Abstract

The article analyses the role played by the Italian Constitutional Court in the neoliberal turn inspired by the European Union during the crisis. After having mapped the main institutional innovations introduced in the Italian legal order under the flag of austerity and deflation as well as their influence in the case law of the Constitutional Court in the field of labour relations and social rights, the article sustains the implausibility of any effective «constitutional resistance» by the Court. In the same time, another instrument of resistance against neoliberal reforms has been the abrogative referendum, proposed by the main Italian leftist trade Union (CGIL). The decision of the Constitutional Court against the admissibility of the most disruptive referendum proposed by the CGIL together with other precedents proves the willingness of the Court to smooth the transition more than to oppose the neoliberal turn inspired at European level. A little hope for «constitutional resistance» is to find in the Constitutional Court's judgments on the electoral law, clearly against any form of «hidden power of President» and forced simplification of political pluralism pursued through electoral reforms.