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Without doubt, 2014 was the year of Matteo Renzi. Since winning the leadership of his own party at the end of 2013 and becoming prime minister in February 2014, the young Florentine politician has imparted a decisive change of pace to the endless debates over institutional and policy reforms in Italy. The government has tackled reform of the Senate, the electoral law, and state bureaucracy and has issued measures to address the economic crisis and unemployment. These vital matters have formed the heart of the government's agenda, but that agenda has sometimes seemed to involve "government by press release" and belated recognition of important facts, making overall evaluation of the Renzi government difficult. Thanks to the contributions of international and Italian academics, this volume offers a detailed analysis of the "Year of the Bulldozer," highlighting the key developments that have affected Italian politics and institutions and Italian society in its broadest sense.
List of contents
List of Abbreviations
Chronology of Italian Political Events, 2014
Compiled by Rinaldo Vignati Introduction: The Year of the Bulldozer
Chris Hanretty and Stefania Profeti Chapter 1. The Democratic Party of Matteo Renzi
Mattia Guidi Chapter 2. The Formation of the Renzi Government
Carolyn Forestiere Chapter 3. The European Elections of May 2014: Still Second-Order Elections?
Edoardo Bressanelli Chapter 4. The Italian Presidency of the Council of the European Union: A Semester of Contrasting Outcomes
Marco Brunazzo Chapter 5. Politics in a Transformed Labor Market: Renzi's Labor Market Reform
Georg Picot and Arianna Tassinari Chapter 6. Local Governments at the Time of the Crisis
Sonia Bussu and Maria Tullia Galanti Chapter 7. Italy toward (Yet Another) Electoral Reform
Gianfranco Baldini and Alan Renwick Chapter 8. The Difficult Conditions Inside Italian Prisons: Signs of Change?
Asher D. Colombo and Luigi La Fauci Chapter 9. Centripetal and Centrifugal Corruption in Post-democratic Italy
Donatella della Porta, Salvatore Sberna, and Alberto Vannucci Documentary Appendix
Compiled by Valentina Sartori Abstracts
About the author
Chris Hanretty is a Reader in Politics at the University of East Anglia, United Kingdom.
Stefania Profeti is a Researcher in Political Science in the Department of Social and Political Sciences at the University of Bologna.
Summary
Without doubt, 2014 was the year of Matteo Renzi. Since winning the leadership of his own party at the end of 2013 and becoming prime minister in February 2014, the young Florentine politician has imparted a decisive change of pace to the endless debates over institutional and policy reforms in Italy. The government has tackled reform of the Senate, the electoral law, and state bureaucracy and has issued measures to address the economic crisis and unemployment. These vital matters have formed the heart of the government’s agenda, but that agenda has sometimes seemed to involve “government by press release” and belated recognition of important facts, making overall evaluation of the Renzi government difficult. Thanks to the contributions of international and Italian academics, this volume offers a detailed analysis of the “Year of the Bulldozer,” highlighting the key developments that have affected Italian politics and institutions and Italian society in its broadest sense.
