THE PRINCIPLE OF SOLIDARITY WITHIN THE ITALIAN CONSTITUTION AND THE EUROPEAN MIGRANT PROBLEM

Abstract

Having been enshrined in the principal European constitutions after the devastation of the Second World War, with the adoption of the Charter of Fundamental Rights and the subsequent Lisbon Treaty, the term solidarity has taken on central importance also within the new constitutional and institutional framework of the European Union. The Italian republican Constitution asserts the principle of solidarity in a particularly evident manner and marks one of the clearest instances and one of the most strongly enshrined manifestations of the principle within Europe. It is within the historical context that the numerous and precise references - both explicit and implicit - to the vocation of solidarity inherent within the Italian Constitution, must be placed and construed. However, the centrality and pervasive manner in which this watchword of the contemporary political and legal lexicon is used takes on a particular depth in the light of the immense tragedy of the migrants who are daily knocking on the doors of Europe, and which has had a profound effect on the Old Continent. It has been pointed out in this regard from various quarters that it would be appropriate to introduce a binding requirement of solidarity between European governments. The awareness that the full resolution of this crisis will require a profound transformation of the institutional structure of the Union is in fact no longer a prerogative solely of progressive political forces: although the predominant characteristic element of the Union is the economic one, the argument that the Union can only survive the current crisis and prosper if it moves swiftly towards political union is attracting an increasing number of supporters in Italy. And yet, in the words of one of the founding fathers, French Foreign Minister Robert Schuman, cooperation between European peoples cannot remain an economic and technical affair. It is necessary to give it a soul. Europe will live insofar as it will have conscience of itself.