Challenging Italian centralism through the vertical shift of competences to the subnational and supranational levels

Abstract

This article shows that even though the high hopes of Italy’s most radical federalist advocates were largely dashed as the country remains a regionalised state within a less-than-federal European Union (EU), there have in fact been changes in the vertical allocation of competences since the early 1990s. The article maps these transformations in Italian democracy by tracing the formal transfer of national powers to subnational and EU levels. In addition, it portrays the driving forces behind this competence shift and discusses other outcomes of the process besides the changes in the Italian Constitution and EU Treaties. It concludes that central institutions have only adapted partially and incrementally to this formal transfer of powers.