During the last decades, Italy has been facing intense reforming seasons, which has involved the regional level. According to the constitutional chart, since 2001 these administrations share the legislative power with the national Parliament and take on a relevant role in policy-making, for instance in healthcare, public transportation and environment.
In order to ensure the effectiveness of Regional programming process and the coherence of cross-cutting policies, Regions need to be supported by an organizational setting that facilitates coordination and makes the administrative level interact with the political one.
Hence, this research aims at identifying and discussing the dimensions needed to design effective models of regional governance, considering both coordination between different organizational structures in charge of traducing policies into actions and the linkages between politics and bureaucracy. In order to ensure a “hands-on approach”, the paper focuses on the case of Lombardy Region, that is the most economically advanced Region in Italy and has recently experienced an organizational change process aimed at responding to increasing complexity levels, faced both on the external (cutback management; interdependent needs) and on the internal (policy inter-dependency; evolution of politics/management relation) context.
After a review of the scientific literature concerning organizational lateral coordination, the research focuses on different level of analysis such as: organizational structures and governance, coordination mechanisms, enabling conditions and barriers. These levels are analysed in the case of Lombardy Region, whose governance model is examined in order to propose concrete solutions and organizational actions to boost its effectiveness and efficiency.
Finally, the research depicts a comparative view, taking into consideration other international experiences in organizational coordination and integration at the regional level.
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