Territorial Employment Pacts (since 1998)

Eligibility extends to areas facing structural disadvantages, throughout Italy. Examples include Rovigo and Eastern Venice, Val di Chiana, Grosseto and Livorno, Sangro-Aventino, Teramo, Lecce, East Naples, Benevento, Caltanisetta, and Simeto-Etna.

A key characteristic is the integration of initiatives to promote capital investment in a particular area, involving targeted interventions.

National government
Funding by the Interministerial Economic Planning Committee (Comitato Interministeriale per la Programmazione Economica, Cipe)

Regional/local government
Local government takes part in defining and implementing the territorial pacts.

Employers' or employees' organisations
Social partners take part in defining and implementing the territorial pacts.

Other
Other public subjects working at local level, local representatives of the business and worker sectors; private subjects can participate in the territorial pacts; European funding

European Funds

National funds

According to the Ministry of the Economy Development and several experts, territorial pacts have generated good practices in both the industrial districts of the Centre and North of Italy. This development has also been found in certain southern regions, including predominantly rural area and those that enjoy a certain level of industrialisation.

Strengths include: the mobilisation of local actors and resources; formalised 'accompanied development', in cases where internal actors succeed in obtaining the support they need from external sources; and practices of social concertation (this term refers to the process of continuous interaction between the social partners with the aim of reaching agreements on the control of certain economic and social variables).

Weakness include the following: this mechanism is less operational than assisted area agreements; a proportion of the allocated funds remains unused; collusive and corrupt behaviours are present; difficulties occur in finding 'one best way' to implement the territorial pacts.

Rovigo and Eastern Venice; Val di Chiana; Grosseto and Livorno; Sangro-Aventino; Teramo; Lecce; East Naples; Benevento; Caltanisetta; and Simeto-Etna.

Department of Development and Economic Cohesion, Ministry of Economic Development: www.sviluppoeconomico.gov.it.

Coletto, D. and Pedersini, R. National background paper Italy. Anticipating and managing restructuring in enterprises: 27 national seminars, ARENAS Report. Brussels, European Commission, 2009; ARITAKE-WILD. Joint European Level Social Partners’ Work Programme 2006–2008, Joint study on restructuring in the ‘EU15’. Phase one. Italy National Dossier. 23 and 24 October 2007; Negrelli S. 'The territorial pacts in Italy: the competitive corporatism assumption in question.' In Salais R., Villeneuve R. Europe and the Politics of Capabilities. Cambridge University Press. 2004; Pichierri A. ‘Concertation and local development.’ International Journal of Urban and Regional Research. Vol. 26, 4, 689–706. December 2002; www.sviluppoeconomico.gov.it.