Parliamentary Speeches and Re-Election Incentives

An established assumption in legislative studies is that legislators are primarily motivated by re-election, which constitutes a precondition for other policy and office goals. In line with this assumption, \citet[p. 1]{proksch_changing_2014} describe parliamentary speeches as “a forum for public communication that parties and their Members of Parliament (MPs) utilize for electoral purposes.” Building on this literature, our research examines how parliamentary speeches are employed in the absence of re-election incentives, particularly in a mostly party-centered environment. We hypothesize that when MPs’ electoral incentives wane, legislators are more likely to use the floor to further their own interests, resulting in increased divergence from the party leaders. To test this hypothesis, we leverage the case of the Five Star Movement’s party-imposed term limits in Italy. We compiled an original dataset of plenary speeches delivered by legislators elected to the Italian Chamber of Deputies in 2013 and re-elected in 2018. We thus assess whether Five Star Movement MPs who are unable to run for office due to the term limit restrictions deviate from the party agenda in their speeches to a larger extent than their non-term limited peers. Our analyses control for debate-specific characteristics such as proceedings type/floor access rules and the topic of discussion. This study contributes to the broader literature on intra-party politics and legislative speeches by examining how term limits influence MPs' alignment with their parties.