The session aims at shedding light on the evolution of the Italian welfare capitalism (both welfare institutions and economic production systems) through the systematic analysis of reforms and/or stalemate in different policy fields: labour market, welfare, banking sector, and industrial policy. The focus on a number of policy fields allows for comparing different reform trends and checking the evolution of the Italian market economy towards the liberal market economy (LME) model, the coordinated market economy (CME) model, or new hybrid forms.

The session will look at the reforms introduced in different policy fields while following a common analytical reading largely inspired by the Varieties of capitalism (VoC) approach. All the papers will thus look at the coherence of the reforms introduced and the overall institutional complementarities and coordination mechanisms of the Italian welfare capitalism, while looking at the future prospects. Papers will address questions about policy success and/or failure at national and sub-national level, while shedding light on the main determinants of the reforms: the role of national and sub-national institutions (e.g. institutional complementarities), EU integration, ideas and interests.