Riforma delle società a partecipazione pubblica: punti di forza e punti di debolezza

A recent decree introduces in Italy a substantial reform of the governance rules for public enterprises, that is economic organizations ultimately owned or co-owned by national or local governments (D. Lgs. 175/2016, so-called “Madia”). The application field of the reform is general, including public enterprises in the utilities sector and other public enterprises. The main objective is the stabilization of a legal framework where European laws, sectoral regulations and civil law coexisted in the past with some difficulties and inconsistencies. Another aim is to support an already ongoing process of restructuration of public enterprises. However, the drivers of this process are governance rules and a general and generic objective of cost reduction, with poor attention to industrial and regulation issues, both from the supply and the demand side. In this paper the points of strength and the points of weakness of the reform are discussed.