Development and Crisis: transformations in the Italian economy in the last 80 years. Lessons for Europe

The presentation deals with the great transformations of the Italian economy in the last 80 years, from the economic miracle during the beginning of the 1960s till the strong crisis of the last years, crossing all the great changes in the European strategies, the changes in the international order and in relative prices between manufacturing goods and raw materials, the explosion of regional wars (starting with the oil price’s boom during the Kippur war), and the financial changes (or reforms?) during the European Monetary System and with the application of the Maastrict’s rules to join the issue of the unique European currency. Moreover, with the globalization phase which led many people and opinion leaders to think that we should have entered a period of economic peace and collective wellbeing but created, instead, a great crisis in 2007-2008 and the following explosion of the sovereign debt crisis.

The presentation deals also with the different economic policies introduced both at national and European levels and the evaluation of their effects on the economy, on the investments and employment, on the general well being of the society. Very often, it has been possible to demonstrate the incoherence between the goals of economic policies (especially at European level) and the effective economic results. Some examples could help: the very good performancs of the Italian real economic variables during the 1980s were joined with very bad performances in financial variables; again the good performance in financial variables in some “pigs” economies were indifferent to guarantee the lack of economic crisis after the 2007-2008 international economic crisis. Moreover the solidarity among European partners was guaranteed during the EMS but not anymore during the introduction of the European currency … 

We are entering, probably, in the 4th international crisis in the last 15-20 years; this means economic  crisis is not anymore a strange phenomenon, escaping from the normal growth path, due to some extraordinary exogenous events. Probably we need to think about the coexistence of economic changes and crisis, to forget growth rates and starting to think in terms of transformations in the medium-long term of the economic system and on the crucial  role of investments (and of the State), giving autonomy to the European economy and society.

Professor Gioacchino Garofoli is Full Professor of Economic Policy at the University of Insubria, where he previously served as Director of the Department of Economics (2008–2011). He has taught at the University of Pavia since 1972 and has held visiting professorships at the Universities of Grenoble and Toulouse. He is President of the Association of Economists of Neo-Latin Languages (since 2005) and formerly served as President of AISRe (2000–2003). From 1999 to 2017, he coordinated the European PhD Programme in Economics of Production and Development and directed the LED (Local Economic Development) Master Programme at the University of Insubria between 2003 and 2007. Prof. Garofoli is a member of the Editorial Boards of Regional Studies and Entrepreneurship and Regional Development. His publications include Economia e politica economica in Italia (Franco Angeli), Development on the Ground (Routledge), I maestri dello sviluppo economico (Franco Angeli), Endogenous Development and Southern Europe (Avebury), Modelli locali di sviluppo (Franco Angeli), Impresa e territorio (Il Mulino), Economia del Territorio (EtasLibri), and Industrializzazione diffusa in Lombardia (Franco Angeli).