ABSTRACT

The paper investigates the Italian institutional adaptation to Neoliberalism and contributes to the literature in two ways. First, we analyse Italian and international political economy developments since the late 1960s, employing a historical institutionalist approach, sequencing the shift from the ‘roll back’ of Fordism to the ‘roll out’ of neoliberalism. In doing so, we connect the long-standing relevance and re-emergence of neoliberal ideas among technocratic elites and major political parties to the progressive building up of a neoliberal turn in 1992. Second, we develop the notion of selective neoliberalism, defined as a modality of institutional adaptation to neoliberalism which starts from the margins after the 1992 critical juncture, hitting first weak social groups through a dualization process, and then expanding to the rest of society in the form of liberalisation. We illustrate how successive governments circumvented the resistance of trade unions and completed the process of neoliberal adaptation over time, through an analysis of labour market and pension reform processes. The notion of selective neoliberalism might be applied to other countries and policy domains, in particular where an incremental reform process undermines step-by-step the resistance of different veto players to neoliberalization.

摘要

该论文调查了意大利制度对新自由主义的适应，并以两种方式对文献做出了贡献。首先，我们分析了自 1960 年代后期以来意大利和国际政治经济的发展，采用历史制度主义的方法，对从福特主义的“倒退”到新自由主义的“推出”的转变进行排序。在这样做的过程中，我们将技术官僚精英和主要政党之间新自由主义思想的长期相关性和重新出现与 1992 年新自由主义转向的逐步建立联系起来。 其次，我们发展了选择性新自由主义的概念，定义为制度适应新自由主义的模式，从 1992 年紧要关头之后的边缘开始，通过二元化过程打击了第一批弱势社会群体，然后以自由化的形式扩展到社会的其他部分。我们通过对劳动力市场和养老金改革进程的分析，说明历届政府如何规避工会的抵制并随着时间的推移完成新自由主义的适应过程。选择性新自由主义的概念可能适用于其他国家和政策领域，特别是在渐进式改革过程逐步削弱不同否决者对新自由化的抵制的情况下。