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A Regional Alliance Sprouts in Brussels

By Gabriel Kahn
ITALY DAILY STAFF

The Region of Lombardy is looking for new real estate… in Brussels. The small office it opened there three years ago, the first Italian region to set up shop in the European Union capital, has become cramped. “It was fine at the beginning,” said Alberto Zorzoli, the region’s vice president, when Lombardy was just feeling its way around the European Commission. But now, the office has evolved into a sort of home base for universities, farmers and chambers of commerce from Lombardy, all of which are confronted by an increasing need to dialogue at the European level.
It’s a telling sign of how the role of local government is expanding across Europe, and in Italy in particular. Until 1996, the Italian government forbade regions from posting representatives in Brussels. Rome feared that a claque of local lobbyists, each pushing their own special interests, could threaten national unity. But late last year, Calabria became the last of Italy’s 20 regions to set up an official presence in Brussels.
The move is more than just symbolic. Regional administrations are taking on more responsibility for interacting directly with the EU, which represents a growing chunk of their funding. But perhaps more importantly, as regions become bolder in dealing with their affairs at the European level, they find they are less and less dependent on Rome.
“In dealing directly with Europe, our relationship with Rome has changed,” said Mr. Zorzoli. He said that whereas Rome once used to dictate policy to regional governments, “now, they sit across the table from us.” Regional autonomy will get another boost on Sunday, when voters will directly elect 15 regional presidents for the first time ever. Previously, presidents had been dependent on regional councils, a situation which made the local governments highly unstable. But this year, the new electoral rules in force will create a stronger executive and a more durable administration. That could also contrast sharply with the national government in Rome, which still operates under old electoral laws and is enfeebled as a result. “More than anything else, there has been a cultural shift,” said Vincenzo Cimino, who became the European Commission liaison for the Marche region when it opened an office a year and a half ago. “The central administration never liked the fact that regions were getting involved with Brussels, especially in agriculture, which is the biggest item on the budget.” The increased reliance on Brussels has become a matter of necessity, as EU law, from environmental regulations to t r a n s p o r t a t i o n grants, governs more and more of a region’s business. “Today, if we take out health, I’d say 80 percent of a regional government’s activity is governed by EU norms,” said Mr. Cimino. “When I started at the region a decade ago, Europe only meant agriculture funds.” Others note that by weaning local administrations away from Rome, Brussels forced regions to open up to a broader culture. “Our commissioners move around more. We are building a different Europe. We are European citizens now,” said Sauro Brandoni, a spokesman for the Marche region. “While before these relationships were extraordinary, they have now become routine.” While there are still frequent complaints that dealing with the EU can be as bureaucracy-laden as Rome, much of the future of European integratio hinges on delegating more powers away from national capitals to local authorities. “The more we move toward a unified Europe, with 500 million inhabitants, the more local spirit, the local bell tower, becomes a reference point,” Romano Prodi, the former Italian prime minister and current European Commission president said recently. But in Italy, despite the fact that regional identities are among the strongest in Europe, implementing a more federal-style of government has been a struggle. Rome has failed to turn over many of the responsibilities that it had promised to grant to regions. What’s more, vast regional differences, mostly between North and South, mean that a region like Lombardy has a significantly more developed administrative capacity than does Calabria. “Sicily and Puglia are not up to the challenge at all,” said Lanfranco Senn, a professor of regional economics at Milan’s Bocconi University. “They are not able to respond in due time and respect the commitments that the EC is asking of them.” At the same time, Mr. Senn said that he had recently attended a forum at the European Parliament in Strasbourg where the Veneto Region was presenting its local transportation initiatives. “The Veneto office in Brussels office had organized the entire thing,” he said. Local Government Begins to Bypass Rome for a European Dialogue “This means that regions with something to offer don’t hesitate to ignore Rome and be independent,” said Mr. Senn. But many of the southern regions, he added, “still depend on
Rome.” The role of Rome still impacts heavily on how regions interact with Brussels. “Italian regions arrived late on the scene,” said Mr. Senn, and did not immediately enjoy a blessing from Rome. As a result, there was never any effort to coordinate regional interests, as frequently happens in other European countries, especially those with a genuinely federal structure. “German regions, for example, are heavily sponsored by the federal government. Berlin is much more supportive,” Mr. Senn said. But despite the ongoing meddling from Rome, the era of centralized planning is gradually disappearing. “Brussels,” said Mr. Brandoni of the Marche, has become the reference point, not just for the regions, but all local government.”