I written this blog thinking whether evidence-informed policies and decision-making processes the prerogative of central governments or can they also take place at local level? Local First has kindly published it and you can find it here >> \’Local First is an approach to international development that prioritises the views and leadership of people and […]
Interesting times in Italian politics. President Napolitano has assigned the task of forming a new government to Pier Luigi Bersani, the leader of the Democratic Party Italy\’s leading center-left party which in this month (i.e.March) election secured a majority in the Chamber of Deputies but not in the Senate. A new government requires the vote
I woke up this morning thinking about the political situation in Italy. Yesterday, President Napolitano, began meetings with the various parties represented in the parliament to understand if and to whom give the task of trying to establish a government which will also need to be voted by the majority of parliamentarians in the two
Evidence can wait. Can’t it? Read More »
Silvio Berlusconi did it again. Fifteen months ago he was forced down as prime minister in favor of Mario Monti. The country economy on the brink of default. Even his allied believed he was finished as a politician. His party falling downhill in people\’s preference. His allies jumping from the sinking ship. Unable to find
Why so many Italians vote for Berlusconi? Read More »
Interesting paper by Francis Fukuyama for the CGD: What is Governance? Here the abstract: This paper points to the poor state of empirical measures of the quality of states, that is, executive branches and their bureaucracies. Much of the problem is conceptual, since there is very little agreement on what constitutes high-quality government. The paper suggests
What is Governance? A paper by Francis Fukuyama Read More »
You may have faith or not. You may be religious or not. You may follow the church precepts or not, it does not matter. The announcement of the Pope’s resignation as of 28. February is something that will be in the history books for many years (centuries) to come. Growing up in Italy you just
The resignation of the Pope, courage and Italian politics Read More »
Paul Krugman has written in his End This Depression Now! ‘In normal times, the latest academic research plays a very small role in real-world policy debates, which is arguably how it should be – in the heat of the political moment, how many policy makers are truly equipped to evaluate the quality of a professor’s
Evidence gone missing in the Italian election campaign show Read More »
The newspaper La Repubblica is conducting a investigation about the responsibilities within the Department of Civil Protection in the event of the earthquake at l\’ Aquila. Here is what is emerging from the investigation and analysis of the documentation (now public) collected by the judges: ‘It \’s the end of March 2009, the city of Abruzzo hostage for four months of shocks measuring up to 4.1 on the Richter scale