Following decentralization processes, many Italian Regions have been acting as policy laboratories, developing very different approaches according to their political attitude. On the one hand this gives rise to a scenario of fragmented policies and growing inequalities in the Italian welfare system. On the other hand, opportunities are opening for trying new institutional and organizational structures at regional level. In this article we focus on a pilot programme which aims to promote and implement innovative practices in health and social care services in Friuli Venezia Giulia. On the basis of this case study, we offer an analytical overview of some issues involving the development of «local active welfare» in Italy.only subscribers can see the full article

This article analyses the changes in the regulations and institutions of the social policies system following the economic crisis through the case study of the region of the Marches, and starts from the theory that less structured institutional contexts are feeling the economic crisis more markedly and their choices tend to break with the general trend of the last ten years. The change of institutional paradigm taking place in the Marches suggests a series of reflections of national significance on the potentiality and limitations of local governance and organization as encouraged by law 328/2000, bringing out some of the main limitations and potentiality in the processes of institutional learning at local level.only subscribers can see the full article

I’ll try and explain what has been done in the last twelve years in Tuscany and Pisa. After reflecting on the question for several years, we were convinced of the importance of making the local administrations fully responsible for the problems of wellbeing and health. The starting-point was the integration between the social and health sectors. Some general considerations on these subjects, now generally known, which led the Municipalities to start this debate, may help us understand the various phases.only subscribers can see the full article

The article shows the decisive impact of three dimensions linked to the role of the third sector in social policies: how politicians see nonprofit organizations, how social services delegate, and how social policies involve and plan at local level. As a result of how these three aspects are developing, the subsidiarization of welfare is almost naturally starting to modify the roles of those involved, towards spaces of new privatization of social intervention, that betray the institutive aims of non-profit organizations.only subscribers can see the full article

The paper analyses the level of preparation of the local welfare system targeted at immigrants, focusing specifically on the social requirements of foreign citizens as well as the chance to achieve integration. On the basis of the experience acquired by the city council of Reggio Emilia, some characteristics of the intervention system aimed at the integration of immigrants are outlined.only subscribers can see the full article

The article is written from a particular point of view, that of a regional administrator who has also had many years of research experience in Italian universities, studying welfare systems, and offers a reasoned account of some key critical aspects of the creation of social policies at regional level. It thus offers an inside analysis of the regional administrative machine, using the techniques and tools of university research. It illustrates some of the main points involved with making social policy at regional level, connected with intervention models and philosophies, the characteristics of the administrators, and the relation between bureaucracy and policy and between the various levels of government.only subscribers can see the full article

The crisis of the system of production has had the effect of reinforcing the role of regional administrations in managing passive labour policies. In fact, we need to consider not only the functions of running – and financing – the benefits system, delegated to the regions in the agreement between state and regions of February 2009, but also the array of additional and substitute interventions that have been made by locally autonomous bodies. Yet regional interventions, lagging behind national interventions, have been patchy and inevitably limited to the immediate area, and bring out the potentially disruptive character intrinsic to more recent developments in the area of wageprotection policies, when they are not sufficiently accompanied by a strongly equalizing action at national level. only subscribers can see the full article