MAURIZIO COTTA - LUCA VERZICHELLI IL SISTEMA POLITICO ITALIANO CHAPTER 7 Regions and local government A long travel towards the federalism?

Topics of this chapter The centralized state and the first regionalist wave The second regionalist wave Recent reforms: federalism and multilevel governance

The genetic phase of the Italian local government The centralization was considered as the right choice for a country divided by:  Local alienated communities (f.i. amoral familism)  Different cultural zones  Local political sub-systems During the liberal and the fascist regimes:  Provinces and municipalities, with a strong control by the prefects

The first wave, Until the 1970:  Municipality  Province  Region In general:  Parliamentarism  PR  Severe governmental control

The second wave, 1970 Weak financial autonomy Slow national general legislation Persistent ex post governmental control Institutional design involving:  Parliamentarism  Proportionalism  Consociativism  Completely different policy performances

The local government since the 1990s The neo-parliamentarian systems  Direct election of the mayors (1993)  “As if” direct election of the regional “governors” (since 1995)  Confidence vote from the assembly is maintained in both cases Constitutional change (2001)  Direct election of the “governors” (since 1999, trough a constitutional reform)  Different power distribution promoting regional decision- making

The consequences of the recent reforms Enforcement of the autonomy of the local government Enforcement of the regional legislative powers Inter-governmental federalism Persistent different levels of performances Different levels of Europeanization Frequent governmental alternation More changes are still necessary, and they are coming…