk was formed
by the Democrats of the Left (heirs of the Italian Communist Party) and Democracy is Freedom The
Daisy (Slomp, 2011, p. 406). Within the party, an important role is played by Christian leftists, who
are direct heirs of the late Christian Democracy's left.
Seeing the complicated history full of changes and re-apparition, it should come as no surprise that
the ideological background is quite varied. Indeed the main areas can be summarised as the
following:
-

Social Democracy: emphasizes labour and social issues. Many different currents are present
here, from traditional social democrats (led by Massimo DAlema) supportive of democratic
socialism, to third way types (led by Walter Veltroni), who are strongly influenced by
American liberalism and New Labour ideas.

Christian left: heirs of the left-wing part of Christian Democracy. This is also a homogenous
group, from TeoDem, which is considered the most right-wing faction of the Democratic
Party, to/and social Christians, who adhere to Christian socialism.

Social liberalism: in a way the new faces, headed by Enrico Letta.

Green politics: the ecologist stream of the party.

Big Bangers: the emerging trend represented by Matteo Renzi (Rini, 2013).

While it would be hard to define more concretely the ideological backgrounds of some of the trends
(it would require more space than what we can offer in this thesis), we can quite confidently
attribute them a centre-left political position. The last point to mention is that the Democratic Party
is a member of the Progressive Alliance of Socialists and Democrats 39, a European Parliament group.
The People of Freedom is (or rather was) a liberal-conservative political party. It was launched by
SIlvio Berlusconi on the 18th of November 2007 as a federation of political parties, which was later
transformed into a party during a party congress from 27 to 29 March 2009. In June 2013 Berlusconi
announced Forza Italia's revival and the PdL's transformation into a centre-right coalition40. On 16
November 2013 the PdL's national council voted to dissolve the party and start a new Forza Italia, the
name of his original political movement. The assembly was deserted by a group of dissidents, led by
the secretary of PdL Angelino Alfano, who had launched the alternative New Centre-Right party the
day before (Hornby and Mackenzie, 2013).

39

Parties. Retrieved 21.11.2013 from http://www.socialistsanddemocrats.eu/about-us/parties-page

Berlusconi annuncia ritorno di Forza Italia. Temo che sar ancora il numero uno [Berlusconi announces the
return of Forza Italia. I feel that I will still be the number one]. Retrieved 21.11.2013 from
http://www.repubblica.it/politica/2013/06/28/news/berlusconi-62047776/
40

56

The People of Freedom also has a rich history of changes. Indeed, depending on the date of the
article, the faction division appears each time completely different. So while the party's main cultural
strains were Christian democracy and liberal conservatism41, we cant underestimate the weight that
some prominent members from the internal extremes of the party brought. For example, there were
present four former members of the Socialist Party of Italy as leading ministers in Berlusconi IV
Cabinet (8 May 2008 to 16 November 2011; Cazzullo, 2009; Romano, 2008). Traditional values and
the social market economy grew in importance in the rhetoric of the new party, partly replacing the
small government and libertarian ideals expressed by FI. In this respect, Sacconi summarised the
economic propositions of PdL with the slogan "less state, more society" (Rizzo, 2010). However, in
PdL there was still some room for Reaganomics, with Berlusconi often making the case for lower
taxes and Tremonti for deregulation and against red tape (Bagnoli, 2010; Tamburello, 2010;
Verderami, 2011). All in all, PdL holds a centre-right political position and is a member of the
European Peoples Party42.
The specialty of this election, the Five Star Movement, is perhaps the hardest one to define. It was
launched by Beppe Grillo, a popular activist, comedian and blogger, and Gianroberto Casaleggio, a
web strategist, on 4 October 200943. What started as a series of simple meetings to discuss ideas
eventually turned out to generate public mobilisation and civic activity perhaps best represented
with the V-Day (Grillo, 2007). Eventually they started supporting candidates for politics and even
creating civic lists for elections (Grillo, 2008). The Five Star Movement or its candidates did fairly well
on several local or regional elections, notably in Sicily where they became the most voted party 44.
If for other Italian parties it is hard to define their ideological orientation, for the Five Star Movement
its doubly so. Starting as a meeting group, the party established a tradition of deciding about its
programme through internet discussion and vote. Yet, some researchers have tried to define their
ideology and they came up with these tags: populist, anti-corruption, environmentalist, participatory
democracy, direct democracy, and E-democracy (Kuta-2013). It also advocates Euro-scepticism
(Mollica, 2012), the principles of zero-cost politics45, nonviolence (Redazione Italia, 2013), and

41

Parties and Elections: Italy. Retrieved 21.11.2013 from http://www.parties-and-elections.eu/italy.html

Italy. Retrieved 21.11.2013 from http://www.eppgroup.eu/italy
43
Notizie
in
minuti
[News
in
minutes].
Retrieved
21.11.2013
from
http://archiviostorico.corriere.it/2009/ottobre/05/NOTIZIE_DUE_MINUTI_co_9_091005092.shtml.
A waning star? Retrieved 21.11.2013 from http://www.economist.com/node/21563762
44
Elezioni Regionali 28 ottobre 2012 Sicilia [Regional election 28 October 2012 Sicily]. Retrieved 22.11.2013
from http://www.repubblica.it/static/speciale/2012/elezioni/regionali/sicilia.html#risultati
45
Zero
cost
politics.
Retrieved
22.11.2013
from
http://www.beppegrillo.it/en/2010/05/
zero_cost_politics_1.html
42

57

degrowth46. Seeing these aspects and their constant attack on the political establishment, for
example against the particracy 47, we can safely add the label of anti-establishment party.
Lastly we will look at Montis party Civic Choice. The party was formed in the run-up to the 2013
general election to support the outgoing Prime Minister and continue his political agenda48. It was
composed of several groups and individuals, who were represented in the partys lists. Examples
include Towards the Third Republic (a political manifesto for a new centrist political party in Italy),
ministers of Montis technocratic government, dissidents from PdL and PD, etc. (Dino, 2013). In the
election, Civic Choice was part of a centrist coalition named With Monti for Italy, along with the
Union of the Centre of Pier Ferdinando Casini and Future and Freedom of Gianfranco Fini (Hornby,
2013). After the catastrophic results of the election (where they obtained only 8,3% of the vote)
internal struggles started appearing, until eventually on the 17 th of October 2013 Monti resigned as
president of the Civic Choice, which led to a break-up of the party49.
Due to the very short history of the party, and the concrete reason for which it was created, its hard
to make a deeper analysis of its ideological foundation. Technically, since the goal of the party was to
further Montis agenda, then its ideology is the same as Montis ideology, which was defined as
centrist and liberalist50. With Monti gone its a question of whether the party will be reformed, with a
more concrete ideology, or disappear completely.
3.2.6 Election and aftermath
Pre- election surveys of autumn 2012 showed an unequivocal lead of the centre-left coalition led by
the Democratic Party (PD). But step by step Grillos M5S started gaining popularity. During the
analysis of the pre-election situation many were considering a coalition between the left and the
centre around Monti. Therefore, the elections of 24-25 of February brought an undeniable surprise
(Kuta, 2013). The results of the election can be found in Table 3.1 and 3.2.

46

La denuncia di Latouche: Vogliono delegittimare Grillo e il M5S [Latouches denunciation: They want to
delegitimize Grillo and the M5S]. Retrieved 22.11.2013 from http://www.lafucina.it/2013/11/20/la-denunciadi-latouche-vogliono-delegittimare-grillo-e-il-m5s/
47
Codice di comportamento eletti MoVimento 5 Stelle in Parlamento [Code of conduct for elected members of
the Five Star Movement in the Parliament]. Retrieved 22.11.2013 from http://www.beppegrillo.it/movimento/
codice_comportamento_parlamentare.php
48
Italys Mario Monti presents own election list and motto. Retrieved 25.11.2013 from
http://www.gazzettadelsud.it/news/english/29123/Italy-s-Mario-Monti-presents-own-election-list-andmotto.html
49
Mario Monti si dimette da Scelta Civica [Mario Monti resigns from Civic Choice]. Retrieved 25.11.2013 from
http://www.sceltacivica.it/doc/1071/mario-monti-si-dimette-da-scelta-civica.htm
La delibera del Comitato Direttivo di Scelta Civica del 22 ottobre [The resolution of the Steering Committee of
Civic Choice of the 22nd of October]. Retrieved 25.11.2013 from http://www.sceltacivica.it/doc/1078/ladelibera-del-comitato-direttivo-di-scelta-civica-del-22-ottobre.htm
50
Parties and Elections: Italy. Retrieved 21.11.2013 from http://www.parties-and-elections.eu/italy.html

58

Party

N
8.644.523

%
25,4

Seats (ItalyPrice)
N
%
292
47,3

Total Bersanis coalition

10.047.808

29,5

340

55,1

10.353.275

345

The People of Freedom

7.332.972

21,6

97

15,7

7.478.796

98

Total Berlusconis coalition

9.922.850

29,2

124

20,1

10.074.109

125

Five Star Movement

8.689.458

25,6

108

17,5

8.797.902

109

Civic Choice

2.824.065

8,3

37

6,0

3.004.739

39

Total Montis Coalition

3.591.607

10,6

45

7,3

3.773.636

47

34.002.524

100,0

617

100,0

35.057.287

630

Democratic Party

Total

Votes (Italy-Price)

Total
Votes
8.932.615

Seats
297

Table 3.1: Results of general election 24-25.2.2013 (Chamber of Deputies), (DAlimonte, Di Virgilio, and
Maggini, 2013).

Party

Votes

Seats

Total
Votes
Seats
8.683.690 109

Democratic Party

N
8.408.958

%
26,9

N
105

%
34,0

Total Bersanis coalition

9.988.118

31,9

119

38,5

10.262.850

123

The People of Freedom

6.829.587

21,9

98

31,7

6.965.639

98

Total Berlusconis coalition

9.502.774

30,6

117

37,9

9.638.826

117

Five Star Movement

7.382.109

23,6

54

17,5

7.471.671

54

With Monti for Italy

2.806.726

9,0

18

5,8

2.984.128

19

31.228.822

100,0

309

100,0

32.123.981

315

Total

Table 3.2: Results of general election 24-25.2.2013 (Senate), (DAlimonte, Di Virgilio, and Maggini, 2013).

As we can see, the results led to an interesting paradox. While the election system of the Chamber of
Deputies allows for an undisputed winner (in this case, Bersanis coalition) despite the similar
amount of votes amongst the first three coalitions, in the Senate the amount of votes is reflected
better in the number of seats. Arithmetically the results did not allow for the pre-election model of a
coalition between Monti and Bersani. Bersani as the winner in the Chamber of Deputies was
commissioned by president Napolitani in the second half of March to form a government coalition
(Davies, 2013a). After roughly a week Bersani announced that he probably wouldnt be able to fulfil

59

this task. He claimed the reason of his failure to be the inability to form a winning coalition in both
Chambers, which would be connected in their opinions. The main problem was the Senate, where
Monti and Bersani together did not have enough votes. Grillos Five Star Movement pushed for an
end of the so-called Montis Agenda (austerity and reforms). Bersani summarised the talks like a
continuous setting of conditions and reminders (Davies, 2013b).
The inability of the winner of the elections to create a government, which would get a vote of
confidence from both Chambers, brought back into the game president Napolitano. Napolitano
decided to establish a committee of experts (dubbed Napolitanos wise men) who had to prepare a
list of the most important steps to take, which could be supported by all the parties (OLeary, 2013;
Jones, 2013). Some people expressed an opinion of forming a technocratic government, whose prime
minister would receive the task to create an electoral reform and bring the country to anticipated
elections according to the new law (Day, 2013). However, the leader of the centre-right coalition
Berlusconi, towards the end of March, rejected the creation of a technocratic government with a
limited mandate. Instead he demanded the creation of a coalition according to the current
distribution of power51 (de facto the creation of a grand coalition, the first one in the history of the
Second Republic; Kuta, 2013).
The creation of a grand coalition, as it was the direction the talks were taking towards the end of
March, was however rejected by the leaders of the Democratic Party (PD), the reason being the
imminent elections of the future president (Napolitanos mandate ended on May). The figure of the
president was central also in solving the crisis resulting from the inability of any party to form a
government. According to the constitution, the president cant dissolve parliament six months
before the end of his mandate (art. 88 par. 2 of the constitution) in order to make way for
anticipated elections. Bersani rejected the creation of a grand coalition referring to Berlusconis
unpredictability during Montis mandate. In regards to this Berlusconi announced that the only way
out of the political crisis were anticipated elections as soon as possible (in June, July; Scherer, 2013).
The debates of political elites about the government stopped during the debates about the
presidential candidate. The first election took place on the 18 th of April, where former President of
the Senate, Franco Marini participated as a joint candidate for both Bersanis Democratic Party and
Berlusconis centre-right coalition. The first election was however unsuccessful because some of the
Democratic Party deputies did not agree with the nomination of Marini, mainly due to the very low
public support he had (Frye, 2013). In the end both parties managed to agree only on the retiring
president Giorgio Napolitani, who on the 23rd of April was elected president for another seven years.
The President emphasized during his inaugural speech that political parties are partially responsible
51

Italian president holds more talks after Bersani fails to find a majority. Retrieved 20.11.2013 from
http://www.dw.de/italian-president-holds-more-talks-after-bersani-fails-to-find-majority/a-16708678

60

for the current situation and called for a change in the electoral law, which would help avoid another
political crisis (Johnston, 2013).
A day after his re-election the President Napolitano entrusted the vice-chairman of the Democratic
Party Enrico Letta with the task of forming a government based on the cooperation of the two
biggest and strongest parties: the Democratic Party and the centre-right coalition (Montis Civic
Choice and UDC also became part of the coalition). This format would allow a vote of confidence in
both chambers of the parliament. The Five Star Movement was also invited to join the coalition, but
it chose to remain in opposition52. At the end of April 2013 the government (which included also
technocratic ministers) received a vote of confidence from both Chambers (Willey, 2013). In the
history of the Second Republic (from 1993) this is the first grand coalition (Kuta, 2013).

52

Enrico Letta set to become Italys new

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-22278038

61

prime

minister.

Retrieved

20.11.2013

from

4 The Italian General Elections of February 2013 and the Moral

Foundations Theory
4.1 Aims
The idea for this thesis owes much of its inspiration to Haidts (2012) book The Righteous Mind. In his
book there was an exposition the work he was doing with the Moral Foundations group which
consisted of indentifying and testing universal innate foundations that would explain the source of
morality and the division in causes in society. They identified five foundations53 (Harm, Fairness,
Ingroup, Authority, Purity) and through an extensive online questionnaire analysed the relation these
foundations have with self proclaimed ideology (from strongly liberal to strongly conservative). They
discovered that the strongly liberal scored very high in Harm and Fairness, and very low in Ingroup,
Authority, and Purity. As they progressively shifted more towards the right, the first two got lower,
and the other three higher, until reaching a point with strongly conservatives who held roughly the
same scores.
Thanks to the webpage at disposition where users could register and complete several
questionnaires, the Moral Foundations team got a wide range of respondents, albeit most of them
from the USA (see for example Graham et al., 2009). There has been little research done on the
effect of the Moral Foundations Theory in other countries. And this was our starting point.
We brought the theory to Italy, but in the process decided to try some innovative approaches too.
First of all we chose not to limit ourselves just to the use of the Moral Foundations, but to include
Moral Trade-Offs as well.
Moral Foundations is composed of items from both Moral Relevance and Moral Judgement. Moral
Relevance is a method where participants rate how relevant various concerns were to them when
making moral judgments. It is introspective and intuitive, with all the limits it comprises (Nisbett and
Wilson, 1977; Haidt, 2001). As such, reports of moral relevance are best understood as self-theories
about moral judgement, and they are likely to be concordant with explicit reasoning during moral
arguments (Graham et al., 2009). Moral Judgment is a more contextualized and concrete method. It
contains several types of items, from normative ideals to statements about government policy. This
approach requires participants to make moral judgements about cases that instantiate or violate the
abstract principles represented as Moral Foundations (ibid.). You can find examples of items of both
methods in chapter 4.2.
Moral Trade-Offs is a less used method of identifying the five foundations, the greatest difference
being than instead of taking an explicit approach (how important is for you this aspect of this
foundation?) they take an implicit one (how much money would I have to pay you to break a taboo
53

In their later works they introduced a sixth foundation Liberty/Oppression, but when we conducted our
experiment it hadnt been developed enough to be considered part of the solid core.

62

related to this foundation?). Moral Trade-Offs express a similar tendency to Moral Foundations
(decreasing Harm, increasing Ingroup, Authority, and Purity), but not completely identical (Fairness is
roughly equal for all ideological scales; Harm and Purity achieve lower scores compared to the other
foundations than they do in Moral Foundations). The fact that we decided to include Moral TradeOffs in our research already sets us apart from others (ibid.).
The second area of innovation is the country to which we bring Moral Foundations Theory. This
theory hasnt been used much in Italy (one example would be Bobbio, Nencini, and Sarrica, 2011, but
they focused mainly on the internal validity of the Italian translation of the Moral Foundations scale,
which found results similar to those of Graham et al., 2011) so by bringing it here, we enlarge the
number of theories tested in this country on the one hand, and on the other, analyze the results it
yields in a different environment.
The Moral Foundations Theory isnt the first, nor the only theory that deals with morality. One
possible existing framework for broadening the moral domain is research on values, which Schwartz
(2007, p. 712) has defined as trans-situational goals that vary in importance and serve as guiding
principles in the life of a person or a group (for reviews, also see Feldman, 2003; Rohan, 2000).
Schwartz operates with a set of 10 broad sets of values, which are Power, Achievement, Hedonism,
Stimulation, Self-Direction, Universalism, Benevolence, Tradition, Conformity, and Security. This
approach has been widely used in Italy and other countries, but perhaps the most interesting piece
of research is the one done by Piurko, Schwartz, and Davidov, 2011, where they analyzed the relation
between personal values and left-right political orientation in 20 countries.
Although the research unfortunately did not include Italy among the countries, by dividing the
analyzed countries into three categories (liberal, traditional, and post-communist) we can get a fairly
good impression of what the results of Italy would be as a traditional country according to the
researchers definition. For these countries tradition and conformity values correlated most
consistently with right self-placement, and universalism and self-direction correlated with left selfplacement. Why the need to mention Schwartz and his research? This might serve to give us a certain
idea or framework of how we should view the possible outcomes.
Returning to our research, another point in which we differ is the analysis of the link between the
foundations and voting intention. Generally speaking the main object of research is the correlation
between Moral Foundations and ideology. The main reason for that is probably again the country of
origin of the theory. The political system of the United States, having a bipartisanship, collects the
ideological opposing poles into two different parties: one for liberalism and one for conservatism 54.
However, in the process of attracting voters of the same ideological alignment its the ideological
54

As weve explained in chapter 1.5 it wasnt always like that, but we can safely assume that today thats the
situation.

63

extremes which are voiced the most, and its in this exchange of voices that the so-called cultural
war happens. The great chasm between the two representatives of the cultural war is what
stimulated the interest of the research team and what got them into analyzing the differences in the
perception of morality between liberals and conservatives.
However, other political realities might not show, at first glance, such a big cultural war, or it might
be configured differently. In Italy one of the reasons for this might be that by having a proportionate
system the big parties dont need to necessarily go for all the voters of their spectrum. As such, the
big parties can opt for a more moderate tone, while the smaller ones can adopt a stronger tone in
order to attract dissatisfied voters (this is the case for example for Popolo della Libert vs. Lega Nord,
the latter being smaller and with a more extreme programme). We therefore want to look into the
relationship between MFT and party preference (or in this case voting intention) beyond just
ideology, and try to see how similar the two scores are and if theres anything special that emerges.
For this purpose we decided to make use of the February 2013 general elections 55. These elections
were the result of a government crisis, where the previous Prime Minister, Mario Monti, leader of a
technocratic government lost support for his cause and had to call for anticipated elections. In a
sense it was a general vote about the choice of the Italian people whether they wanted to continue
with the austerity policies promoted by Monti, or opt for a different approach to resolving the crisis.
There are several peculiar points about the result of these elections:
1) Rejection of Monti: ending up in fourth place with a combined total of just 66 out of 945
seats, these elections were a clear rejection of the austerity policies brought by Mario Monti
and his government. Italians overall decided to place their hopes on other political subjects
wishing there would be other ways to solve the economic crisis that had had such a strong
impact on their nation.
2) Rise of Movimento 5 Stelle: although it had existed as a party since 2009, this was the first
time that Movimento 5 Stelle competed on a national level and the results were surprisingly
good. With almost 9 million votes (25% of the total) it achieved 163 seats a huge and rare
success for a completely new party, and a sign of distrust of the political culture up to that
point hoping for a change, for a new breeze that would bring life to the stale waters.
3) Political stalemate: these elections essentially created three mega-blocks the left lead by
Partito Democratico, the right lead by Popolo della Libert, and Movimento 5 Stelle. Each
block held roughly a third of the seats 56, making it impossible for a single party or block to
govern Italy, and forcing the negotiation of a coalition. However, the M5Ss leader Beppe
55

A more in-depth description of the elections can be found in chapter 3.2.

This is valid especially for the Senate. In the Chamber of Deputies the winning party gets a big bonus of seats,
but since both chambers are equally strong the lower one cant pass any laws without the higher one.
56

64

Grillo forbade forming a coalition57 essentially blocking the negotiation led by PDs leader
Bersani. Due to the personal animosity towards PdLs party leader Berlusconi a grand
coalition or M5S-PdL coalition was also impossible. This stalemate was eventually broken
after 127 days thanks to the intervention of the president (Strada, 2013).
So using Moral Foundations Theory and applying it to the Italian circumstances we came up with
several hypothesises that we wanted to verify:
-

Hypothesis 1: Moral Foundations and Moral Trade-Offs will show the same relative results
when analyzed together with other determinants. Both measures work in a different way,
one trying to go for a direct approach asking about the importance of aspects closely
connected to foundations, the other through an indirect approach asking about whether
money (as something mundane) is more important than a morality. They might not show the
same type of results (such as seen in Graham et al., 2009), but ultimately since both measure
the same moral foundations we expect that they will correlate highly enough with each other
and that they will give the same results when compared with other determinants.

Hypothesis 2: Moral Foundations and Moral Trade-Offs (from now on grouped together as
MF and MTO) will correlate in Italy with the socio-demographic factors in the same way as in
the USA. By this we mean that we expect several things. Women will score higher in Harm,
Fairness, and Purity, men in Ingroup and Authority. As far as traditional, or even
evolutionary, roles go, we expect these foundations to be more gender tied and that they
will reflect the results of America (Graham et al., 2011). Another point that we expect is that
higher levels of education will correlate with higher Harm and Fairness scores. On the other
hand a higher proclaimed relevance of religious life and church attendance will correlate
with higher Ingroup, Authority, and Purity scores. The level of education being one of the
keystones of the WEIRD society58 (E for Educated), there should be a bigger impact on the
foundations of individual morality. On the other hand, church life as a more traditional
aspect should bring up the bonding moralities.

Hypothesis 3: MF and MTO will show high scores in Harm and Fairness, and low scores in
Ingroup, Authority, and Purity for the ideological left, and roughly equal scores for all
foundations for the ideological right. The ideological centre will show signs of a midway.
Schwartz puts Italy as a traditional country, and the USA as a liberal one. However, seeing the
results on the research done by Piurko et al., 2011, and considering that both countries could
be considered WEIRD, they should show similar results when speaking about ideology.

57

Codice di comportamento eletti MoVimento 5 Stelle in Parlamento [Code of Conduct for the Movimento 5
Stelle elected to be in Parliament]. Retrieved 01.10.2013 from http://www.beppegrillo.it/movimento/
codice_comportamento_parlamentare.php
58
See chapter 1.1

65

Hypothesis 4: Voting intention should hold a similar score on MF and MTO according to the
ideological proximity of the party (e.g.: left-wing party voters with the same scores as people
who proclaimed to belong to the ideological left). We also predict that Movimento 5 Stelle
voters will score the lowest on Ingroup and Authority. The MF and MTO scores should be
similar but not identical due to the fact that some parties have a catch-all nature trying to
attract voters who at a first glance, dont correspond to the ideology of the party.
Nonetheless, the majority of the voters should be ideologically aligned and this core will keep
the results close to the previous ones. Regarding M5S, due to the fact that the movement
shows signs of being an anti-establishment party59, we would expect that the followers will
score very low in the foundations that are tied the closest to the establishment: Ingroup and
Authority. However for the other three its hard to make predictions because it is yet to be
seen whether it will manage to attract enough right-wing voters to even the foundations out,
or if the original left-wing aspect of the party will remain predominant, giving high Harm and
Fairness, and low Purity scores.

Hypothesis 5: Right-wing party voters will score higher in Energy, left-wing in Agreeableness.
In other traits they will have similar results. Centre party voters will hold scores which are a
midway between the two poles. Movimento 5 Stelle voters will score high in Openness and
low in Stability. No predictions for Conscientiousness. Being a new anti-establishment party,
we expect the voters to be open to novelty and with a desire to change things. Our
predictions on the right- and left-wing parties are based on research on party leaders which
has indicated the outcome which we are predicting (Vecchione et al., 2001).

4.2 Method
4.2.1 Participants
Participants were a non-random non-representative sample of 291 people (31,6% male, 46,7%
female, 21,6% did not include their gender) who were asked to fill in an online survey. Further
important categories are listed below:
-

Education: elementary education 0,3%, middle-school education 4,5%, professional

qualification 3,8%, high-school diploma 34,4%, university degree 35,4%, non-specified 21,6%

Current occupation: teacher/military 6.5%, executive 3,4%, salesman/employee 17,2%,

worker/farmer 1%, entrepreneur 4,1%, practitioner 6,5%, merchant 3,4%, pensioner 5,8%,
housewife 3,1%, student 22%, unemployed 3,4%, bankrupt 0,3%, looking for first
employment 1,4%, non-specified 21,6%

59

As presented more in detail in chapter 3.3.2

66

Religion: catholic 44,7%, non-catholic Christian 7,2%, Hebrew 0,3%, other religion 14,8%, non
believer 11,3%, non-specified 21,6%

The age range was 16-79 with an average of 39,74.

4.2.2 Materials
A questionnaire in Italian was used for the research. The questionnaire was divided into several parts
that will be presented here, but the whole questionnaire can be found in the Appendix section
(Appendix A). The English version of the Moral Foundations Questionnaire and its items can be found
at http://www.moralfoundations.org/.
1) Moral relevance items: participants first read When you decide whether something is right
or wrong, to what extent are the following considerations relevant to your thinking? They
then rated 10 moral relevance items on 6-point scales anchored by the labels never relevant
and always relevant. The items were written to be face-value measures of concerns related
to the five foundations, with the proviso that no item could have an obvious relationship to
partisan politics. Example of items:
Care: Whether or not someone cares for someone weak or vulnerable.
Fairness: Whether or not some people were treated differently than others.
Ingroup: Whether or not someones action showed love for his or her country.
Authority: Whether or not someone showed a lack of respect for authority.
Purity: Whether or not someone violated standards of purity and decency.
By avoiding mention of specific culture war topics such as gun rights or gay rights, the
authors of the questionnaire minimized the extent to which participants would recognize the
items as relevant to political ideology and therefore draw on knowledge of what liberals and
conservatives believe to guide their own ratings (Graham et al., 2009).
2) Moral judgement items: these are more contextualized and concrete items that could trigger
more strongly the sorts of moral intuitions that are said to play an important role in moral
judgment (Haidt, 2001). Moral judgment statements were rated on a 6-point scale, from
strongly disagree to strongly agree (Graham et al., 2009). Example of items:
Care: Compassion for those who are suffering is the most crucial virtue.
Fairness: Justice is the most important requirement for a society.
Ingroup: People should be loyal to their family members, even when they have done
something wrong.
Authority: Respect for authority is something all children need to learn.
Purity: People should not do things that are disgusting, even if no one is harmed.

67

Cronbachs alphas for the first two sections were put together and in this research they
turned out to be .62 (Harm), .60 (Fairness), .63 (Ingroup), .54 (Authority), and .69 (Purity).
Comparing these to other studies where they put both items together (e.g. Baril and Wright,
2012), the alphas turned out to be relatively similar (e.g. the second study, where it was .55
/Harm/, .61 /Fairness/, .71 /Ingroup/, .64 /Authority/, and .73 /Purity/).
3) Moral trade-off items: in this section the participants were confronted with the decision to
trade off a value related to one of the five foundations in exchange for money. They read the
following:
Try to imagine actually doing the following things, and indicate how much money someone
would have to pay you (anonymously and secretly) to be willing to do each thing. For each
action, assume that nothing bad would happen to you afterwards. Also assume that you
cannot use the money to make up for your action. Also consider that the amount of money
should be the only or the major motivation for your action. Dont answer with the first thing
that comes to your mind, but take your time to think about each phrase.

Response options given after each action were 0, 10, 100, 1.000, 10.000, 100.000,
1.000.000, and never for any amount of money. Below these instructions participants found
a list of 25 actions (5 for every foundation). These actions corresponded to the 20 from the
Moral Foundations site plus 5 added by the author to make up for possible cultural
differences between the USA and Italy. In the end however, it turned out that these five
items did not modify so much Cronbachs alphas so they were excluded from the results.
Example of items:
Care: Kick a dog in the head, hard.
Fairness: Say no to a friends request to help him move into a new apartment, after he
helped you move the month before.
Ingroup: Leave the social group, club, or team that you most value.
Authority: Slap your father in the face (with his permission) as part of a comedy skit.
Purity: Sign a piece of paper that says I hereby sell my soul, after my death, to whoever has
this piece of paper.
Cronbachs alphas for each foundation were in the original study .69 (Harm), .69 (Fairness),
.69 (Ingroup), .67 (Authority), and .58 (Purity) (Graham et al., 2009), in this study .92 (Harm),
.83 (Fairness), .77 (Ingroup), .74 (Authority), and .81 (Purity).
4) The Big Five trait taxonomy: self-assessment on the five traits with 25 items rated on a 5point scale, from it doesnt describe me at all to it describes me perfectly. We used the
method from Vecchione, Gonzlez Castro, and Caprara (2011) which measures the Big Five
through adjectives, using 5 adjectives for each trait. For example:
68

Dynamic (Energy)
Generous (Agreeableness)
Precise (Conscientiousness)
Optimistic (Emotional Stability)
Modern (Openness)
Cronbachs alphas in this research turned out to be .73 (Energy), .78 (Agreeableness), .83
(Conscientiousness), .67 (Emotional Stability), and .65 (Openness). In another found study
Cronbachs alphas were .84 (Energy), .73 (Agreeableness), .78 (Conscientiousness), .80
(Emotional Stability), and .80 (Openness), (Zakrisson, 2010).
5) Political orientation: self-assessment left-right placement (1-5 with a non-aligned option),
predicted voting choice (several parties to chose from, undecided, wont vote, dont want to
answer).
6) Socio-demographic factors: age, level of instruction, profession, religion, nationality, and
residence.
4.2.3 Procedure
One month before the Italian General Elections we started spreading the questionnaire through
family, friends and acquaintances. The participants were given a message and asked to cordially click
on the link provided to fill the survey.

4.3 Results
4.3.1 General Results
To begin, weve reported the average results of both main research objects: Moral Foundations and
Moral Trade-Offs. For Moral Foundations (N=291) we operated with a scale from 0 to 5, the higher
the result the more relevant the foundation. For Moral Trade-Offs we operated with a scale from 1 to
8, again the higher the result the more relevant the foundation. This time the number of respondents
who completed the section was lower, for a total of N=277. The results are reported in Table 4.1, but
for a better visual image you can refer to Figure 4.2:
Moral Foundations
N=291
Moral Trade-Offs
N=277

Harm
4,00 (0,79)

Fairness
4,23 (0,71)

Ingroup
2,52 (0,97)

Authority
2,47 (0,92)

Purity
3,41 (1,06)

7,10 (1,86)

6,41 (1,91)

6,08 (1,95)

5,47 (1,96)

6,41 (1,94)

Table 4.1: Average scores for Moral Foundations and Moral Trade-Offs.

69

5
4
3
2
1
0

8
7
6
5
4
3
2
1

Figure 4.2: On the left Average Moral Foundation score (which is an average of Moral Relevance and Moral Judgement)
for all participants. On the right Average Moral Trade-Offs score for all participants. Response scale was as follows: 1 = 0
(Id do it for free), 2 = 10, 3 = 100, 4 = 1.000, 5 = 10.000, 6 = 100.000, 7 = 1.000.000, 8 = never for any amount of
money.

Looking at the figures we can immediately see the differences between the two outcomes. Let us
look at the correlation between the two methods of measurement, ergo how much the
measurement of Harm by Moral Foundation correlates with the measurement of Harm by Moral
Trade-Offs (and that logic applied to all the foundations): Harm: Pearsons r=0,142 (p < 0,05),
Fairness: r=0,296 (p < 0,01), Ingroup: r=0,204 (p < 0,01), Authority: r=0,294 (p < 0,01), and Purity:
r=0,302 (p < 0,01). As we can see, the correlations are lower than expected considering that both
should be measuring the same foundation.
These results prove mixed support for Hypothesis 1, since the two methods dont correlate with each
other the way we expected they would.
4.3.2

Correlations between Moral Foundations and Socio-Demographic Factors

4.3.2.1 Men vs. Women

Out of the pool of N=228, 92 reported to be men and 136 women. The results are reported in Table
4.3, and the graphical representation of the results can be seen in Figure 4.4.
Moral Foundations
Men
Moral Foundations
Women
Moral Foundations
Total
Moral Trade-Offs
Men
Moral Trade-Offs
Women
Moral Trade-Offs
Total

Harm
3,83 (0,81)

Fairness
4,18 (0,73)

Ingroup
2,34 (0,94)

Authority
2,40 (0,87)

Purity
3,33 (1,15)

4,08 (0,66)

4,27 (0,61)

2,55 (0,90)

2,46 (0,89)

3,43 (0,95)

3,98 (0,74)

4,23 (0,66)

2,46 (0,92)

2,44 (0,88)

3,39 (1,03)

7,26 (1,24)

6,45 (1,56)

6,15 (1,64)

5,35 (1,74)

6,09 (1,63)

7,19 (1,93)

6,43 (1,98)

6,17 (1,93)

5,53 (1,90)

6,64 (1,91)

7,21 (1,69)

6,44 (1,82)

6,16 (1,81)

5,46 (1,84)

6,42 (1,82)

Table 4.3: Relation between gender, Moral Foundations, and Moral Trade-Offs. Mean values are shown before
the parentheses, standard deviations are shown in parentheses.

70

5
4
3
2
1
0

8
6
4

M
F

Figure 4.4: Relation between gender, Moral Foundations (left), and Moral Trade-Offs (right).

For Moral Foundations women show greater importance than men to the foundation of Harm (M =
4,08 vs. M = 3,83; F[1, 226] = 6,00, p = 0,015). For the other foundations there were no other
significant differences. For Moral Trade-Offs women show greater importance than men to the
foundation of Purity (M = 6,64 vs. M = 6,09; F[1, 226] = 5,15, p = 0,024). For the other foundations
there were no other significant differences.
With respect to the expectations we expressed in the Hypothesis 2, the results dont quite match. On
the one hand women did score higher than men in both Harm and Purity, but they came out in
different objects of research not confirming the other foundation in the other object of research. So
here it would depend on whether we take the two as complimentary or exclusive. On the other hand
the expectations for men werent confirmed at all.
4.3.2.2 Age
Checking the relation of increasing age with the importance attributed to the Moral Foundations,
correlations were as follows: Harm: Pearsons r=0,272 (p < 0,01), Fairness: r=0,223 (p < 0,01),
Ingroup: r=0,206, Authority: r=0,119 (p < 0,01), and Purity: r=0,177 (p < 0,01), showing a low, but
significant, correlation, but in all cases positive (with higher age, greater importance). For the Moral
Trade-Offs Harm: Pearsons r=-0,040, Fairness: r=0,090, Ingroup: r=0,060, Authority: r=0,129, and
Purity: r=-0,058, showing no significant correlation.
4.3.2.3 Level of Education
Having 6 levels of instruction ranging from no education (havent completed even elementary
school, =1) to university degree (=6) we analyzed the correlations there might be between both
Moral Foundations and Moral Trade-Offs on the one hand, and higher level of instruction on the
other. In the first case Harm: Pearsons r=0,083, Fairness: r=-0,028, Ingroup: r=0,029, Authority: r=0,061 , and Purity r=-0,025, showing no significant correlations. In the second case Harm: Pearsons
r=-0,147 (p < 0,05), Fairness: r=-0,158, Ingroup: r=-0,129 (p < 0,05), Authority: r=-0,180, and Purity:
r=-0,193 (p < 0,05). This shows that regarding Moral Trade-Offs we can see a low negative correlation
in all items, meaning that the more educated a person, the less sensitive he is to all the foundations
(especially significant for Harm, Ingroup, and Purity).
71

The correlations are so low in all cases that we cant predict that higher education means greater
importance given to Harm and Fairness, meaning that the first part of Hypothesis 2 is not confirmed.
4.3.2.4 Religious Centrality
Another level of comparison is the self-proclaimed importance that religion holds in ones own life,
and church attendance frequency. The first aspect was measured with a 7-point self-assessment
scale from not at all important (=1) to very important (=7). For Moral Foundations Harm:
Pearsons r=0,184 (p < 0,01), Fairness: r=0,036, Ingroup: r=0,265, Authority: r=0,375 (p < 0,01), and
Purity: r=0,467, showing positive significant correlation with Harm and Authority (the more one
retains religious life important, the more value he gives to these two foundations). For Moral TradeOffs Harm: Pearsons r=0,001, Fairness: r=0,038, Ingroup: r=0,192, Authority: r=0,291, and Purity:
r=0,201, showing no significant correlations.
The second aspect (church attendance frequency) was measured with a 5-point scale with answers
ranging from once a week (=1) to never (=5). For Moral Foundations Harm: Pearsons r=-0,420,
Fairness: r=0,006, Ingroup: r=-0,185, Authority: r=-0,308, and Purity: r=-0,359, showing no significant
correlations. For Moral Trade-Offs Harm: Pearsons r=0,045, Fairness: r=-0,021, Ingroup: r=-0,163,
Authority: r=-0,211, and Purity: r=-0,135, showing no significant correlations.
Putting it all together, the second part of Hypothesis 2 cant be confirmed due to a lack of significant
correlations.
4.3.3

Correlations between Moral Foundations and Political Orientation

4.3.3.1 Left-Right Placement

When asked about self-placement on the left-right scale, participants could choose from 5 options
plus one which read none of these definitions fit me, making them effectively unplaced. The
distribution of the answers is reported in Table 4.5 below:
Frequency
28

Left

Percentage
12,3

Centre-left

55

24,2

Centre

19

8,4

Centre-right

41

18,1

Right

17

7,5

None of these definitions fit me

67

29,5

227

100,0

Total

Table 4.5: Left-right placement

72

This offers the very first level of analysis of the results, the one that has been predominantly used by
literature operating with the Moral Foundations Theory (see for example Graham et al., 2009;
Graham et al., 2011), although, granted, they did not include a non-aligned option. Therefore, it
offers us the simplest and most straightforward method of comparison. The results of Moral
Foundations and Moral Trade-Offs are reported in Table 4.6:
Harm

Fairness

Ingroup

Authority

4,24 (0,68)

4,54 (0,41)

2,46 (1,06)

2,26 (1,07)

3,10 (1,05)

Centre-left

4,00 (0,72)

4,36 (0,61)

2,41 (0,88)

2,34 (0,71)

3,20 (0,88)

Centre

4,01 (0,75)

4,30 (0,69)

2,71 (0,97)

2,61 (0,91)

3,78 (0,96)

Centre-Right

3,93 (0,73)

4,14 (0,65)

2,57 (0,95)

2,59 (0,78)

3,63 (1,02)

Right

4,01 (0,68)

3,94 (0,65)

2,68 (0,92)

2,90 (0,86)

4,12 (0,75)

Non-aligned

3,85 (0,78)

4,13 (0,75)

2,31 (0,88)

2,36 (0,93)

3,22 (1,12)

Total

3,97 (0,74)

4,23 (0,67)

2,46 (0,93)

2,44 (0,87)

3,39 (1,04)

Moral Trade-Offs
Left

7,06 (1,94)

6,50 (1,90)

6,21 (1,85)

4,92 (1,81)

6,14 (2,22)

Centre-left

7,31 (1,39)

6,58 (1,45)

5,95 (1,48)

5,23 (1,58)

6,14 (1,63)

Centre

7,49 (1,69)

7,07 (1,68)

7,07 (1,67)

6,30 (1,82)

7,04 (1,59)

Centre-Right

6,96 (2,11)

6,26 (2,09)

6,13 (2,22)

5,55 (1,97)

6,30 (2,13)

Right

7,24 (1,74)

5,76 (2,44)

6,74 (1,61)

5,65 (1,77)

7,07 (1,82)

Non-aligned

7,27 (1,53)

6,38 (1,73)

5,90 (1,79)

5,51 (1,96)

6,47 (1,60)

Total

7,21 (1,69)

6,43 (1,82)

6,16 (1,81)

5,45 (1,84)

6,41 (1,82)

Moral Foundations
Left

Purity

Table 4.6: Moral Foundations and Moral Trade-Offs in the relation with left-right placement. Mean values are
shown before the parentheses, standard deviations are shown in parentheses.

Within these results, there are many significant results which involve pairs, but for Fairness in Moral
Foundations the result was significant for the whole foundation F(5, 221) = 2,69, p = 0,022. Looking at
Tukeys B for Fairness, the ideological right is part of one group (the low), the ideological left is part
of the second group (the high), and the rest are in the middle. This means that indeed the ideological
left values more than the ideological right the foundation of Fairness, which confirms the findings in
the USA. Another foundation that is significant as a whole is Purity with F(5, 221) = 4,05, p = 0,002.
Looking at Tukeys B for Purity, the left, the centre left, and non-aligned are part of one group (the
73

low), the right is part of the second group (the high), and the centre-right and centre are in the
middle. As such, this foundation doesnt quite correspond with the findings in the USA as the
differences in the scores arent as high, and as such all the analyzed groups (left, centre, right, etc.)
end up being grouped together, not showing significant distinctions in their evaluation of Purity.
Now let us look at the differences between pairs. In Moral Foundations weve found for Harm a
significant difference between the ideological left (M = 4,24) and the non-aligned (M = 3,85), p =
0,019. For Authority weve found a significant difference between the left (M = 2,26) and the right (M
= 2,90), p = 0,017, and between the centre-left (M = 2,34) and the right (M = 2,90), p = 0,021. No
other significant differences have been found. Looking at Tukeys B, Harm, Ingroup, and Authority
have all the analyzed groups as part of the same sub-group (confirming that there are no differences
big enough to create contrast).
Weve assembled all the scores of Moral Foundations in a graph (Figure 4.7) where, despite the lack
of significance of some of the foundations, we can see the decreasing tendency of the values of Harm
and Fairness, and the increasing tendency of the other three, basically like the results found in the
American studies, apart from the high Purity scores.
5
4,5
4

Harm
Fairness

3,5

Ingroup
Authority

Purity

2,5
2
left

centre-left

centre

centre-right

right

Figure 4.7: Moral Foundations in relation to left-right placement excluding non-aligned.

For Moral Trade-Offs the situation is a bit different. First of all no single foundation stood out as
relevant on its own, but rather some of the relationships inside the foundations were. The individual
cases follow now. For Fairness weve found a significant difference between the ideological centre
(M = 7,07) and the right (M = 5,76), p = 0,033. For Ingroup weve found a significant difference
between the centre (M = 7,07) and the centre-left (M = 5,95), p = 0,021, and between the centre (M
= 7,07) and the non-aligned (M = 5,90), p = 0,013. For Authority weve found a significant difference

74

between the centre (M = 6,03) and the left (M = 4,92), p = 0,012, and between the centre (M = 6,03)
and the centre-left (M = 5,23), p = 0,028. No other significant differences have been found.
Looking at Tukeys B, Harm, Fairness, Ingroup, and Purity have all the analyzed groups as part of the
same sub-group (confirming that there are no differences big enough to create contrast). For
Authority the ideological left is part of one group (the low), the ideological centre is part of the
second group (the high), and the rest are in the middle.
For Moral Trade-Offs weve also assembled all the scores in a graph (Figure 4.8), however due to its
little significance this graph might tell us even less than the previous one. Perhaps whats worth
mentioning is that the significant differences always regarded the centre, and we can see this appear
in the graph with the unexpectedly high foundation scores for the centre. This can be seen a little bit
also in Figure 4.7, but its with the indirect items (Moral Trade-Offs) that it becomes more evident. All
in all, these results differ quite a lot from the ones of the American team (Graham et al., 2009), since
the centre did not score so high and Fairness would hold similar scores all across the spectrum.
8
7,5

7
Harm

6,5

Fairness
6

Ingroup

5,5

Authority
Purity

5
4,5
4
left

centre-left

centre

centre-right

right

Figure 4.8: Moral Trade-Offs in relation to left-right placement excluding non-aligned.

However, the big question is whether left-right placement really brings significant associations.
Therefore, based on these numbers we proceeded to analyze the correlations between ideological
self-placement (from left to right, left being 1 and right being 5; from this analysis we excluded the
non-aligned) and Moral Foundations. For Moral Foundations Harm: Pearsons r=-0,102, Fairness: r=0,271 (p < 0,01), Ingroup: r=0,086, Authority: r=0,220 (p < 0,05), and Purity: r=0,309 (p < 0,01). This
shows a significant correlation for Fairness (negative, ergo the more on the left, the more relevant)
and for Authority and Purity (positive). For Moral Trade-Offs Harm: Pearsons r=-0,021, Fairness: r=0,106, Ingroup: r=0,081, Authority: r=0,140, and Purity: r=0,120, showing no significant correlations.
Because of opinion heterogeneity we did not analyze the correlation of the non-aligned.

75

We dont have enough significant results to make a definitive affirmation regarding Hypothesis 3.
With a certain degree of caution, we can say that in Moral Foundations Harm and Fairness are high
for the ideological left and lower for the ideological right, and Ingroup and Authority the other way
around, but it turned out that Purity collected higher results than in the USA (effectively being
medium and not low) and the centre wasnt really in a midway position between left and right.
For Moral Trade-Offs the results were completely different than what had been hypothesized
effectively coming up with the centre as the ideological spectrum that is most sensitive to the
formulation of the taboos, and showing results for the other foundations which dont correspond
with the research in America and hence with the expectations expressed in the Hypothesis 3.
4.3.3.2 Voting Intention
PD

Frequency
37

Percentage
16,3

As we have explained, contrary to the

USA or other countries with a strong
majoritarian system, the Italian political

PDL

12

5,3

Monti

27

11,9

Movimento 5 Stelle

24

10,6

Lega Nord

1,3

faced with the question who do you

Riv civile Ingroia

1,3

plan on voting in the general elections

SEL

1,8

of February 2013? the answers given

UDC

0,4

Fratelli dItalia

0,4

La Destra

0,9

Other party

12

5,3

Being roughly a couple of weeks before

I will not vote

24

10,6

the effective election, it came as no

I havent decided yet

56

24,7

surprise that there were still so many

I dont want to answer

21

9,3

227

100,0

Total

system is full of different, many times

little, parties. Naturally, this aspect was
reflected in our research, where, when

varied quite a lot. Therefore, to offer a

neater image of the distribution of the
voting intention, weve reported them
in Table 4.9.

people undecided. The result however

was that between those who did not
want to vote, those who did not want to

Table 4.9: Voting intention.

answer and those who ticked the

other answer, we were left with only 114 answers that could be analyzed, half of the total. Spread
that number among the 10 chosen parties, and we were left with many parties being severely
underrepresented. The biggest problem however, was that none of the parties which belong to the
ideological right collected enough respondents to be analyzed (generally speaking a group should

76

have at least 15 respondents to be analyzed; PDL had only 12). We therefore decided to group the
parties according to ideological similarity into 3 groups or factions: the left (PD, SEL, Riv civile
Ingroia), the centre (Monti, UDC), and the right (PDL, Lega Nord, Fratelli dItalia, La Destra). Due to its
special nature and a fairly high amount of respondents we kept Movimento 5 Stelle out of this
division and as a category of its own.
Having solved this issue, the next point, before looking at the effective results of the correlation
between foundations and voting intention, would be to check the relation between self-proclaimed
left-right placement and voting intention (Table 4.10).

Left
Centre-left

PD
SEL
INGROIA
15

MONTI
UDC
3

PDL LN M5S
FIT DX
0
4

No vote
1

Undecided No
answer
3
1

27

12

Centre

Centre-right

12

Right

Non-aligned

15

21

44

28

18

25

24

56

21

Total

Table 4.10: Self-proclaimed left-right placement and voting intention.

As weve pointed out earlier, there was an elevated number undecided people, however the
uncertainty varies across the spectrum, having the two extremes as the most certain in their choice
(10-18% were undecided), while on the other hand the centre-right and non-aligned come out as the
most uncertain (29-31%) with the centre close behind (26%). Looking then at the individual factions,
we see that the left and centre-left voters are very clear in their voting choice (around 50%
announced their vote for the PD, SEL, INGROIA group), still quite clear centre and right (42% for
Monti and UDC, 47% for PDL, LN, FIT, DX), but quite fragmented centre-right (on the one hand 19%
for Monti and UDC, on the other 22% for PDL, LN, FIT, DX). The Movimento 5 Stelle took most of its
voters from the non-aligned, although it still remains a very heterogeneous group.
Having dealt with this, let us look at the results. As weve mentioned, the big amount of parties have
led us to choose to analyse the results for four groups: the left faction, the centre faction, the right
faction, and Movimento 5 Stelle. Those who expressed an intention of not voting are labelled as no
vote, those who did not make up their mind at that time as undecided, and those who did not

77

want to answer as no answer, for a total N = 215. You can find the results numerically in Table 4.11,
and graphically in Figure 4.12 and 4.13 (excluding no vote, undecided, and no answer).
Harm

Fairness

Ingroup

Authority

Purity

Moral Foundations
Left faction

4,22 (0,64)

4,52 (0,47)

2,60 (0,91)

2,18 (0,88)

3,13 (1,04)

Centre faction

4,20 (0,67)

4,20 (0,69)

2,71 (0,92)

2,73 (0,79)

3,79 (0,86)

Right faction

4,00 (0,69)

4,18 (0,81)

2,90 (0,94)

2,78 (0,87)

4,04 (0,75)

M5S

3,83 (0,77)

4,11 (0,76)

1,92 (0,92)

1,86 (0,87)

3,08 (1,03)

No vote

3,85 (0,76)

4,18 (0,51)

2,38 (0,84)

2,64 (0,78)

3,50 (1,01)

Undecided

3,93 (0,70)

4,20 (0,64)

2,38 (0,80)

2,42 (0,83)

3,29 (1,09)

No answer

3,82 (0,95)

4,25 (0,76)

2,52 (1,01)

2,82 (0,74)

3,52 (1,00)

Total

4,00 (0,73)

4,26 (0,65)

2,47 (0,91)

2,44 (0,87)

3,41 (1,03)

Moral Trade-Offs
Left faction

6,78 (2,17)

6,23 (2,10)

5,87 (2,03)

4,74 (1,95)

5,90 (2,15)

Centre faction

7,51 (1,51)

6,95 (1,32)

6,73 (1,59)

6,21 (1,36)

6,91 (1,50)

Right faction

6,42 (2,57)

5,44 (2,59)

5,54 (2,45)

4,75 (2,28)

6,15 (2,56)

M5S

7,47 (1,46)

6,45 (1,69)

6,00 (1,84)

5,25 (1,78)

6,02 (1,86)

No vote

7,47 (0,92)

6,08 (1,86)

6,57 (1,32)

5,39 (1,90)

6,88 (1,38)

Undecided

7,60 (0,82)

6,89 (1,21)

6,35 (1,63)

5,99 (1,56)

6,86 (1,33)

No answer

6,63 (2,38)

6,38 (2,27)

5,92 (2,03)

5,74 (2,08)

6,08 (2,16)

Total

7,20 (1,72)

6,45 (1,84)

6,18 (1,84)

5,48 (1,87)

6,44 (1,84)

Table 4.11: Moral Foundations and Moral Trade-Offs in relation to voting intention. Mean values are shown
before the parentheses, standard deviations are shown in parentheses.

For Moral Foundations Ingroup F(6, 208) = 2,85, p = 0,011, Authority F(6, 208) = 4,72, p = 0,000, and
Purity F(6, 208) = 3,09, p = 0,006 are relevant as whole foundations. Looking at Tukeys B for these
two foundations, for Ingroup M5S is part of one group (the low), the centre and right faction are part
of the second group (the high), and the rest are in the middle. For Authority M5S is part of one group
(the low), no vote, the centre faction, the right faction, and no answer are part of the second group
(the high), and the left faction and the undecided are in the middle. For Purity M5S and the left

78

faction are part of one group (the low), the right faction is part of the second group (the high), and
the rest are in the middle.
For the other two foundations the significance applies to concrete pairs. For Harm weve found a
significant difference between the left faction (M = 4,22) and M5S (M = 3,83), p = 0,039, and
between the left faction (M = 4,22) and no answer (M = 3,82), p = 0,042. Furthermore weve found
borderline significant differences between the left faction (M = 4,22) and no vote (M = 3,85), p =
0,051, and between then left faction (M = 4,22) and undecided (M = 3,93), p = 0,054. For Fairness
weve found a significant difference between the left faction (M = 4,52) and the centre faction (M =
4,20), p = 0,038, between the left faction (M = 4,52) and M5S (M = 4,11), p = 0,014, between the left
faction (M = 4,52) and no vote (M = 4,18), p = 0,036, and between the left faction (M = 4,52) and M5S
(4,11), p = 0,014. Looking at Tukeys B, Harm and Fairness have all the analyzed groups as part of the
same sub-group (confirming that there are no differences big enough to create contrast).
Looking at nominal regression we get several significant confirmations. We see that with regards to
Fairness, we can conclude that people would vote the left faction rather than the right faction (p =
0,032), centre faction (p = 0,004), or M5S (p = 0,053). With regards to Purity, the situation is the
other way around, where people would vote the right faction (p = 0,001), centre faction (p = 0,007),
and M5S (p = 0,052) rather than the left faction.
5
4,5
4
3,5
left faction

centre faction

2,5

right faction

M5S

1,5
1
0,5
0
Harm

Fairness

Ingroup

Authority

Purity

Figure 4.12: Voting intention and Moral Foundations

First the expected things: in Figure 4.12 about voting intention and moral foundations we can see
that voters of the left faction show the highest scores in the Harm and Fairness foundations, and
comparatively low scores in the Ingroup, Authority, and Purity foundations. The voters of the right
faction, on the other hand, show the highest scores in the Ingroup, Authority, and Purity foundations,

79

and comparatively low scores in the Harm and Fairness foundations. The centre faction shows results
in between the two factions, albeit usually closer to the right one.
What comes as a big surprise are the voters of the Movimento 5 Stelle. Looking overall at the scores
of Moral Foundations, they got the lowest results. But while in some cases the difference isnt so big
(such as in Harm and Fairness when comparing to the right factions, or in Purity when comparing to
the left faction), meaning that they hold very similar results to other groups, in others the difference
is surprisingly big, leading to quite low results (the case of the binding foundations Ingroup,
Authority, and Purity, where they hold overall the lowest scores). This means that, as Italians, the
voters of this movement are less sensitive to foundations that value loyalty towards their country,
family, or groups, respect for authorities, and keeping the sanctity and purity of ones body.
8
7
6
5

left faction

centre faction
right faction

M5S
2
1
0
Harm

Fairness

Ingroup

Authority

Purity

Figure 4.13: Voting Intention and Moral Trade-Offs

For Moral Trade-Offs foundations, relevant as a whole were Harm F(6, 208) = 2,36, p = 0,032, and
Authority F(6, 208) = 3,35, p = 0,004. Furthermore, Fairness F(6, 208) = 2,12, p = 0,052, and Purity F(6,
208) = 2,13, p = 0,051 showed borderline significance as foundations as a whole. For Ingroup weve a
significant difference between the centre faction (M = 6,73) and the right faction (M = 5,54), p =
0,032, and a borderline significant difference between the centre faction (M = 6,73) and the left
faction (M = 5,87), p = 0,052.
Looking at Tukeys B, Harm, Ingroup, Authority, and Purity have all the analyzed groups as part of the
same sub-group (confirming that there are no differences big enough to create contrast). For
Fairness the right faction is part of one group (the low), the centre faction is part of the second group
(the high), and the rest are in the middle.
Moving from Tukeys B to nominal regression, we find that a high Authority value can serve to show
that people would rather vote for the centre faction than the left faction (p = 0,018). With a high
Harm value people would rather vote for M5S than for the left faction (p = 0,025).
80

Again with Moral Trade-Offs the results are different, even when looking at voting intention (Figure
4.6). This time the centre faction holds the highest scores in all the foundations. However, the one
with the second highest score is, in almost all cases, Movimento 5 Stelle (except for Purity, where all
the groups except the centre faction hold similar results), even in the case of Ingroup and Authority.
This is an extremely surprising finding especially comparing to the results of Moral Foundations
where they scored the lowest. This time the lowest scores are held by the right faction (including the
Ingroup foundation) with a close second by the left faction (with an equally low score for Authority
and the lowest for Purity).
So going back to our hypotheses, Moral Trade-Offs did not fulfil any of our predictions in Hypothesis
4. However in Moral Foundations all of our predictions were confirmed, be it for the left-centre-right
parties or for Movimento 5 Stelle.
4.3.4 Correlation between the Big Five Trait Taxonomy and Voting Intention
The last aspect we are going to analyze is the correlation between individual personality (measured
through the Big Five Traits) and voting intention. This was analyzed through self-assessment on 25
items rated, related to the five traits on a 5-point scale with a higher score meaning a greater
centrality or importance of the personality trait. With N = 215, the results are reported in Table 4.14:
Left faction

Agreeabl.
4,17 (0,43)

Openness
3,53 (0,62)

Stability
3,27 (0,65)

Conscient.
3,92 (0,71)

Energy
3,63 (0,72)

Centre faction

4,21 (0,51)

3,60 (0,55)

3,53 (0,71)

4,18 (0,56)

3,63 (0,72)

Right faction

4,32 (0,51)

3,46 (0,52)

3,36 (0,50)

3,84 (0,67)

3,50 (0,79)

M5S

4,18 (0,74)

3,43 (0,71)

3,19 (0,72)

3,68 (0,81)

3,61 (0,65)

No vote

3,88 (0,50)

3,33 (0,61)

3,24 (0,56)

3,48 (0,79)

3,29 (0,62)

Undecided

4,03 (0,54)

3,37 (0,59)

3,19 (0,61)

3,65 (0,72)

3,49 (0,71)

No answer

3,91 (0,78)

3,50 (0,66)

3,07 (0,73)

3,77 (0,64)

3,75 (0,78)

Total

4,09 (0,57)

3,45 (0,61)

3,26 (0,65)

3,79 (0,73)

3,56 (0,71)

Table 4.14: Voting intention in relation to traits. Mean values are shown before the parentheses, standard
deviations are shown in parentheses.

The Conscientiousness trait is relevant as a whole F(6, 208) = 2,90, p = 0,010. Looking at Tukeys B, no
vote is part of one group (the low), the centre group is part of the second (the high), and the rest are
in the middle.
For Agreeableness weve found a significant difference between the left faction (M = 4,17) and no
vote (M = 3,88), p = 0,037, between the centre faction (M = 4,21) and no vote (M = 3,88), p = 0,030,
between the right faction (M = 4,32) and no vote (M = 3,88), p = 0,011, between the right faction (M
81

= 4,32) and no answer (M = 3,91), p = 0,024, and a borderline significant difference between the right
faction (M = 4,34) and undecided (M = 4,03) p = 0,051. For Stability weve found a significant
difference between the centre faction (M = 3,53) and undecided (M = 3,65), p = 0,025, and between
the centre faction (M = 3,53) and no answer (M = 3,07), p = 0,014. For Energy weve found a
significant difference between no vote (M = 3,48) and no answer (M = 3,75), p = 0,031. No other
significant findings have been made (so none for Openness). Looking at Tukeys B, Agreeableness,
Openness, Stability, and Energy have all the analyzed groups as part of the same sub-group
(confirming that there are no differences big enough to create contrast). Nominal regression doesnt
show any significant results.
So summing up, for Openness, due to the very similar results we cant conclude any big differences
between the groups. For Agreeableness the ones who stand out are those who expressed that they
would not vote, having scored the lowest of all (quite understandable, as they might express strong
disagreement with how things are going), whilst its the right faction that scored the highest and thus
expresses a more pro-establishment sentiment. For Stability it is the centre faction that stands out as
the strongest, and for Energy the relevant differences are, strangely enough, between those who
expressed that they will not vote (the lowest) and those who did not want to reveal their answer (the
highest) there is no explanation for that.
The biggest differences however can be seen for Conscientiousness. At first glance, we can see a big
difference between the highest score (4,2 centre faction) and the lowest score (3,5 no vote). These
two results stand out also by not having close seconds, since all the other results hold a similar range
(3,7-3,9). It might be that out of all the traits, Conscientiousness has had the highest relative impact.
Putting it all together, not only was Hypothesis 5 not confirmed, the results turned out completely
opposite to what was expected, or we did not have results relevant enough to draw a conclusion.

4.4 Discussion
When discussing the results and the possible explanation for such an outcome we need to keep in
mind one important thing: that this research wasnt conducted on a random representative sample.
On top of that, the sample was fairly localised! Surely that blocks us from making broad, courageous
affirmations, and perhaps if we were to obtain a broader sample (one that included the whole
country, their different age ranges, political preferences, etc.) we would be able to check how much
of these findings can be generalised. However there are still enough points that come from this work
that can make us stop and think. Indeed, to say that we were surprised by the results would be an
understatement.
Lets start from the beginning: we might say that the first problems already arise from the choice of
analysing both Moral Foundations and Moral Trade-Offs. Despite the non-identical results in the

82

original research (Graham et al., 2009), in our Hypothesis 1 we expected that Moral Foundations and
Moral Trade-Offs would correlate a lot. Were they to fulfil our expectations, we could use both
methods in a complementary way when analyzing the relationship between moral foundations and
other determinants. However, this assumption was already swept to the floor. Both methods did
correlate for all foundations, but quite little. Why did that happen? Is it because when asked about
trade-offs we tend to be more reluctant to display a lack of morality? That would explain the
seemingly higher results on Ingroup and Authority, but why did Fairness score lower? Is it because
the concept in its abstract form is very attractive, but when it comes to concrete examples and
situations they are quicker to opt for the less moral, mundane option? That would be very strange
considering that Fairness is, out of all five foundations, the one most closely tied to money. In any
case, its a strange outcome and we dont have an answer for it.
This puts us in a difficult position: should we give both the results of Moral Foundations and Moral
Trade-Offs the same importance or should we regard one as more significant than the other? We opt
for the latter, focusing mainly on the results of Moral Foundations and looking at Moral Trade-Offs in
just some cases for purposes of comparison or added value. This decision derives from the thought
process that perhaps in Italy the very thought of a moral trade-off (how much money are you
willing to take in order to do something bad) may not be part of the general thinking culture, and
that that is the reason why the results tend to be so different. Granted, this is just speculation as we
dont have any studies that can confirm this theory, but it could be easily confirmed or refuted using
items that dont involve morality (such as how much money would you be willing to take in order to
spend one hour in freezing water?) and comparing the results between Italy and the USA.
Now that weve solved this first issue, let us look at the different results, and the first one is the
correlation between Moral Foundations and socio-demographic factors. One of the most interesting
things to look at is how men and women feel about moral foundations. We theorized that in Italy the
gender differences would be the same as in the USA: with women scoring higher in Harm, Fairness,
and Purity, and men scoring higher in Ingroup and Authority. Surprisingly enough, women did show a
significant result of scoring higher in Harm and Purity, but men did not show the same results for
Ingroup and Authority. On the contrary, while the results were not significant, women scored higher
also in these two foundations. Does it mean that Italian women are more sensitive to morality than
men? Maybe. The fact is that we cant find a good enough explanation for this finding.
Moving next to age, we did not express any hypothesis on this one, since American research did not
look for correlations, but we are surprised to find that there is a significant positive correlation with
age, meaning that the older one is, the more sensitive to moral foundations. Since there are no

83

relevant studies for MFT, we can look at correlations found with Schwartzs system60. Here we can
see that the higher the age, the stronger the endorsement for conservation and self-transcendence
values, the lower the age the stronger for openness to change and self-enhancement. This saves us
the effort of discussing which values would correlate with which foundations, as the results are
clearly different. So going back to our results, we could probably attribute this to the possibility that
most of our younger respondents are university students, and as such would show less sensitivity
(especially to the binding foundations). Unfortunately, level of education did show a low negative
correlation for all foundations, but only in Moral Trade-Offs (while age showed only in Moral
Foundations), putting our theorizing at an end.
So now that weve seen our results regarding Moral Trade-Offs and education, what does Schwartzs
research tell us about the subject? He found that the higher the education, the stronger the
endorsement for openness to change and self-enhancement values and the lower the education, the
stronger the endorsement for conservation values. There are no significant correlations for selftranscendent values. Again our findings dont match Schwartzs.
The last point of the correlations between moral foundations and socio-demographic factors is
religious centrality. We hypothesized that a higher religious centrality (measured by church
attendance and proclaimed relevance) would correlate positively with the binding foundations.
However, maybe because of a small sample, maybe because there really is nothing, we found very
few correlations only a small positive one for Harm and Authority with proclaimed relevance.
Maybe one of the reasons might be that in Italy church attendance or religious identity isnt as much
of a moral cleavage as in the States.
Putting all the above findings together, only some aspects of our Hypothesis 2 were confirmed, but
most of them werent.
More interesting than the correlation with socio-demographic factors is the one between ideology
and Moral Foundations. Where in the USA the lowest scoring foundation would be Purity (Haidt,
2012, p. 161), in Italy this primacy goes to Authority. Purity holds high scores, maybe not as high as
Harm and Fairness, but definitely around a whole point higher than in America. This is particularly
visible when looking at the ideological left. Also while in the USA the scores would start with a big
gap for the liberals that step-by-step closes up until having all the foundations at roughly the same
value for conservatives, this doesnt happen it Italy. Certainly, we do see a decrease in the Harm and
Fairness foundations, and an increase in the others, but Ingroup and Loyalty hold very low scores
even for the far right. Lastly, the category labelled as unaligned hold the lowest or second lowest
scores in all foundations. Having Fairness as the most respected foundation of this group, one might
60

Basic
Human
Values:
An
Overview.
Retrieved
did2.fmag.unict.it/Allegati/convegno%207-8-10-05/Schwartzpaper.pdf

84

11.01.2014

from

http://segr-

wonder if there isnt a substantial amount of respondents who could be labelled as libertarians. Of
course, unaligned is just a big umbrella that covers many different ideas, but seeing how many of
these voted for Movimento 5 Stelle, maybe there might be some truth to it. Perhaps under this
umbrella there are enough strong elements to create a new political thought.
Now, when looking back at the results, the higher scores for the Purity foundation could be easily
explained by the important role that the Catholic Church holds in Italy. But why then dont we also
see such a fundamental role in the Ingroup and Authority foundations? It could either be because the
Catholic Church doesnt give as much importance to these foundations as the Protestant branches do
(doubtful), or there could be other reasons. Ingroup perhaps could be explained by the internal
fragmentation of the country, where a local or regional identity is stronger than a national one, but
since patriotism is only one aspect of Ingroup, it would be strange if it had such great influence. For
Authority the reason might lie in a distrust towards authority figures in vertical cultures with a
strong emphasis on respect towards authorities, it is expected that they, in exchange, will take care
of their inferiors. Perhaps in Italy there is a general disillusion born from the lack of such reciprocity.
Another point worth mentioning is about the ideological middle. While it would be expected that
people perceiving themselves as part of this group would stand somewhere between left and right,
this isnt exactly the case, and in all cases it reaches higher scores than both the centre-left and
centre-right. Since the difference in score isnt so big, one might argue that it is fruit of the
characteristics of the sample and that a wider random sample would correct this mistake. But
although such a sample would definitely bring a clearer picture, it is here where we look at the Moral
Trade-Offs and notice the abnormality of the centre, which, despite our expectations, holds the
highest scores for all the foundations. We then have to ask ourselves: is there something special
about the Italian centre? Is it the countrys political history that gives the centre a more catholic
meaning? Is it a product of the measurement we used and would, for example, a 10-point scale have
brought different results? Whatever the reason we dont have a convincing answer for this result and
we would be quite interested to see more in-depth research in the matter. In any case our
Hypothesis 3 has been confirmed except for the small surprise with Purity and the ideological middle.
Passing from ideology to voting intention, it was, for once, pleasant that no huge surprises were
found here. There indeed seems to be a relation between ideology and parties, and we were able to
observe certain aspects of that relation in the results, albeit the differences in score were many times
fairly small. Let us look at the four main parties and analyze them.
The left faction headed by Bersanis Democratic Party scored the highest of all parties in Fairness and
held high scores also in Harm. However in all the other foundations they held low scores, the second
lowest. In Purity they go as far as almost tying with M5S for the lowest scores. This shows a similar

85

pattern to the ideological left represented as more individualistic and confirms the hypothesis we
made.
In terms of expectation we had a similar outcome with the right faction headed by Berlusconis
People of Freedom. Voters who expressed an intention of voting for this faction scored lower in
Harm, but the highest in Ingroup, Authority, and Purity. Again this reflects the pattern of the
ideological right with a higher emphasis on binding confirming our hypothesis.
Things start getting more interesting when we look at the centre faction headed by Montis Civic
Choice. Moral Foundations show a consistent pattern with that seen before (centre faction holding
scores between the left and right faction, adhering to our hypothesis). However, when we look at
Moral Trade-Offs things are quite different. Here we find that the centre faction holds the highest
scores of all the parties, a truly interesting outcome, which leaves us wondering about the reasons
for that. Why is it that the centre faction is so sensitive to the notion of asking for money in exchange
of violating taboos? One of the answers might lie in history. The centre party Democrazia Cristiana
(Christian Democracy) was traditionally the party with the closest ties to the Catholic Church. So a
stronger identification with Catholic values might explain these very high scores, but its a mystery as
to why these scores werent reflected in Moral Foundations.
The one that stands out the most is the score of the M5Ss voters. First of all, they did score the
lowest of all other party voters, but what is most interesting is that they hold the lowest scores (by a
significant margin) in Ingroup, Authority and Purity (where they tied with the left). This might be a
product of the anti-systemic nature of the movement, going into politics promising that it would
change everything and that no compromises would be made. But while this would explain the lower
Ingroup and Authority scores, what about Purity? Is there some sort of carpe diem approach that
unites both left and M5S? Or perhaps it is a mild anti-clericalism? Whatever the reason, despite
having low scores when comparing with other parties, we have to realize that they are still
considerably higher than the scores of the American left.
But while we might speculate about the reasons for the low scores, the scores of Moral Trade-Offs
scream louder. Indeed, in all foundations but Purity, M5S voters scored the second highest, right
after the centre voters. This is even more amazing when compared to the scores of Moral
Foundations: what is it that brings these people to such rejections of the mundane in favour of the
sacred? It cant be an ideological thing: most voters of M5S come from the unaligned, and those did
not show particularly high scores. Perhaps its one of the bonding principles of the movement: the
concept that money is the root of evil and, as such, should be distrusted, even in the case of
foundations which they dont retain to be so important. Again, this could be easily checked with
extra Trade-Offs items not related to morality.

86

Lastly we feel obliged to raise the question: is Moral Foundations Theory mature enough to be
used outside of the USA? MFT was tailored to the USA, based on the existing cultural war and the
need to analyse it. Granted, its seeds lie in the research in Brazil and the inspiration brought by
Shweder, but has it been sufficiently tested outside of America? Are all the items truly connected in a
relevant way with the foundations in the same way as they are in the USA? This is even more
fundamental when talking about Moral Trade-Offs, considering that the items used might have a
completely different connotation depending on the culture. However, we cant push this idea too far
based on the scores from only one study, especially when the internal validity remained quite high.

87

Conclusion
In this work weve taken Moral Foundations Theory (MFT) a social psychological theory intended to
explain the origins of and variation in human moral reasoning on the basis of innate, modular
foundations and used it to investigate the link between moral reasoning and voting intention in
Italy. In the USA, where this theory comes from, it has been used mainly to check the link between
moral reasoning and ideology as a way of explaining the great division between republican and
democrat partisans (the so called culture war).
We confirmed the findings made in America that the ideological left cares more about Harm and
Fairness, whilst the ideological right have a more balanced approach to all foundations. The big
difference from America, though, was proven to be about the Purity foundation, which in Italy is
endorsed in a considerably stronger way. This is because both the left and the right have a higher
endorsement than their American counterparts.
Another strong point of our research was the use not only of Moral Foundation items, but also Moral
Trade-Offs a less developed and used set of items which work upon the idea of asking for money in
exchange for breaking a taboo. We confirmed the need for developing this system further, especially
with the results that the ideological centre showed. The ideological centre scored the highest in all
foundations breaking the notion of holding a midway position between left and right.
This brings us to our third and strongest innovative point: the correlation between moral foundations
and voting intention. In the general election of February 2013 three coalitions and one party became
the main winners: the centre-left coalition headed by Bersani with 29,5% of the votes, the centreright coalition headed by Berlusconi with 29,2% of the votes, the Five Star Movement headed by
Grillo with 25,6% of the votes, and the centre coalition headed by Monti with 10,6% of the votes. The
correlations between moral foundations and the three main coalitions mirrored those of ideology.
The biggest surprise came from Grillos Five Star Movement. Those who expressed an intention in
voting for the Five Star Movement scored the lowest in Ingroup, Authority, and Purity. Voters of the
left faction scored the second lowest in Authority and Purity, but the highest in Fairness. Moral
Trade-Offs voters of the centre faction scored the highest in all foundations, while voters of the right
faction scored the lowest in all but Purity. Five Star Movement voters scored the second highest in all
foundations except for Purity where they scored the second lowest. Left faction voters scored the
second lowest in all foundations except for Purity where they scored the lowest.
For anyone who might want to take up this work and further develop it, there is one main suggestion
we would make: to run the research on a random representative sample across the whole nation. In
that way we would be able to make broader generalizations and even check for local deviations from
the norm, a notable contribution both for the advancement of research in Italy and for the whole
world.
88

To conclude, Moral Foundations Theory is definitely an interesting and enriching method of analysis,
which can bring many new insights. There is also the possibility that, as a still developing theory, it
will grow to mirror the realities of many different cultures, allowing for international comparison. It is
our wish that with this work we might have helped to take a step forward in that direction.

89

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Il Blog di Beppe Grillo: http://www.beppegrillo.it/

Il Corriere della Sera: http://www.corriere.it/
La Fucina: http://www.lafucina.it/
La Gazzetta del Mezzogiorno: http://www.lagazzettadelmezzogiorno.it/
La Gazzetta del Sud: http://www.gazzettadelsud.it/
La Repubblica: http://www.repubblica.it/
Ministero dellInterno: http://www.interno.gov.it/
Moral Foundations: http://www.moralfoundations.org/
Movimento 5 Stelle: http://www.beppegrillo.it/
Mrs. Slatterys File Hub: http://azslattery.net/
Nano Press: http://www.nanopress.it/
Parties and Elections in Europe: http://www.parties-and-elections.eu/
Presenza: http://www.pressenza.com/
Reuters: http://www.reuters.com/
RPG Forum: http://rpgforum.cz/forum/index.php
Russian Legal Information Agency (RAPSI): http://www.rapsinews.com/
S&D: http://www.socialistsanddemocrats.eu/
Scelta Civica: http://www.sceltacivica.it/
TED: http://www.ted.com/
The Huffington Post: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/
The Independent: http://www.independent.co.uk/
Thomas White International: http://www.thomaswhite.com/
Tuttoggi: http://tuttoggi.info/
Universit degli studi di Catania: http://segr-did2.fmag.unict.it/
YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/

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Appendix
Appendix A
FRASE INTRODUTTIVA
Per la mia tesi di laurea in Scienze Politiche sto svolgendo una ricerca sui valori delle persone e sulle
loro opinioni circa alcune questioni sociali e politiche di attualit. Come te, sto contattando molte
altre persone e sto chiedendo la loro collaborazione per la compilazione di un questionario. Il
questionario anonimo e il contenuto delle risposte sar utilizzato esclusivamente per fini di ricerca.
La compilazione richiede quindici minuti circa. Ti ringrazio anticipatamente per la tua collaborazione.
Per accedere al questionario, clicca qui.
PRIMA SCHERMATA
Quando devi decidere se un fatto o un comportamento giusto o sbagliato, quanto sono rilevanti
per te le seguenti considerazioni?
Indica quanto ciascuna delle seguenti considerazioni rilevante per te utilizzando una scala da 0 (Per
nulla rilevante) a 5 (Molto rilevante).
a) Se si causata la sofferenza di qualcuno.
b) Se si discriminato qualcuno.
c) Se si mostrato amore per il proprio Paese.
d) Se si mancato di rispetto allautorit costituita.
e) Se si sono violate le norme di decenza.
f) Se ci si presi cura delle persone deboli o indifese.
g) Se si agito con equit.
h) Se si tradito il proprio gruppo.
i) Se si sono seguite le tradizioni della societ.
l) Se stato fatto qualcosa di ripugnante.
SECONDA SCHERMATA
Indica ora il tuo grado di accordo con ciascuna delle affermazioni che seguono. Utilizza una scala da 0
(Per niente daccordo) a 5 (Molto daccordo).
a) La compassione per chi soffre la virt pi importante.
b) Quando il parlamento fa le leggi, il principio numero uno che tutti siano trattati in modo equo.
c) Sono orgoglioso della storia del mio Paese.
d) Il rispetto per lautorit un principio che tutti i bambini devono imparare.
e) La gente non deve compiere azioni ripugnanti, anche se non danneggiano nessuno.
f) Una delle azioni peggiori che si possano compiere far male ad un animale indifeso.
g) La giustizia il requisito pi importante per una societ.
h) La gente deve difendere i propri familiari anche quando compiono azioni scorrette.
i) Uomini e donne devono ricoprire ruoli diversi nella societ.
l) Considero alcuni atti sbagliati sulla base del fatto che sono innaturali.
TERZA SCHERMATA
Cerca di immaginare realisticamente ciascuna delle azioni elencate qui sotto e indica quanti soldi ti
dovrebbero dare (in forma anonima e confidenziale) affinch tu acconsenta a compiere ciascuna di
esse. Tieni conto del fatto che a te dopo non accade nulla di male per nessuna di queste azioni, e
tieni conto anche del fatto che non puoi usare il denaro per compensare gli effetti della tua azione. In
105

pi tieni in conto che la unica o la maggiore motivazione per svolgere le azioni dovrebbe essere la
somma di denaro. Non dare la prima risposta che ti viene in mente ma prenditi il tuo tempo per
pensarci ad ognuna delle frase.
La risposta segue questa scala:
1) 0
2) 10
3) 100
4) 1.000
5) 10.000
6) 100.000
7) 1.000.000
8) Non lo farei per nessuna somma di denaro
Quanto vi dovrebbero pagare per:
a) Dare un forte calcio alla testa di un cane?
b) Barare per soldi in un gioco di carte contro gente che non conosci molto bene?
c) Dire qualcosa di negativo sulla tua nazione (che non credi essere vero) telefonando
anonimamente ad un programma radiofonico in un paese estero?
d) Maledire i tuoi genitori di persona? (Puoi scusarti solo dopo un anno)
e) Firmare un pezzo di carta con scritto: Dichiaro di vendere la mia anima, dopo la mia morte,
a chiunque sia in possesso di questo pezzo di carta?
f) Sparare ed uccidere un animale in via di estinzione?
g) Dire di no alla richiesta di aiuto di un amico a trasferirsi in un nuovo appartamento, dopo che
lui ti ha gi aiutato a trasferirti il mese scorso?
h) Cessare ogni tipo di comunicazione con la tua famiglia per un anno?
i) Fare un gesto di mano irrispettoso verso il tuo superiore, insegnante, professore?
j) Ricevere chirurgia plastica che aggiungerebbe una coda di 5cm alla fine della tua colonna
vertebrale? (Puoi toglierla dopo 3 anni)
k) Fare dei commenti crudeli verso una persona obesa sul suo aspetto davanti a lei?
l) Buttare via una scatola di schede elettorali durante le elezioni per aiutare il proprio
candidato preferito a vincere?
m) Rinunciare alla propria cittadinanza e diventare cittadino di un nuovo paese?
n) Lanciare un pomodoro marcio contro un leader politico che ti sgradevole?
o) Ricevere una trasfusione di mezzo litro di sangue privo di malattie e di un gruppo sanguineo
compatibile da un molestatore di bambini condannato?
p) Inserire uno spillo nella mano di un bimbo che non conosci?
q) Firmare una promessa segreta ma vincolante di impiegare solo persone della tua nazionalit
nella tua azienda?
r) Abbandonare il gruppo sociale, club o squadra che valorizzi di pi?
s) Dare uno schiaffo a tuo padre (con suo consenso) come parte di una scenetta di commedia?
t) Partecipare ad unopera di arte in cui tutti i partecipanti (incluso tu) devono agire come
animali per 30 minuti, incluso strisciare nudi e urinare sul palco?
u) Occupare lunico posto libero in un mezzo di trasporto pieno lasciando in piede una donna
incinta allottavo mese?
v) Prendere due fette di una torta di compleanno in modo che uno degli invitati resti senza?
w) Giocare una partita di uno sport competitivo in tal modo, che la propria squadra perda?
x) Dare del tu a tutte le persone per un mese? (Inclusi anziani, superiori, professori,
sconosciuti, ecc.)
y) Dare un bacio alla francese ad una persona con una differenza di et rispetto a te di 40 anni?

QUARTA SCHERMATA
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Ora indica per favore quanto ciascuno dei seguenti aggettivi ti descrive. Utilizza una scala da 1 (non
mi descrive per niente) a 5 (mi descrive perfettamente).
a)
b)
c)
d)
e)
f)
g)
h)
i)
j)
k)
l)
m)
n)
o)
p)
q)
r)
s)
t)
u)
v)
w)
x)
y)

Dinamico
Generoso
Scrupoloso
Ottimista
Affascinato dalle novit
Attivo
Cordiale
Coscienzioso
Calmo
Anticonformista
Allegro
Sincero
Preciso
Equilibrato
Creativo
Energico
Altruista
Efficiente
Rilassato
Acuto
Deciso
Leale
Diligente
Sicuro di ti stesso
Informato

QUINTA SCHERMATA
Parliamo ora di alcuni nostri leader politici.
Iniziamo da Mario Monti. Secondo te, in che misura Monti : [per ciascuno degli item qui sotto
mettere una scala da 1 (per niente) a 7 (molto)]
Onesto
Competente
Energico
Vicino ai problemi della gente
Affidabile
Simpatico
Com il tuo giudizio complessivo su Monti?
Molto negativo/ Molto positivo [anche qui mettere una scala da 1(per niente) a 7 (molto)]
E Pier Luigi Bersani? [ripetere le domande come per Monti]
E Beppe Grillo? [ripetere le domande come sopra]
E infine Silvio Berlusconi? [ripetere le domande come sopra]

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[sono state create 4 versioni del questionario in ciascuna delle quali viene seguito uno di questi
ordini]
Versione 1
Versione 2
Versione 3
Versione 4

Berlusconi
Bersani
Monti
Grillo

Bersani
Grillo
Berlusconi
Monti

Monti
Berlusconi
Grillo
Bersani

Grillo
Monti
Bersani
Berlusconi

SESTA SCHERMATA
a) In generale quanto ti interessi di politica? [Utilizza una scala da 1 (Per niente interessato) a 7
(Molto interessato)]
b) Con quale frequenza ti capita di parlare di politica?
a. Tutti i giorni
b. Qualche volta alla settimana
c. Una volta alla settimana
d. Qualche volta al mese
e. Qualche volta allanno
f. Mai
Le domande qui sotto riguardano le cariche e il sistema politico del nostro Paese. Rispondi per favore
a ciascuna di esse scrivendo per esteso le tue risposte.
a) Qual il cognome del Presidente della Camera dei Deputati?
b) Il cognome del Presidente del Senato?
c) Il cognome del Ministro della Pubblica Istruzione?
d) Infine, il cognome del Ministro degli Esteri?
e) Da chi viene eletto il Presidente della Repubblica?
f) Quanti sono, allincirca, i deputati della Camera dei Deputati?
g) Per quanti anni resta in carica il Presidente della Repubblica?
h) Chi esercita il potere legislativo?
SETTIMA SCHERMATA
a) Genere: M-F
b) Et:
a. Sotto i 19 anni
b. 20-29 anni
c. 30-39 anni
d. 40-49 anni
e. 50-59 anni
f. 60-69 anni
g. Sopra i 70 anni
c) Livello distruzione:
a. Nessun titolo
b. Licenza elementare
c. Licenza media inferiore/avviamento
d. Diploma qualifiche professionale (2-3 anni)
e. Diploma maturit
f. Laurea (4-5 anni, laurea triennale, laurea specialistica, ecc.)
d) Pensando alla tua occupazione attuale, indica dove ti collochi nella lista seguente:
a. Quadro statale, insegnante, militare di carriera
b. Dirigente, personale direttivo
c. Impiegato, commesso
108

e)
f)

g)

h)

i)

j)
k)
l)
m)

d. Operaio, agricoltore indipendente

e. Imprenditore
f. Libero professionista (medico, avvocato, ecc.)
g. Commerciante, agricoltore indipendente, artigiano
h. Pensionato ritirato dal lavoro
i. Casalinga
j. Studente
k. In servizio di leva o servizio civile
l. Disoccupato
m. In cassa integrazione
n. In cerca di prima occupazione
o. Inabile al lavoro
Quanto importante la religione nella tua vita? [mettere una scala da 1 (per niente
importante) a 7 (molto importante)]
Dal punto di vista religiosi, ti definiresti:
a. Cattolico
b. Cristiano non cattolico (es. protestante, ortodosso)
c. Ebreo
d. Musulmano
e. Di altra religione
f. Non credente
Escluse cerimonie come matrimoni, battesimi e funerali, con quale frequenza partecipi alla
messa o a funzioni religiose?
a. Una volta alla settimana
b. Due o tre volte al mese
c. Una volta al mese
d. Due o tre volte allanno
e. Mai
In politica si parla spesso di destra, centro e sinistra. Pensando alle tue opinioni personali, ti
definiresti:
a. di sinistra
b. di centrosinistra
c. di centro
d. di centrodestra
e. di destra
f. nessuna di queste definizioni mi vanno bene
Nelle elezioni nazionali di 24-25 febbraio 2013 chi pensi di votare?
a. Agenda Monti per lItalia
b. IdV
c. Lega Nord
d. Movimento 5 Stelle
e. PD
f. PDL
g. altro
h. non voter
i. non ho ancora deciso
j. preferisco non rispondere a questa domanda
Di che nazionalit sei?
In quale regione risiedi? (Se allestero, indica il paese)
Da quanto tempo vivi nel luogo in cui risiedi?
In quale regione hai riseduto per la pi grande parte della tua vita? (Se allestero, indica il
paese)
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n) In quale regione sei nato? (Se allestero, indica il paese)

110