A referendum that sought to make it easier for foreigners to apply for Italian citizenship ended unsuccessfully on Monday when it failed to draw a majority of voters to the polls.
Polls closed at 3 p.m. with around 30 percent of eligible voters having cast a ballot — far below the turnout of 50 percent plus one person required for a referendum to be valid. The vote, which took place over Sunday and Monday, also sought to strengthen labor rights.
The result was a relief for Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, who had vocally opposed the referendum, which called for dropping to five from 10 the number of years a foreigner had to live in Italy before applying for citizenship.
Some of her coalition partners had called on people to abstain from voting. Ms. Meloni went to her polling station on Sunday evening but did not cast a ballot.
The referendum prompted nationwide discussion about who could be a citizen, and came as the issues of migration and birthright citizenship are hotly debated in the United States and Europe. Even if they are born in Italy, the children of lawful immigrants can apply for citizenship only when they turn 18 — and only if they have continuously lived in the country since birth.
Many economists believe that migration is critical to a country that is facing a steep demographic decline.
The referendum was championed by a major trade union, civil society groups and some center-left opposition parties. But it had little bipartisan support, and voter turnout was low on the first weekend after public schools closed in much of Italy. Since 1990, only three of 14 referendums managed to draw enough voters to be valid.
“We’ve been let down by Italy before, we knew it was an uphill battle,” Fioralba Duma, an activist for Italians Without Citizenship, one of the groups that supported the referendum, said of the low turnout.
On the positive side, she added, the referendum brought the citizenship issue into mainstream conversation, spotlighting the challenges faced by hundreds of thousands of foreigners who seek to be better integrated into Italian society.
Even though the referendum didn’t pass, with about a quarter of the ballots counted, about 64 percent of those who voted did so in favor of reducing the number of years living in Italy required for citizenship to five from 10.
For many activists, she said, the defeat of the referendum was merely a setback, adding, “We will continue to work.”
Elisabetta Povoledo is a Times reporter based in Rome, covering Italy, the Vatican and the culture of the region. She has been a journalist for 35 years.
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