An Italian Urban “Fashion”

IJPP ­ Italian Journal of Planning Practice 66Vol. II, issue 2 ­ 2012

Sara Verones1, Simone Tulumello2, Simona Rubino2, Ilaria
Delponte3

ISSN: 2239­267X

The Urban 1 Programme as a Catalyst for InstitutionalPlanning Shift

2 Department of Architecture, University of Palermo ­ simone.tulumello@gmail.com;
simonarubino@unipa.it

ABSTRACT
Since the 1990s Italy has been going through changes and
experiments concerning modes and tools of urban government. New
methods, based on public­private partnership, on a consensual basis,
were progressively adopted, overcoming the traditional authoritative
mechanisms and role of public actors. The contribution of Community
policies such as initiatives on urban areas, has been crucial in
creating new tools, influencing the existing ones and activating new
approaches to planning.
This paper builds some theoretical considerations on the
contributions the implementation of European Programmes has given
to the changes in the conception of urban interventions and the
debated shift in urban policies from “government” to “governance”.

1 Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, University of Trento ­
sara.verones@ing.unitn.it

3 Department of Civil, Environmental and Architectural Engineering, University of Genoa ­
ilaria.delponte@unige.it



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1. INTRODUCTION
Italy has faced momentous changes. The transformation from a predominantly
agricultural economy to one based on industrial and services sectors only
occurred in the 1970s after the post­war reconstruction period (Scattoni &
Falco, 2011). In the 1980s and 1990s the de­industrialization processes
started, shifting to a post­fordist, post­modern model (Bagnasco, 1990) with
the development of «hyper­territories, meta­expressions, and increasingly
complex functionalities of urban life, work, consumption, and mobility»
(Seixas & Albet, 2010, 772).
In such turbulent contexts, Italy experienced two decades of experiments in
legislation and operations (Palermo, 2006; Governa & Saccomani, 2004;
Tira & Zanon, 2011), shifting the mainstream institutional planning
paradigms from government to governance (Seixas & Albet, 2010). New
methods, based on public­private partnership, on a consensual basis, were
progressively adopted, overcoming the traditional authoritative mechanisms.
Various legislative provisions have introduced new instruments for territorial
and urban planning (Governa & Saccomani, 2004) such as the family of
Integrated Programmes and tools focusing on economic­productive aspects.
Moreover, while strong pressures existed for the reform of national and
regional planning legislation, several mechanisms have been experimented
«with contracts among different institutional tiers or between public and
private actors, with grants, special purpose vehicles, marketable building
rights or potentials, mixed agencies» (Ponzini, 2011).
The role of European Comunity policies in the innovation of territorial and

The aim is to build a critical analysis about how the Urban 1
initiative acted as a “catalyst” for the evolution of urban practices,
accelerating the innovation of the planning cultures and practices.
The article examines three cities where an Urban 1 Programme has
been developed: Genoa, Naples and Palermo. The cases have been
selected in order to present the variety of interpretations of EU
initiatives across Italy, fostering a critical discussion on EU
programmes and their relationships with local planning policies.



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urban government tools in Italy has been crucial. The Community
Initiatives, such as the Urban Pilot Project 1 and 2, and the Urban
Programmes, were designed by the European Union as opportunities for
innovation in urban policies in the local perspective to enhance the
effectiveness of public action (Padovani, 2002a). As a result, the
Europeanization of urban intervention cultures, together with the innovation
and integration of policies concerning social and economic issues and an
invitation to overcome the traditional focus on building and planning
modelling has made new inputs to the debate. The Community Initiatives
contributed to the definition of new modes and tools for urban interventions,
according to Rivolin and Faludi (2005, 207):

thanks to a sort of contamination by Community policies
(through participation in Integrated Mediterranean
Programmes, Territorial Employment Pacts, Urban Pilot
Projects, Leader and Urban Community Initiatives), a dozen or
so new tools for “negotiated programming” and “complex
programmes” for urban regeneration have been created, within
the short period of time of only a few years giving rise to a
plethora of local territorial actions.

In recent years, Community policies have been the objects of several studies,
revealing a wider debate on the development of national policies for the city
and the territory, including different institutional levels of government and
governance (Balducci, 2000; Rivolin & Faludi, 2005; Rivolin 2000;
Governa, 2010; Governa & Salone, 2005). The literature has deeply
analysed Urban 1, above all, due to the innovative concept of inter­
institutional, inter­sectoral, multi­actor, and participative action and to its
wide use throughout the peninsula.
The Urban 1 Initiative concluded in 1999, involved 118 European cities, 16
in Italy. The objective was to push European cities to implement innovative
and participative programmes in order to be able to intervene in effective
terms in situations of serious environmental and social urban decay
(Padovani, 2002b). The Urban Initiative aimed at acting as a driver for local
development «through exemplary projects aimed at sustainable improvement
of living conditions of urban residents, particularly in the poorest and socially



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degraded areas» (CEC 1994).
Whereas the physical outcomes of this experience have been analysed
(Palermo et al., 2002; Campagna & Ricci, 2000), studies have approached
Urban 1 experiences as a chance to activate a learning process concerning the
use of cross­sectoral urban policies (Padovani, 2002a), and the promotion of
effective participative processes, all aimed at the social and economic
cohesion of target areas (Tosi, 2001). Accordingly, the Urban initiative has
improved a set of capabilities in co­operation and in dealing with integrated
urban problems (Padovani, 2002a, 2002b). Furthermore, the adoption of
suggestions from the EU city governance approach and the introduction of a
series of Integrated Programmes have had direct consequences on the Italian
planning culture, inaugurating a “planning by project” (Fontana, 2002) fashion
which had to deal with the crisis of planning models.
What seems to be missing is a debate on the contribution of Urban 1 in the
discussion on the contemporary shift in the Italian institutional planning. To
discuss this, the article will analyse the initiative in three Italian cities,
Genoa, Naples and Palermo, following three specific perspectives.
The first is related to the role of the nation states in relation with European
Union institutions and the consequent new models for public action. The
first generation of European Community initiatives – such as the Urban
Programme have partly contributed to the evolution of the Italian planning
systems with the introduction of new concepts and practices to deal with
urban issues pressing to enforce administrative decentralization, strengthen
local responsibilities and to develop integrated urban policies (Saccomani &
Governa, 2004; Stanghellini, 2001; Tosi, 2001; Governa, 2010). Clementi
(2002, 26), stated that it is necessary «to manage by agreements rather than
with decrees and measures for self­reliance. We would expect that after this
very intense period of experimentation, the local development plan would
never be the same [translated by the authors]».
The second is to critically discuss how the European aspiration to build a
socially shared interaction, closely related to the concept of “consensus
building”, were differently activated. Laino (1999, 75) observed that the 16
different interpretations of Urban 1 were examples of «a series of decision­
making means partially following the government approach combined with
others in accordance with urban governance conceptualization [translated by



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the authors]». Taking into account the significance of the term governance in
relation to the particular phase of citizens’ involvement in the decision­
making processes, he outlines the use of methodologies of participation of
inhabitants, the great potential for innovation, and the clear limits to the
Italian practice of urban regeneration.
The last point of interest is how such urban regeneration policies with social
objectives, together with the expansion of strategic means of planning, select
areas and/or issues of intervention and how the trends to timely intervention
may foster some tendencies to the exclusion of some areas or issues from the
planning field.
To sum up, the concern of this paper is to make some theoretical reflections
on the modifications of planning practice in Italy, through the lenses of the
institutional planning shift that restructured the planning discipline in
Europe in the last decades. The role of the Urban programme as a “catalyst”
of changes in planning cultures will be debated. In chemistry, a catalyst is a
«substance that increases the rate of a chemical reaction without itself
undergoing any permanent chemical change1»: the same programme has
been implemented in several different contexts, and we will debate how it
contributed to the accelerating of the processes of shifting of institutional
planning. The theoretical debate on this shift will be outlined in section 2.
Section 3 will summarise the evolution of the Italian planning system in
order to give the context for the empirical analysis (Section 4) which will
show how the implementation of the Urban 1 programme in Italy is worth
studying in order to provide some theoretical considerations (Section 5) in
respect to the general frame aforementioned.
2. THE CONTEMPORARY INSTITUTIONAL PLANNING SHIFT AND THE EU
INITIATIVES

The last three decades of the last century have been described as the epoch
of the post­modern shift, the transition between a fordist and a post­fordist
economy being entrenched with great social and cultural consequences and

available on www.wordreference.com
As defined by the Concise Oxford English Dictionary, edited by the Oxford University Press and1



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gigantic spatial transformations within the urban field (Fillion, 1996). The
growing specialization of urban spaces, the fragmentation of the urban
structure, and the emergence of new and typical urban forms allow the
1970s to be considered as the beginning of a period of general
transformation of urban forms, not yet concluded (Martinotti, 1993).
Such phenomena have been faced by the public sector with growing
difficulties due to the fiscal stress connected with de­industrialization
processes. Neo­liberal trends and the crisis of planning models made factors
like the decline of nation states, the fragmentation of the decision­making
processes, and the prevalence of the multinational private sector crucial to
an exploration of contemporary policies (Shaktin, 2002).
Three general aspects of the contemporary shift in planning can be reviewed
in order to formulate the questions to be debated within the paper.
1. It is necessary to look at the redefinition of the role of the nation states
which do not simply passively undergo the aforementioned processes «but
engage in them as actors in their own right» (Governa, 2010, 664).
Decentralization processes have reshaped the relationships between national
and local levels, defining new models for public action and a number of new
policies were developed, shifting the mainstream institutional planning
paradigms from government to governance (Seixas & Albet, 2010). It has
been noted that making an absolute distinction between such two models is
an unattainable task, and referring rather to a «continuum of intersecting
aspects and features» (Governa, 2010, 679) seems to be a more appropriate
approach. Indeed, within such processes, the role of strategic means of
planning is crucial. Within the EU, a further level is in play: a re­scaling of
territorial governance (Brenner, 1999) related to the bilateral relationships
between nation states and EU institutions. The shift to governance and the
innovation of local policies are commonly considered as main tools for
achieving the objectives of competitiveness and cohesion which frame the
community agenda on urban development (Territorial Agenda, 2007;
ESPON, 2010; Governa, 2010). From this view­point, the first generation of
Urban programmes can be analysed as a test­bed for the desired renovation
of local policies in southern European cities.
Within such a context, some reflections on the EU's Territorial Agenda have
stressed on the fact that a shift towards a so­called “evidence­based”



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justification of policies has brought a relative neglect of the dimension of
political and social agency in spatial development processes (Gualini, 2008).
Might we extend such reflections by suggesting that the shift from
governmental to governance practices refers to a shift from a political to an
operational attitude? In other words, may the shift towards project­based
planning and the (relative) neglect of normative planning practices reduce
the opportunities for political debate and foster some tendencies to focus
only on economic development policies?
2. Such a question is intertwined with the second theoretical point to be
debated: the so­called institutional turn in social sciences2, stressing the new
forms of political interactions between the vertical pressures of private
interests – linked with the growing role of multinational sectors – and the
grass­roots democratization and decentralization pressures. In a post­modern
political arena, decisions cannot be taken «in a linear fashion from intent to
choice, but in a complex, socially structured interaction» (Vigar et al., 2000,
47). Thus, specific practices should be embedded in a wider context made of
social relations (Healey, 1999), considering both the growing effects of large
international institutions on day­to­day people's lives and the ability of
people to influence them (Beauregard, 2005). Consensus building practices
and the general shift from normative to strategic planning are deeply
interconnected with such themes.
Within their analysis of contemporary large urban developments in Europe,
Gualini & Majoor (2007) have stressed some critical aspects: a limited
amount of both strategic and comprehensive planning approaches; a lack of
effective implementation of “new” planning ideas. The point seems to be the
institutional fragmentation wherein most of such projects are realized which
makes it harder for governments and local administrations to effectively
pursue their interests. These authors foresee the emergence of a “new urban
policy” (ibidem, 198) whose main focus shifts from welfare policies to
market­oriented approaches.
Given the shifting patterns of justification of policies, how did the
implementation of the Urban 1 programmes in Italy manage the consensus­
building issues? Can we recognize some tendencies towards the so­called

See Planning Theory, vol. 4, n.3, 2005.2



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“new urban policies”?
3. A last theme stresses the “dark­side” of the institutional planning shift. If
we recognize that both contemporary societal patterns and urban forms are
increasingly associated with social polarization, privatization of public
space(s) and exclusion of social groups (Young, 1991; Petti, 2007; Holston,
1998) we might be interested in understanding how such processes are
justified: if a democratic interaction is necessary to justify policies, the role
of information is decisive for consensus building (Forester, 1989; Hillier,
2002). Thereby, a “neo­liberal governmentality” has been described, based
on the building of oppositional categories such as “order/disorder”,
“we”/”the others” (Hutta, 2009) to justify selective and/or exclusive policies.
From this viewpoint, a strategic means of planning – and the use of specific
programmes as well – allows a “selective non­planning” (Yiftachel, 2009) in
order to exclude from institutional attention some areas, instances, or
populations.
Tosi (2001) questioned the model of an integrated approach proposed by
European documents in relation to the concept of multidimensionality of
measures in the social literature, stressing the relationships between the
choice of areas where Urban programmes apply and the achievement of
social goals. A last question emerges: can the generalised use of integrated
programmes, such as the Urban one, reduce the use of normative planning
tools and, thus, foster some tendencies to the exclusion of some areas or
issues from the planning field?
These questions can provide some critical interpretations of the Italian shift
in planning policies. Thus, instead of a review of “best practice” outcomes,
this paper will compare different processes, in order to make some general
conclusions on the way complex, well­funded urban programmes may, at the
same time, contribute to positive innovation to planning processes or shift
the decision­making focus from public to private interests.



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3. THE ITALIAN PLANNING SHIFT
3.1 From zoning to the crisis of traditional Italian planning
The Italian planning system is grounded in an outdated law, Law 1150
approved in 1942, which defines the municipal plan (PRG, Piano Regolatore
Generale) as a master plan based on land­use zoning extended to the
municipal area. Its main aims were organizing the physical growth of the
city and providing building regulations for land transformation. Subsequent
legal amendments and supplements have further articulated the zoning and
the PRG has progressively become a tool used to orient urban growth in
order to perform economic and social development (Oliva et al., 2002;
Mazza, 1997). This model is based on a comprehensive knowledge of reality
that allows the definition of problems and the construction of alternatives to
choose the planning solutions, structuring the local plan in the notion of
public interest (Mazza, 1997).
Since the 1970s, major territorial expansion has stopped, social demand
changed, and the notion of collective interest broken down (Saccomani,
2003) putting in crisis this sort of plan. The main criticisms of this model
were brought from social, business, and environmental interests (Salzano,
1998). Three main reasons for the ineffectiveness of public actions and the
inadequate technical quality of municipal plan have been recognised (Oliva
et al., 2002):

• the reference to a model unable to govern the transformations
taking place;
extreme rigidity of the plan in comparison to the rapidity of urban
change;
inadequate implementation tools, essentially based on expropriation
procedures and not considering public­private negotiations.

•
•

To overcome such a crisis, an incremental approach to the municipal plan
was developed aiming to a design parts of the city, according to the needs
and priorities of the moment. Thus, in the early 1990s, new tools for urban
planning were introduced in the Italian framework to operate in a more
flexible and pragmatic way on the basis of public­private agreements in



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derogation of the existing PRGs (Mello, 2007; Ombuen et al., 2000). After
the first implementations, these tools could only give partial answers when
disconnected from a general planning strategy and vision. Thus, there was a
new planning demand for a return to having a municipal plan, but radically
changed in form and procedures (Salzano, 2008; Oliva et al., 2002).
3.2 “Complex Urban Programmes”: integrated planning tools and European
projects
During the 1990s, new tools were developed in order to shift the way of
urban intervention from “traditional” to “integrated” (Governa & Salone,
2004): the family of “complex urban programmes” (Programmi Complessi),
were tools focusing on economic­productive aspects, negotiated planning
(Programmazione Negoziata), and all finalised to define a contractual model
for the interaction between public and private actors.
The complex urban programmes, have been implemented in five national
Programmes: Integrated Intervention Programmes (PII, Programmi Integrati
di Intervento, 1992), Urban Rehabilitation Programmes (PRU, Programmi di
Recupero Urbano, 1993), Urban Renewal Programmes (PRIU, Programmi di
Riqualificazione urbana, 1994), Neighbourhood Contracts (CdQ, Contratti di
Quartiere, 1998 and 2003), and Programmes for the Urban Renewal and
Sustainable Development for Territories (PRUSST, Programmi di
Riqualificazione Urbana e Sviluppo Sostenibile del Territorio, 1998).
In these programmes, the principle of integration – in terms of intervention­
sector multi­dimensionality (functions, economy, local societies), of
coordination among various institutional levels, and of cooperation between
public and private actors (Davoudi, 2003) – is put forward with different
approaches in an evolutionary perspective. The first direction for these urban
regeneration policies – aimed to improve urban quality – including PIIs,
PRUs, and PRIUs, focused mainly on physical renewal, integrating urban
issues with social and economic problems. Then, PRUSSTs and
neighbourhood contracts, were aimed at promoting sustainable local
development in situations in which physical and functional degradation are
accompanied by social problems, but at an enlarged scale, municipal at least.
The second kind of intervention programmes (Law 662/1996; CIPE



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resolution 21/3/1997), consists of a set of tools focused on economic­
productive aspects using negotiating approaches. Territorial Pacts (Patti
Territoriali), Area Contracts (Contratti d’Area) as well as Quarter
(Neighbourhood) Contracts were defined as agreements for local
development promoted by local entities.
Within this context, several planning policies – EU actions, complex
programmes, traditional planning, and plan implementation tools – can overlap
in a single geographical area, and the analysis of their relationships is a
challenging task. It is important to stress the experimental character of the last
two decades and the period of important institutional, economic, and social
changes. Moreover, with a similar model but with different financial capacity,
complex and Urban 1 programmes have simultaneously involved the same
public local administrations and, sometimes, the same target areas. Following
these considerations, it is undoubted that the complex urban programmes
«have often been implemented in accordance with EU Urban initiative or
through projects emulating its “spirit”» (Governa, 2010, 673) and the pivotal
role of European Union to widely spread an innovative model of urban
intervention able to “contaminate” (Rivolin & Faludi, 2005) and contribute to
the evolution of the Italian way of planning, working as a catalyst.
It is evident that, not only the introduction of various legislative provisions
of different tools for urban renewal but also the European Union policies
have put forward the principle of integration in different forms and in
different sectors contributing to an evolution of Italian practices not only
through the amount of finance offered, but also by introducing an urban
renewal culture unlike the traditional building and urban renewal approach
(Governa & Saccomani, 2004).
Hence, Urban initiatives, and Urban 1 in particular, being the first, have
played a crucial role in proposing the same new cultural issues in planning
that were similarly debated in each EUCountry, introducing key innovations
in terms of territorial and urban government tools (Padovani, 2002a).
3.3 Main outcomes in ordinary planning
Since the second half of the 1990s the Italian National Planning Institute
(Inu) has tried to respond to the new planning situation with the proposal for



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a novel national planning act with principles, guidelines, and coordination
with the subsequent legislative action of the regions (Stanghellini, 1997).
The extension of the municipal plan into strategic­structural and
programmatic­operative regulations has been the major innovation. Such a
new plan is split into three tools: Structural Plan (Piano Strutturale
Comunale, PSC), the programmatic one; Development Plan (Piano
Operativo Comunale, POC), the prescriptive one; Planning and Building
Regulations (Regolamento Urbanistico Edilizio, RUE), prescriptive for the
management of developed areas (Campos Venuti, 2008).
The Structural Plan is aimed at outlining the main organization lines and
indicating long­term changes; the Development Plan is intended to identify
actions and transformations to be carried out in the short­term (Dal Piaz &
Apreda, 2010; Salzano, 2008). As a result, a proactive/strategic nature and a
regulative role arise for the plan. The former, without a real prescriptive
framework, create new possibilities for development. The latter ensures
existing and new rights, defined through prescriptive and detailed proposals
(Mazza, 1995). Particularly, the main innovative aspect of the PSC should be
the non­prescriptive nature of the land­regulation, except for higher­level
prescriptions and constraints (Oliva, 2009; Oliva et al., 2002), deleting land
revenue provisions (Campos Venuti, 2009). Thus, from a normative point of
view, the PSC should be a flexible tool for identifying strategies, objectives,
constraints, and safeguards, representing more agreements by the
administration than duties for the private sector (Urbani, 2000).
Within this framework, the POC defines the initiatives and the governance
of main territorial development achievable in the municipal electoral
mandate or five­year period on the basis of the programme of the
administration (Dal Piaz 2004; Avarello & Properzi, 1997). In this sense, the
POC regulates planning interventions and implementation according to
criteria of priority and feasibility (Dal Piaz & Apreda, 2010) and occurs in
strict relation to procedures for public­private negotiation (Oliva, 2009;
Urbani, 2000). Following Tuscany, in 1995, many regions have reformed the
concept and structure of the PRG, developing different variations, reflecting,
more or less, the model proposed by Inu.
The new local plans system largely uses the equalization strategy of property
rights for its implementation, recognizing both its advantages and limitations



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(Micelli, 2010; 2011). While strong pressures were aimed at the reform of
national and regional planning legislations, new models have been introduced.
Pro­market based devices – proposing the exchange of development rights –
have been experimented and progressively adopted (Pompei, 1998; Micelli,
2002; 2004) with the objectives of achieving spatial justice and allowing
administrations to effectively implement planning decisions without using
financial resources (Karrer, 2004).
In such a national context – where a more advanced urban planning model is
arising, bringing to more effective implementation of normative planning
means – complex urban programmes and Community policies can become a
way to implement the Development plan3. Otherwise, urban interventions from
national and European initiatives may become, sometimes in derogation of the
existing plan, tools which run counter to the traditional Italian planning system.
4. CASE STUDIES
4.1 Methodology and background of the case studies
A case study methodology has been considered to closely examine the
questions within the specific contexts (Yin, 1994/2003; Tellis, 1997a). The
paper presents a multiple­case design due to the numerous sources of
evidence through the dissemination logic of Community Initiatives (Tellis,
1997b). Three cases have been selected for the exploration of the Urban 1
Italian experience: Genoa, Naples and Palermo, in order to reflect the wide
variety of interpretations of EU initiatives across Italy, highlighting strong
and weak points of local authorities actions, and fostering a critical
discussion on EU programmes and their relationships with the evolution and
improvement of urban government. Some interviews and informal meetings
with local administration’s representatives4 have been included in the case

See also Oliva et al., 2002.
The foregoing is strongly supported by Gianluigi Nigro as emerged in a long interview with him.3

Municipality Councillor. In Naples, Daniela Lepore, responsible for national research on the
Urban programme and person close to the former manager for social policies. In Palermo,
Emilio Arcuri, former Chairman of the Committee for the Historical Centre and Nadia
Spallitta who lead the office for the design of the Urban 1 proposal.

In Genoa, Bruno Gabrielli, professor emeritus at University of Genoa and former Genoa4



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study approach and are named as sources in the text. Before discussing each
case, a brief summary of the background is necessary to show the great
variety and interpretation of Urban 1 in Italy.
In Genoa, a port city in northern Italy, the selected areas are located in two
industrialized neighbourhoods in the urban west side. The background of the
sites was characterized by social conflict and lack of control by public
authorities over the process of exploitation of land by private developers.
These are, in fact, two of the most representative areas where the industrial
production has characterised the context, both in physical and social terms.
Both in Naples and Palermo, the largest cities of southern Italy, the selected
areas were within the historical centres which are characterized – like many
Mediterranean cities – by a richness of cultural values and historic buildings;
a complex and decayed physical structure; social deprivation; depopulation
with some trends to re­population thanks to immigration and initial
regeneration processes; inadequacy of public policies (Lo Piccolo, 1996).
The table below gives a general overview of the selected case studies.

Table 1 – Overview selected case studies
Source: official Urban website: ec.europa.eu/regional_policy/urban2/index_en.htm.

4.2 The Urban experience: measures and results
Genoa: the Urban tessera
The Urban 1 initiative in Genoa mainly involved three measures: (1)



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reclamation of the environment; (2) control, monitoring and mitigation of
traffic pollution; (3) economic support for new economic activities.
Distinctive aspects of the deployment of Urban 1 in the Genoese area could
be attributed to the importance given to it as a fundamental tessera of a total
redesign of the city and, above all, of its image: in fact, contemporaneously
to the renewal of central parts of the old harbour, financed by other
programmes and national investments (PRU, PRUSST, Structural Funds
Objective 2, Columbus International Exhibition, G8 International Summit,
2004 Capital of EU Culture), and considering the typical polycentrism of the
city, they chose to channel Urban 1 funding into the reuse of the western
industrial outskirts. Thus, the Municipality provided to the citizens visible
interventions in different quarters and neighbourhoods of the metropolitan
area. According to Bruno Gabrielli – in one of the informal meetings we had
around these topics – the real future challenge was in how such
improvements could become permanent and durable afterwards.
The Genoese proposal was aimed at organising an innovative job centre and
to improve the general conditions concerning transportation and services.
Some other complementary interventions were implemented, thanks to a
subsequent negotiation that permitted a re­modulation of the financed
objectives. The main funded actions concerned the renewal of the ancient
villas of Cornigliano – establishing new functions and a renewed connection
to the city fabric – and the urban green areas of Valletta Rio San Pietro and
Monte Gazzo, definitely protected from the attacks of building speculation.
During the re­modulation process funds were addressed to the restoration of
a daily surgery centre, justifying it by the starting­up of a new vehicular
accessibility project which improved traffic conditions and made less crucial
the creation of the goods­centre.
The actors involved were the Municipality – an International and European
Policies Sector was created inside the Mayor’s Office –, the Province, and
the local transport society with the technical support of private parties. In
this sense, the desired public­private partnership was not completely
achieved: scholars agree on the authoritative role played by Municipality in
managing the resources (Palermo & Savoldi, 2002; Fedeli & Gastaldi,
2004). At the time of approval, Genoa proposed to assign to a public­private
consortium the leading role in the deployment of the project: nevertheless,



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for a simplification of the steering and managerial activities, the Municipality
assumed the whole function. Only two actions were delegated to other actors:
the public transport manager – for the setting up of new bus­lines in the target
area – and the Province – as far as environmental monitoring was concerned.
For the job centre, an agreement procedure was provided in order to enable
third sector private parties to collaborate in the work.
About the relationships between the reclamation programmes and
(ordinary) spatial planning, some outcomes can be identified. The
complexity of two regulatory plans – city and port – was balanced by a joint
task­force during the drawing up of the Urban programme, but the influence
of extraordinary contributions to planning issues – large­scale projects,
urban marketing decisions, supra­local intents, economic pressures – made
this difficult. Therefore, Urban 1 was not directly connected with the
existing plan drawn up in 1990, but with the new approach to planning – a
new municipal plan was drafted in 2001 – changed because of Urban 1 and
other integrated programmes experiences, especially regarding the dynamic
relation between plans and projects.
Naples: a story of missed opportunity
Urban 1 for Naples was guided by aims of normalization and legalization,
and implemented by a small, informal team that allowed quick decision
making , overcoming the uncertain bureaucratic attribution of duties, and
avoiding the excesses of political negotiation and mediation. Two measures
represent the main focus of the EU programme: (1) setting up of new
economic activities; (2) training and local employment promotion.
When talking about Urban 1 for Naples we mostly refer to the Quartieri
Spagnoli neighbourhood. In terms of social networks, the different starting
points of the two target areas have had a significant impact in terms of
effectiveness of the programme. The Quartieri Spagnoli already had a strong
social cohesion, so it has been possible to implement the Programme more
efficiently recording better results than in the Rione Sanità neighbourhood.
Some maintenance and restructuring of urban furniture, and some actions for
the improvement of areas intended for cultural and recreational activities have
characterized the urban renewal and regeneration. The only intervention
integrated with traditional planning instruments has been the project for the



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restyling and improving pedestrian accessibility of the Toledo street­Plebiscito
square axis – commercial axis into the valley of Quartieri Spagnoli –,
introduced at a later time in the Urban programme to ensure EU funds
(Lepore, 2002c).
The main goal of the programme has been to provide economic and
technical assistance in upgrading existing enterprises, encouraging
entrepreneurial self­improvement and supporting the creation of consortia
and co­operatives. In such a way, it has been possible to restructure two
hundred existing craft manufacturers highlighting the fact that some
economic activities already existed but were not legal (Lepore, 2002a,
2002b). The project also worked as a laboratory for testing innovative
services aimed at improving social conditions through direct prevention and
recuperation work with the young people, with specific interventions in
terms of information, safety, crime prevention, and, lastly, a support to the
unemployed to enter the job market (Mingione at al., 2001). From this point
of view, a job centre has been established in both areas as a point of
listening and guidance to search for job opportunities and carry out
information and training activities. These centres are still active.
The balance of what has been carried out with Urban 1 has been quite
positive in the short term, but today almost nothing is left, because the
former Mayor represented the mainstay that could keep the whole system
together. When he stepped down, the project disintegrated in a domino effect
as we debated in an interview with Daniela Lepore.
The Urban 1 programme in Naples has been characterized by a very low
integration with traditional planning instruments and it is differentiated from
other Italian cases by activities which involved less “build” and more
“social”: in consequence, it interacted with policies that have nothing to do
with urban planning. This has been possible thanks to the delegation from
the municipality to the Councillor responsible for social policies and to a
great trust between the informal team, this Councillor and mayor Bassolino
(Lepore, 2002a, 2002c). In this sense, the measure (2) “Training and local
employment promotion” is the one that best integrated with social policies
already planned by specific departments of the municipality, especially
incorporating actions and social policies foreseen in the “plan for children
and adolescents”. Some provision of the ordinary plan have been used to



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obtain Urban funding due to the need to have in the EU programme a
provision for urban renewal and regeneration aspects.
No integration of the Urban 1 with integrated programmes may be found
because all of them have involved peripheral areas of the city. Nowadays, in
the Quartieri Spagnoli, a pilot project is being implemented for the
regeneration of the bassi5 which, hiding behind the aim of continuity with
Urban 1, is fostering huge gentrification processes.
Palermo: contradictions over contradictions
Urban 1 in Palermo has involved two historical districts on the waterfront,
characterised by the contradictions typical of Southern Italy historical
centres. Within these areas, huge monumental and cultural values exist, as
well as most of the cultural institutions of Palermo, together with areas of
extreme physical and social degradation, lacking any neighbourhood public
facilities. In 1994, the districts were strongly under­populated, as a
consequence of the abandonment by inhabitants, which had characterized
the historical centre since 60s. The unemployment rate reached 35%.
Four measures were implemented: (1) launching new economic activities;
(2) ensuring employment; (3) improvement of public social services; (4)
environment and infrastructure. The municipality desired to renew the image
of the historical centre and to promote the heritage as strategic means of
upgrading the economy (Vinci, 2002). Measure 1 has been the most
successful, and the districts are nowadays punctuated by dozens of newly
established economic activities. The same cannot be said of the other
measures but the new activities have had minor results on residents'
employment rate while the measures (3) and (4) – funded with 80% of the
budget (Padovani, 2002b) – have not been successful.
Different neighbourhoods have seen different outputs. Olivella has seen
successful economic development, with the establishment of a system of
hand­crafts, bars and restaurants, mainly run by residents who have
empowered their sense of community (Leone, 2009). On the other hand,
Vucciria, a neighbourhood hosting a famous historical market, has not
received any benefit. The lack of urban centres – like the ones that were

Small apartments on the ground floor of the historical buildings.5



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decisive for Olivella's outputs – contributed to such a failure (ibidem).
It is useful to note the general lack of coordination with government's tasks:
no relationships existed with 1989 Detailed Plan for the historical centre
which aim was the philological regeneration of the historical space (see Lo
Piccolo, 1996). Not thinking in terms of “feasibility” or “housing”, such a
plan undoubtedly “saved” the historic centre from demolitions and
inappropriate development but left the urban fabric at the mercy of the
property sector, generating a slow but progressive gentrification. The Urban
1 programme has been developed without any relationships with the
Detailed Plan and this has contributed to very scrappy results without much
improvement of the urban condition. Nowadays, the 1989 plan, which has
never being modified after the Urban 1, is clearly out­of­date. The
embryonic re­population of the historic centre which begun in 2001 (Leone,
2009) is partially connected with Urban 1, for many private refurbishments
of residential buildings have started. But the lack of any effective policy for
social housing has pushed towards growing gentrification processes.
The measures involving public intervention were least effective, mostly
because slowness and corruption of public bureaucracy made it difficult to
manage the allocated funding. Furthermore, after the end of the programme,
the new right­wing administration assigned to private activities almost all
the buildings previously appointed and renovated for be social services.
Indeed, the programme has been a challenge for public offices unused to
managing complex programmes. Such aspects clearly emerged during
meetings with Emilio Arcuri and Nadia Spallitta. Excellent results in terms of
quality of the proposals and fast execution of some measures were achieved
thanks to competences acquired by the responsible staff during the
implementation of Urban 1. Unfortunately, in the long term, the results
vanished: the new administration has dissolved such competences,
dismantling offices, mostly for political patronage reasons.
No relationships with integrated programmes may be found, for the use of
such programmes arose after the end of the Urban 1 programme. PRU,
PRUSST, and PII are very significant labels of the new right­wing
administration, which uses them to promote private investments rather than
urban regeneration. Such programmes are commonly used in breaking of
normative planning instruments.



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5. DISCUSSION AND CONCLUDING REMARKS
The great variety of methods, processes and outputs of the three cases
described may be of great help in building some general theoretical
considerations for a critical debate on the role of EU regeneration policies in
the shifting patterns of institutional planning in Italy. The methodology we
chose was a multiple­cases design, and builds on the so­called “replication
logic” (Yin 1994/2003, 47). This provides a theoretical framework in two
complementary ways: predicting similar results in similar contexts – a “literal
replication” – or finding contrasting outputs but for predictable reasons – a
“theoretical replication” (ibidem). The variety of outputs we discovered for
the use of the same tool in different contexts, thus, may be rethought on the
basis of the different contexts and political cultures of the three cities. In order
to build some conclusions with reference to the framework outlined in Section
2, several key themes emerged: the considerations focus on the drivers and
barriers identified in the relation between the local contexts, the Italian
planning system and the European urban policies.
In the Genoa case, following the debate on strategic planning as a reflection
of the shift from government to governance, some of the most representative
interventions were not delivered by the management of transformations in
the traditional “sense” of planning. They are more due to a long­term vision
built up by means of non­standard planning tools, in which private interests
and public priorities are matched, creating all around project aspirations and
an attractiveness halo. The public sector retained the leading role but in
partnership with strong pressure groups expressed by the best economic
resources of the territory: marketing and R&D sectors were also closely
involved in the strategy. About participation, the Urban 1 initiative collected
several contributions by citizens, mostly related to the problems arising from
the damaging environmental impacts of the industrial plants. In this sense,
Urban 1 funding was exploited by the public sector for a typical process of
consensus building: it allowed the Municipality not to concentrate all the
interventions in the central area, turning the regard to a peripheral zone and,
thus, preventing the risk of offering the image of a disequilibrium towards
citizens from different parts of the polycentric city.



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In Naples, the programme was implemented by direct involvement of
government. Nevertheless, we cannot speak about a pure top­down
approach: the choices were the result of continuous and direct face­to­face
contact with the so­called “informal team”, represented by the Quartieri
Spagnoli Association, a social network already existing and strengthened in
the neighbourhood. From the viewpoint of the consensus building, the
“informal team” has been a mouthpiece of citizens without real participatory
practices. Having knowledge of the needs of the inhabitants, it owned the
freedom to decide individually with the institutions. For this reason, this
approach has been termed as the “good soviet” one (Lepore, 2002a; Laino,
1999). Yet, it has represented together the strength and weakness of the
programme. When the Mayor resigned from his office, in the absence of the
strong leadership that had joined the network of trust relationships, the
“good soviet” approach revealed itself as a problem instead than an
opportunity. The biggest weakness of the programme has been that it seemed
incapable of creating an effective system of governance: there has been
product innovation but there has not been process innovation.
Without any doubt, the Palermo case is the one characterised by lower levels
of bottom­up participation. The administration leading the city in such times
has been called the one of Palermo's “spring”: for the first time after the
second world war, the city was lead by uncorrupted and competent
administrators and the 1990s were marked by a great social reaction against
the Mafia and by some cultural and economic development. Nevertheless,
the Urban programme was characterised by low levels of public interaction
for the administrative and bureaucratic apparatus which were, and still are,
contaminated by huge corruption and nepotism. Furthermore it is to be noted
that EU controlled mostly the project phase rather than the implementation
one. Such a complex context may explain the very complex outputs of the
Urban 1: the need for great efforts from the responsible administrative staff
and the identification of short­time consensus from the administration
politicians are two sides of the same coin.
We may trace some general considerations from such a kaleidoscope of
issues. A first point is the effectiveness of the Community Initiatives – such
as the Urban Programme – as drivers for the construction of “European
styles” of urban governance and planning, in the quest for the



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competitiveness/cohesion model (see Governa, 2010). The implementation
of Urban 1 programmes has been strongly dependent on local and national,
political, institutional, and socio­economic conditions: in a period of
turbulent changes, Italian planning has experienced both the EU policies and
the evolution of domestic policies and practices.
In such a frame, the EU factor has had a strong role in accelerating the
restructuring processes. Thus, the case studies support a rethinking of Urban
1 as a “catalyst” for some planning innovations, a tool replicated in the same
way in many different contexts which had some role in increasing the
rapidity of change in local and national planning cultures. Such a “catalysis”
has been both an opportunity and a constraint: in other words, the critical
analysis of the outputs produced suggests that the referred shift to
“governance” – in which the European policies have had an accelerating role
– reveals two faces.
Undoubtedly, Urban 1 has been a great opportunity for there­thinking of
policies in order to achieve urban regeneration for problem areas: in some
cases – in Genoa and partially in Palermo and Naples – results were
achieved in short periods and with relatively low public funding. Some
conditions seem to be crucial for their successful implementation:• integration with general and normative planning in order to ensure

long­term and general results;
a bottom­up attitude, in order to understand the needs of the areas
and where to intervene;
an integration of public and private activities which should not
mean pursuing private interests with public investments;

•
•

integration with social cohesion policies.•
Without such conditions, the following effects may be expected, as mainly
the Naples and Palermo cases showed:

• only sectoral outputs are achieved, which are not effective by
themselves to produce a widespread regeneration of the intervention
areas;
the spatial distribution of outputs is in a random fashion, for while
some areas achieve good results, some other ones may remain
unaffected or worse;

•



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distorted consensus building processes arise, shifting the target of the
programmes to merely private interests and leading to gentrification
processes.

•

Urban 1 programme could have been highlighted as a major opportunity to
start processes of re­orientation of planning structures, experimenting with
public­public and public­private partnerships, innovations and
experimentations with integrated urban planning and programming, but
sometimes it has had also disastrous implications. In some cases – as
happened in Naples and Palermo –, Urban 1 leaded to some reinforcement of
social and spatial polarization: some areas got regenerated for affluent
populations – and the public funding was used to “launder” property
speculations (see Yiftachel, 2009) – and others got progressively abandoned
by the public sector through the lack of general planning – or through a the
selective “non­planning” (ibidem).
However, there are critical aspects of new planning paradigms – like the lack
of political and social agency (Gualini, 2008) and the shift towards market­
oriented means of planning (Gualini & Majoor, 2007) – which have been be
exacerbated by some local characteristics – such as the rhetorical and
distorted use of consensus­building. Thus, a second face of the move to
“governance” appears. In the general context of the “shift” towards less
normative and more strategic means of planning, generously funded
complex programmes – such as the Urban programme – may be for the
public sector a way to reduce “government” practices, abandoning the urban
field and delegating whole issues and areas to single projects and private
agencies. An important issue to emerge is how effective innovations in the
planning culture and some tendencies towards the “dark side” of
contemporary institutional planning may have walked hand in hand under
the banner of the Urban programme. Probably, one of the most critical
aspects is to be identified in the rapidity of changes: it has been said that
only slow and settled changes are sustainable for local contexts (Lo Piccolo
1995). Yet the role of some programmes as catalysts, together with a
growing fashion to short­term intervention, is commonly disconnected from
a long­term programming of changes: we highlighted how excessive rapidity
in the modification of policies and practices may be accompanied by the
reinforcing of the weak points of both normative and strategic means of



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planning. Undoubtedly, in Italy this happened and more critical debates
about such processes within the context of planning theory may be useful for
a rethinking of the future generations of regeneration programmes.

All authors contributed extensively to the work presented in this paper. The individual
contribution of each authors is as follow. Sara Verones, sections 1, 3.2, 4.1 and 5;
Simone Tulumello, sections 2, 4.2 and 5; Simona Rubino, sections 3.1, 3.3, 4.2 and 5;
Ilaria Delponte, sections 3.2, 4.2 and 5.

The authors are grateful to two anonymous referees for their stimulating comments and
to prof. Bruno Zanon for his valuable suggestions.



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