Abstract

By calling an ad hoc seminar on the topic (Rome, Palazzo della Consulta, December 18, 2018), the Italian Constitutional Court has re-affirmed the centrality of questions around the adversary nature of its incidenter proceedings. Four arguments support a strengthening of the adversary nature of these proceedings: an understanding of judgments before the Court as naturally dialectic/adversarial spaces - not unlike ordinary Court proceedings and parliamentary debates; the application of article 111 Italian Constitution also to the Constitutional Court; an understanding of incidenter proceedings as proceedings with potentially indispensible parties; the welcomed widening of the debate within the Court as a consequence of the special nature of the question. These features support proposals to introduce two innovations in the Court's proceedings: the introduction of a more narrowly defined adversary proceeding as well as the possibility of presenting amici curiae, as suggested in the essays of Tania Groppi and Valeria Marcenò within the seminar. These innovations could be introduced through statutory or judicial interventions.