Europeanization and Domestic Policy Change: The Case of Italy

This book examines the impact of Europeanization on the domestic politics of EU member states, focussing on agricultural policy, cohesion policy and employment policy with a detailed comparative case study on Italy. Though a founding member, Italy has often had an uneasy relationship with the EU and found it difficult to be influential in EU politics and to comply effectively with EU policies and institutional pressures. The main focus of this book is the analysis of Italy-EU relationship from a policy-based perspective, adopting the conceptual lenses developed by Europeanization research. By looking at the evolution of agricultural, regional cohesion and employment policy the book shows how the politics of adaptation have brought Italy closer to Europe in the past twenty years and further highlights the impact of the EU-Italy relationship on domestic institutions and politics. The author explains that even though Italy has increasingly learned to respect EU membership requirements, its influence over agenda setting within the EU remains limited. Europeanization and Domestic Policy Change will be of interest to students and scholars of European Politics, Europeanization, comparative politics and Italian politics.