The Italian Social Care System

The last decades were dense of relevant changes that contributed to the crafting of the current Italian social care system. As this chapter tries to depict, such changes occurred in an emergent way, sometimes dealing with specific societal issues, other times tackling broader reforms or following the evolution of the society structure. The chapter describes these developments focusing on three dimensions of analysis: (i) Institutional framework; (ii) Service provision; (iii) Resource extent and allocation. Two different tensions regarding fragmentation and standardization arise, leading towards conflicting goals and increasing complexity. Eventually, the chapter adopts public management lenses to analyse how venues of policy fragmentation and policy standardization may have an impact on social care management. We argue that to tackle an increasing complexity, new managerial skills are needed for public managers and that New public governance theory better addresses such complexity, introducing relevant concepts for the analysis: (i) Public networks; (ii) Collaborative governance and citizen engagement; (iii) Outcome orientation. Eventually, the evolution within the Italian welfare system of public networks and community platforms suggests the rise of a new approach that can reduce the barriers between the public and private spheres and that can promote innovations encompassed by several actors.