Abstract

The effects of the Coronavirus pandemic on the exercise of public powers have also had significant implications for the overall system of the sources of law. When read through these lenses, the pandemic question patently proves to be a democratic question - that is, a question about the role and prerogatives of the executive, the legislative, and the way Italy’s institutional branches have handled the most urgent and far-reaching emergency since the enactment of its democratic Constitution. The goal of this article is to examine whether the political institutions of Italian democracy have handled their decision making in ways that are compatible with the architecture of Italy’s constitutional system, its various levels of government, and the promise of citizens’ political participation also, and mainly, through political parties.