Regional development: reviewing the Italian mosaic

Abstract

This article presents estimates of per capita gross domestic product, workforce, product per worker and activity rates for the Italian regions in benchmark years from 1891 and 1951; historical estimates are linked to the official figures available from 1971 onwards, in order to capture the evolution of the long-term regional economic disparities. In light of this picture, the main analyses concerning the take-off of the north-west, the rise of the central north-east regions, and the failure of southern Italy and of regional policies are briefly reviewed. A long-term, albeit still preliminary interpretative hypothesis is proposed, which is based on the distinction between key fixed resources (energy, human capital, social capital) and mobile resources (technical and financial capital). During the period of ‘extraordinary intervention’ in the south, the Italian state favoured the latter, not the former, thus achieving only transitory and unsatisfactory results.

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