Le riforme delle istituzioni di politica estera economica

During the transition to the second republic, the three governments following the 1994 "almost" majoritarian elections (Berlusconi, Dini and Prodi) started to apply middle-range reforms in foreign economic policy (FEP). The issue areas were: the Instituto di Commercio Estero (ICE), the institutional decision making framework of FEP, the agency of development co-operation. The final outcome in these policies was some sort of conservative reforms. While the right tried to apply some "laissez faire" measures; the left opted for the "protectionist" model to political economy. In the article, some explanatory hypotheses are advanced: the former is linked to ideological factors - the leftist government is the direct "heir" of the centre/left coalition of the first republic -, the latter to rational choice dimensions - based on strong alliances between ministries and their bureaucracies. There are more changes in the decision making process of the Italian party government: the empirical evidence shows that in the transition to the second republic relations between parties and governments are more institutionalised.