Abstract

The inclusion in the Italian Constitution of the obligation of balancing the public budget is an issue largely investigated by the scholars. This paper aims to study the mentioned constitutional reform not in general but from a specific point of view, namely in relation with its impact on the implications of the Constitutional Court judgements. In the Italian constitutional system, the Constitutional Court judgements withdraw a legal regulation with retroactive effects. This feature ensures the effectiveness of the judicial protection of rights. Notwithstanding, the mentioned constitutional reform is able to threaten this traditional feature of the Constitutional Court judgments and, as a consequence, its function. Indeed, the judgment n. 10/2015 of the Constitutional Court states that the insertion of the balanced-budget in the Constitution implies that sometimes the Constitutional Court judgments effects can not be retroactive. In particular, this happens with regards to the judgments with financial effects. The paper argues that this jurisprudence risks to produce effects which are the opposite of what was being sought with the Constitutional reform. In one hand the Constitutional protection of rights is weakened. In the other hand, the discretion of the political decision-makers to adopt not responsible financial public policies is increased.