Wealthy by Accident?: Firm Structure, Institutions, and Economic Performance in 150 (+4) Years of Italian History: Introduction to the Special Forum

Abstract

In the century and half since its 1861 unification, Italy has left the periphery of the world economy and reached a level of wealth close to that of industrialized core Western countries. Since the 1990s, however, the process of globalization has exposed the weakness of the Italian productive system, and the country’s economic performance has been one of the worst in the world. This pattern raises questions about the very nature of the Italian economy, its historical development, and its relative success in the long run, demonstrating the need for a structural reassessment of these themes. The aim of this special forum is to provide such analysis, offering a systematic and innovative view based on the interaction between institutions (conceived as the rules of the game of economic agents), firm structure, and economic performance. The main hypothesis discussed in all four articles is that Italian capitalism has been negatively affected by inefficient institutions that had a strong impact on firms’ size and governance, managerial practices, and attitude to innovate. As a result, the Italian economic performance has been frustrated, rather than promoted, by the institutional environment, and in large part shaped by fortunate contingencies.