For the first time under a new local electoral law, enacted on 25 March 1993, citizens could vote to directly elect the Mayor.

[1] As no candidate won a majority in the first round, a runoff was held between the top two candidates – Francesco Rutelli, a former radical deputy at that time one of the most prominent figure of the environmentalist Federation of the Greens (FdV) and Gianfranco Fini, Giorgio Almirante's pupil and national leader of the neo-fascist Italian Social Movement (MSI) – which Rutelli finally won.

Fini was a young politician considered the inheritor of Giorgio Almirante's political knowledge in the Italian Social Movement (MSI).

Although the political crisis, Christian Democracy (DC) presented its candidate, Carmelo Caruso, who was supported also by the weak Italian Democratic Socialist Party (PSDI).

The election was distinguished by the active involvement of an unprecedented numbers of Italian nobles as either candidates or supporters, including members of the Barberini, Orsini, Chigi, and Borghese families.