Italian Referendum Result: A Headache for Rome, or for Brussels?

... with “the Senate” in the sense of the chief symbol and foundation of Roman statehood. Incalzando con spirito It was against the Senate — to be precise, the Italian Senate rather than the Roman one of old — that Prime Minister Matteo Renzi pitted himself in the 4 December referendum. He was proposing that the Senate change from an influential directly elected legislative body into a primarily advisory institution akin to Russia’s Civic Chamber. Its numbers would be reduced from the current 315 to 100, and the new ...