Selling votes required verifiable mechanisms tying payment to actual balloting

Evidence

Sophisticated methods have been developed for checking whether voters stood by their declared intentions. Until the referendum of June 9, 1991, abolished this system, Italian voters could express up to four preferences among the candidates on any party slate. These votes could be cast by writing in either the candidate’s name or the corresponding number, since numbers are easier to memorize. Thus, voters wishing to sell their vote were instructed to select particular numbers and list them in a particular sequence. Checking the constituency list against the key sequence made accurate identification possible. Votes were usually sold in blocks by middlemen known as capibastone. — Diego Gambetta, The Sicilian Mafia The Business of…, 983

Categorization

• XREF: Directly parallels the reader’s theoretical frame (Milgrom on third-party verification, Schelling on credible commitment): the number-sequence key is a verification technology making the vote contract enforceable in a setting where payment must precede performance. Also connects to Gambetta’s core vote-brokerage chapter.
• DEFINE: Defines capibastone (vote brokers) and the number-key verification mechanism that made vote-selling contractually enforceable despite distrust.
• SEED: Angle: vote selling as a commitment/verification problem — how illegal markets build their own audit trails when state enforcement is unavailable, mirroring the bourse’s grading certificates.
• QUESTION: Worth chasing: did the abolition of preference voting in 1991 actually suppress the brokerage market, or did buyers shift to other verification schemes — e.g., exit polls, candidate-level counts?