Repubblica.it reports that turnout at 19.00 is down 3.5 points from 2006, from 52.2% to 48.7%. If turnout is lower than it was two years ago, who benefits?

The ‘common wisdom‘ in political science is that higher turnout benefits centre-left parties. But Italy may defy the common wisdom – two years ago, Berlusconi presaged that he would do better if turnout reached 80% – which it duly did.

The reason why the common wisdom exists is that centre-left voters are typically assumed to be poorer and less well-educated, and thus – based on everything we know about the determinants of turnout – less likely to vote. But this causal chain breaks down in Italy (and probably also in France) since parties on the left have tended to be almost comically intellectual, thus attracting the high-status voters other flat-cap leftist parties can’t reach.

So, there are no strong grounds for thinking that changes in turnout benefit either side in dramatic fashion.