Position, priority, and political legitimacy: party–citizen alignment on environmental issues in Italy

This article examines how party-citizen alignment on environmental issues relates to satisfaction with democracy (SWD) in Italy, a key attitudinal indicator of political legitimacy. Building on theories of representational congruence, it distinguishes between positional congruence–agreement on policy direction–and priority congruence–alignment on issue importance. Using data from the 2019 European Election Study (EES) and the Chapel Hill Expert Survey (CHES), the analysis provides a descriptive assessment of how these dimensions operate in a context of low salience and fragmented competition. The patterns observed indicate that environmental congruence is extremely rare and largely symbolic: only a small fraction of citizens identify the environment as the country’s most important problem, and even fewer are represented by parties that prioritize it. This absence of alignment reveals a representational void rather than a mere measurement limitation, highlighting the weak politicization of environmental concerns in Italian politics. The article argues that environmental representation exposes the limits of issue-based legitimacy in contexts where citizens’ priorities remain systematically detached from party agendas.