Article 48 of the Italian Constitution states that all citizens, men and women, who have reached the age of majority are entitled to vote. But are we really sure about that? There is no doubt that voting is one of the fundamental rights at the core of our democracy, but it is equally true that not everyone is actually able to exercise it, and the 22-23 March 2026 referendum on justice is the most recent proof of this. As of today, there are an estimated 4.5 to 5 million non-resident voters in Italy, including workers, students, and patients staying in hospital facilities. In order to fulfill both a right and a civic duty, they are forced to return to their home municipalities, facing considerable expenses that often lead most of them to give up.

What weighs most heavily on the wallets of non-resident voters is travel of any kind, despite the fact that several companies have offered specific discounts for voting weekends - up to 60%-70% for Trenitalia and the Italian Navigation Company; ITA Airways has revised its fares, and motorway tolls have also been reduced, if not completely waived. If, for example, we apply these incentives to the 2025 referendum, assuming that all 67,300 non-resident voters made use of them, these would be the figures: if a “typical” round trip costs between €80 and €120 at full price by train, and if the discounts amount to between 60% and 70%, then the incentive would be worth between €50 and €80 for each electoral journey, meaning that the overall value of the incentives would be in the region of €4 million. Extending the calculation to all 4.5-5 million non-resident voters, this would potentially amount to around €250-300 million in total discounts for a single election round (5,000,000 × €60 = €300 million). These figures are clearly unsustainable for public spending, considering that an average election round costs less than half that amount. However, despite the drop in prices, only a very small share of non-resident voters still decides to make this effort, thus lowering voter turnout. Would it not, therefore, be more convenient for both parties, the state and the citizens, to establish remote voting for non-resident voters? This would prevent Italians from facing unnecessary expenses, taking time off work, missing hours of study in order to vote, or even deciding not to vote at all.

Read also: How much does it cost to vote?

Consequently, some more structured proposals to find a solution to the problem have been put forward by associations such as The Good Lobby and campaigns such as “I vote where I live”: one option could be to send the ballot paper directly to voters’ homes (as already happens for residents abroad), to then be returned by post, or to introduce early voting for non-resident voters, so that the ballots can then be redirected in time to the relevant municipalities, setting aside more radical solutions such as digital voting, which still raises many uncertainties regarding security, anonymity, and reliability.

Edited by Ottilia Ogliari