To Italy-watchers, this is old news, but I have just discovered that Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi of Italy has recently been promoting semi-presidentialism as a model that Italy might adopt.

Speaking alongside Nicholas Sarkozy at a press conference in Paris on 9 April, Berlusconi said that he was looking at how France’s semi-presidential model could be adapted to the Italian case. One adaptation that he mentioned was that the president would be elected on the basis of a single ballot system rather than a double ballot and that the election would be held on the same day as the parliamentary election.

Berlusconi said that a draft of such a reform had already been sent to the Italian president, Giorgio Napolitano, for consideration. Berlusconi’s coalition partner, the Northern League, is apparently keen on such a reform.