Is Italian Bureaucracy Exceptional? : Comparing the Quality of Southern European Public Administrations

The idea of Southern European exceptionalism, the theme that various similarities among the states of this area set them apart from their Western and Northern European counterparts, has recently been challenged. Their party systems and the stability of their governments would suggest the political convergence of Italy, Portugal, Greece and Spain towards the other consolidated democracies. However, the idea of exceptionalism was also linked to the distinctive features of Southern European bureaucracies and to the peculiar evolution of their institutions and welfare states. Assuming these similarities, this article has two main goals. First, I will propose an analytical framework for the comparative study of bureaucratic quality. Southern European bureaucracies will be analysed in terms of a number of dimensions, emphasising the role of public administration in consolidated democracies. I will use these dimensions to answer a specific research question: In what respects (if any) can Italian bureaucracy be considered exceptional when compared to the Greek, Portuguese and Spanish cases? Within this context, the role of administrative legacies and the relationship between politicians and bureaucrats will be considered.