ABSTRACT
On 16 June 1996, just sixty days after the general election, elections for the renewal of the Sicilian Regional Assembly were held. The political forces which had faced each other in two competing blocs shortly before each presented separate lists of candidates. The motivation for this choice lay in the region's proportional electoral system which discourages political alliances. The salient, and at the same time contradictory, aspects of the general election can be seen by comparing the results of the majoritarian-voting electoral districts, where the candidates of the Ulivo were successful, and the proportional segment. The difference in the results obtained by the Polo in proportional and majoritarian voting was undoubtedly due to a seepage of votes to the opposing front, but the larger part of that seepage would appear to have gone to minor parties and diversionary lists. A bipolar contest and a majoritarian electoral system seem to discourage centrifugal tendencies and facilitate greater demand aggregation.
