Who Supports Liberal Policies? A Tale of Two Referendums in Italy

Leonardo Madio (University of Padua), Francesco Principe (University of Bergamo), Who Supports Liberal Policies? A Tale of Two Referendums in Italy (2023): 

We leverage a unique dataset at the municipality level in Italy to examine the factors that drive support for two separate referendum campaigns - one on the decriminalization of cannabis cultivation and the other on physician-assisted suicide. Using machine learning techniques, we identify key predictors of support for both referendums, including income, population density, and within-country migration. Our analysis also highlights that local economic conditions, such as the number of firms, and educational attainment, along with exposure to organized crime, are critical factors driving mobilization in favor of the cannabis referendum. In contrast, support for legalizing assisted suicide is more likely to be predicted access to healthcare and cultural factors such as religiosity