Changing Patterns of Social Concertation: Trade Unions' Decline in Italy

The present contribution aims at shedding light on the interaction between political decision makers and Interest Groups (IGs) (in particular, trade unions) through an historical approach, embracing two decades of social policy (especially pension) reforms.  The aim is thus to shed light on party-group relationships, through a rigorous definition of the changing modes of interaction between the two and the study of the key endogenous and exogenous factors that have shaped it.  The present contribution confirms, on the one hand, some broader trends of the IGs politics in Italy: the progressive disentanglement of parties and interest groups  and the fragmentation of the policy arena. New actors see a role in the reform process. On the other hand, we also outline some peculiarities of the field. This is the case of the changing role of IGs between 1990s and the more recent reform processes in the 2000s and 2010s. Party/group relationships have gone through social concertation, where social partners played a key role, in 1990s; the articulation of a more complex policy arena with new financial and banking sector playing a role in pension funds and the increased competition between political and social actors in the 2000s; and the increased hostility of the decision makers against social partners and a political and economic context that has favoured a more unilateral governmental approach to reforms in the last decade.