Local Autonomies, Regional Governments and Metropolitan Areas in Italy

Abstract

The need to introduce flexibility and diversity into an increasingly centralized and insensitive system of political and administrative controls is one of the most strongly felt problems in modern democracies. In particular, reforms must be fostered in state governmental and administrative structures to reckon with the evergrowing weight of regional units and metropolitan areas. The debate affects not only the United States but also Western Europe, witness the recent reforms in England, Belgium, France, the Netherlands, and Italy. Italy, after delaying by some twenty years the application of the 1948 constitution which called for the establishment of regional governments, has taken steps which should transform the political-administrative base of the country and may serve as guidelines for other societies where regional allegiances remain strong and where metropolitan areas outweigh rural ones in terms of financial needs and commitments. The changes, some twenty years in the works, are worthy of attention as they offer an interesting case of intrastate regionalism coupled with successful elements of micro-regionalization.