Italy and the south of the world: still a laggard in international development?

Abstract

This article analyses Italy's approach to international development, focusing in particular on why Italy gives (so little) foreign aid to developing countries. The first part explains trends since the 1960s. Following a slow start, Italy significantly boosted its volume of foreign aid in the 1980s, with the aim to enhance its prestige in the international arena and to support the penetration of its business interests in the developing world. The political crisis of the early 1990s and the difficult economic conditions resulted in drastic cuts in volume of aid and in a disengagement with the international development debate. The second section of this paper discusses Italy's overall approach to international development, looking at both its performance in quantity and quality of aid and in a number of policies particularly relevant for the achievement of the Millennium Development Goals. The third part starts from the bipartisan failure of both the centre-right and the centre-left coalitions to raise the status of development cooperation to ask whether a new season in Italian development policy has emerged. Particular attention is devoted to the new initiatives adopted at the European Union (EU) level, which are deemed to have a significant impact in the future of all Member States of the EU.

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