Managerialism Against Clientelism. A Blocked Process of Political Change in Apulia (Southern Italy)


Abstract


This article aims to explain the evolution of forms of political regulation for the allocation of resources and representation of interests in Southern Italy, at length qualified as clientelistic. It will show how managerial principles can be taken up in a context with a historical resistance to bureaucratic change as well as a political orientation which contests neoliberal beliefs. To this end, it analyses a sequence of political change in the Apulia region, while focusing on the political strategies and discourses concerning local development tools for entrepreneurs. It shows how the objective to increase the regional council's institutional capacity to deliver public policies turned into a managerial drift. It is argued that the critique of clientelism, considered the main factor hindering the development of the South, led to the prioritisation of efficiency over representation of collective interests. The critique of clientelism corresponds to the mechanism through which managerialism has spread in a context of economic crisis.

DOI Code: 10.1285/i20356609v15i2p351

Keywords: Clientelism; managerialism; representation; regional politics; Southern Italy

References


Allum, P. (1995), “Le double visage de la Démocratie chrétienne”, Politix, vol. 8, n° 30, 24-44.

Auyero, J. (1999), «‘From the Client's Point(s) of View’: How Poor People Perceive and Evaluate Political Clientelism », Theory and Society, Vol. 28, No. 2 (Apr., 1999), p. 297-334.

Beramendi, P., Häusermann, S., Kitschelt, H., Kriesi H. (2015), The Politics of Advanced Capitalism, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Bobbio, L. (2005), Italy: After the Storm. In Denters, E. R. Lawrence (eds.) Comparing Local Governance. Trends and Developments, Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, pp. 29-46.

Brancaccio, L. (2018), “Crisi del clientelismo di partito e piccole rappresentanze territoriali”, Quaderni di Sociologia [Online], 78 | 2018, online dal 01 janvier 2020, consultato il 03 décembre 2021.

Briquet, J. L. (2009), “Clientelism and the Socio-Historical Interpretation of the “Italian Case’”, Modern Italy, vol. 14, n° 3, 338-356.

Bull, M., Baudner J. (2004), “Europeanization and Italian policy for the Mezzogiorno”, Journal of European Public Policy, vol. 11, n° 6, 1058-1076.

Caciagli, M., Anastasi, A. (1977), Democrazia cristiana e potere nel Mezzogiorno : il sistema democristiano a Catania, Rimini, Firenze: Guaraldi.

Caciagli, M. (2016), “The long life of clientelism in Southern Italy”, in J. Kawata (ed.), Comparing Political Corruption and Clientelism, Aldershot: Ashgate, pp. 157-170.

Chiarello, F. (2005), « La Forza di Nichi e il ruolo delle associazioni », La Repubblica Bari, 20 January.

Chubb, J. (1982), Patronage, Power and Poverty in Southern Italy. A tale of two cities, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press.

Coates, D. (2018), “Progressive politics under neoliberalism”, in D. Cahill, M. Cooper, M. Konings & D. Primrose (eds.), The Sage Handbook of Neoliberalism, SAGE Publications, pp. 359-369.

Cohen, S. (199), L’art d’interviewer les dirigeants, Paris : PUF.

Collier, A. (1994), Critical realism. An introduction to Roy Bhaskar’s Philosophy, London: Verso.

Di Quirico, R. (2006), “I fondi strutturali tra centro e periferia”, in V. Fargion, L. Morlino & S. Profeti (eds.) Europeizzazione e rappresentanza territoriale. Il caso italiano, Bologna: Il Mulino.

Dunford M., Greco L. (2006), After the Three Italies. Wealth, Inequality and Industrial Change, London: Blackwell.

Ermakoff, I. (2019), “Causality and History: Modes of Causal Investigation in Historical Social Sciences”, Annual Review of Sociology, 45, 581-606.

Fargion,V., Morlino L., Profeti S. (2006), Europeizzazione e rappresentanza territoriale. Il caso italiano, Bologna: Il Mulino.

Gelli, F. (2010), “Puglia. La conferma di Nichi Vendola”, in : Baldi B., Tronconi, F. (eds.) Le elezioni regionali del 2010. Politica nazionale, territorio e specificità locale. Bologna : Materiali di Ricerca dell’Istituto Carlo Cattaneo.

Giannelli, N., Profeti, S. (2006), “I fondi strutturali tra politica e amministrazione nelle regioni del Mezzogiorno”, in V. Fargion, L. Morlino & S. Profeti (eds.) Europeizzazione e rappresentanza territoriale. Il caso italiano, Bologna: Il Mulino.

Graziano, L. (1980), Clientelismo e Sistema politico. Il caso dell’Italia, Milano: Franco Angeli.

Graziano, P. (2006), “Partenariato e rappresentanza nelle regioni del Mezzogiorno”, in V. Fargion, L. Morlino & S. Profeti (eds.) Europeizzazione e rappresentanza territoriale. Il caso italiano, Bologna: Il Mulino.

Gualmini E., Schmidt V. A. (2014), “State transformation in Italy and France: Technocratic versus political leadership on the road from non-liberalism to neo-liberalism”, in V.A. Schmidt, M. Thatcher (eds.) Resilient Liberalism in Europe’s Political Economy, Cambridge:

Cambridge University Press, pp. 346-373.

Hacker, J. (2005), “Policy drift: The hidden politics of US welfare state retrenchment”, In W. Streeck and K. Thelen (eds), Beyond Continuity: Institutional Change in Advanced Political Economies, Oxford: Oxford University Press, pp. 40–82.

Kreuzer, M. (2010), ‘Varieties of Time in Comparative Historical Analysis’, in: Goetz, K. H., The Oxford Handbook of Time and Politics, doi: 10.1093/oxfordhb/9780190862084.013.17.

Kriesi, H., Grande, E., Lachat, R., Dolezal, M., Bornschier, S. & Frey T. (2008), West European politics in the age of globalization, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Lascoumes, P., Le Galès, P. (2005), Gouverner par les instruments, Paris : Presses de Sciences Po.

La Spina, A. (2011), “La politica per il Mezzogiorno nell’Italia Repubblicana”, paper presented at SISP.

Leonardi, R. (2014), “Fondi strutturali e declino economico, perché ? L’anomalia del caso italiano”, Rivista Giuridica del Mezzogiorno, 28(4), 761-782.

Mair, P. (2013), Ruling the void: the hollowing of Western democracies, London, New York: Verso.

Mahoney, J. and Thelen, K. (eds) (2009), Explaining Institutional Change: Ambiguity, Agency, and Power, New York, NY: Cambridge University Press.

Maraffi, M. (1985), “Le politiche industriali”, in ISAP (ed.) Le relazioni fra amministrazione e sindacati, vol. 2, Milan: Giuffré.

Mattina, C. (2007), “La transformation des politiques clientélaires de redistribution. Nouvelle gestion urbaine et pratiques politiques à Marseille et à Naples”, Politiques et management public, vol. 25(1), pp. 1-18.

Mayntz, R. (2003), “Mechanisms in the analysis of macro-social phenomena”, MPIfG working paper, No. 03/3, http://www.mpifg.de/pu/workpap/wp03-3/wp03-3.html.

Minervini, G. (2016), La politica generativa: pratiche di comunità nel laboratorio Puglia, Roma : Carrocci.

Paci M. (2013), Lezioni di sociologia storica, Bologna, Il Mulino.

Pawson, R. (2000) « Middle-range realism”, Archives Européennes de Sociologie, vol. 41, n°2, 283-325.

Pellegrini, G. (2019) Review of A. Accetturo, G. de Blasio, Morire di aiuti. I fallimenti delle politiche per il Sud (e come evitarli). Rivista economica del Mezzogiorno, n°2, 594-602.

Perna, T. (1994), Lo sviluppo insostenibile: la crisi del capitalismo nelle aree periferiche: il caso del Mezzogiorno, Napoli: Liguori.

Petrusewicz M. (2001), “The Mezzogiorno: A bias for hope?”, Modern Italy, vol. 6, n°1, 63-67.

Piattoni S. (1998) “Clientelismo virtuoso: una via di sviluppo per il Mezzogiorno?”, Rivista Italiana di Scienze Politiche, 3, 483-513.

Piattoni S. (2001), Clientelism, Interests, and Democratic Representation, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Pollitt, C., Bouckaert, G. (2007) (eds.), Public management reform. A comparative analysis in the age of austerity, Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Polverari, L. (2020), “La capacità amministrativa in Italia: sfide, opportunità e prospettive”, Roma, Quaderno SVIMEZ n°63. URL: http://lnx.svimez.info/svimez/wp-content/uploads/2020/11/quaderno_63.pdf

Sewell, W. J. R. (1996), “Historical events as the transformation of structures: inventing revolution at the Bastille”, Theory and Society, 25, 841-881.

Somers, M. (1998), “‘We are No Angels”. Realism, Rational Choice and Relationality in Social Science”, American Journal of Sociology, vol. 104(3), 722-784.

Sotiropoulos, D. A., (2006), “Old Problems and New Challenges: the Enduring and Changing Functions of Southern European State Bureaucracies”, in R. Gunther, P. N. Diamandouros, D. Sotiropoulos (eds) Democracy and the State in the New Southern Europe, Oxford: Oxford University Press, pp. 197-234.

Steinmetz, G. (1998), “Critical realism and historical sociology. A review article”, Comparative Study in Society and History, vol. 40 (1), 170-186.

Tarrow, S. (1977), Between centre and periphery: Grassroots Politicians in Italy and France, New Haven: Yale University Press.

Terraciano, B., Graziano P. (2016), “EU Cohesion Policy Implementation and Administrative Capacities : Insights from Italian Regions”, Regional & Federal Studies, 26(3), 293-320.

Tilly, C. (2001), “Mechanisms in Political Processes”, Annual Review of Political Science, vol. 4, 21-41.

Trigilia, C. (1992), Sviluppo senza autonomia. Effetti perversi delle politiche nel Mezzogiorno, Bologna : Il Mulino.

Viesti, G. (2014), « La crisi, il Mezzogiorno e i difetti di interpretazione », Meridiana, 79, 9-27.


Full Text: PDF

Refbacks

  • There are currently no refbacks.
کاغذ a4
Bookmark and Share


Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribuzione - Non commerciale - Non opere derivate 3.0 Italia License.