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Multi-Level Governance in Italy: The Case of Marche

The emergence of sub-national governments as actors in the European political arena is a topic which in recent years has increasingly attracted theoretical attention. In contrast to state-centric views (Hoffmann, 1966; Milward, 1992; Moravcsik, 1993), the Multi-Level Governance (MLG) approach has stressed the independent role played by sub-national actors in the European policy-making process (Marks, 1992, 1993, 1996; Hooghe, 1996). Its assumption is that in the process of European integration ‘authority and policy-making influence are shared across multiple levels of government – sub-national, national, and supranational’ (Marks et al., 1996: 342). Playing an independent role, regional governments shape their own preferences and – being political arenas ‘interconnected rather than nested’ – directly influence the EU political agenda (ibid.: 346–7). National governments no longer represent the only ‘interface’ between domestic and supranational arenas (ibid.: 356). Conceptualizations are still quite sketchy and their explanatory power largely untested, mainly for the wide variety of territorial units of governments amongst member states. However, it is incontestable that the EU, as a political system, has developed into a polycephalic entity. It is therefore important to understand how single units are connected to each other vertically and horizontally and how institutions’ behaviour is adapting to the new ‘European Domestic Policy’ (Jeffery, 1996: 217–8). The acceleration of the European integration since the 1980s proved that regions are important actors in both implementing regional policies, and representing sub-national interests in the EU (Leonardi, 1995: 25). The increased share of policy responsibilities among EU, national and regional actors boosted a progressive mutual adaptation. Scholars term this process as Europeanization: ‘the shift of attention of all national institutions and their increasing participation (...) in the EC/EU decision-making cycle’ (Wessels and Rometsch, 1996: 328). It varies according to member states’ constitutional structure and to institutions’ ability to include in their