The European Semester seeks to coordinate national policies to sustain the stability of the euro and the growth of the euro-area. In reality, European member states only partially heed the Country-specific recommendations (CSRs) that the Council discusses and the Commission issues. This Forum examines Italy’s record to understand why this may be the case: the contributions herein contained analyze the political, administrative and normative determinants of the Italian authorities' degree of compliance. After describing the articulation of the European Semester and rapidly reviewing the international literature, this introduction offers an overview of the contributions of this Forum and of the ways in which they seek to shed light on the peculiarities and consequences of Italy's participation in this important budgetary open method of coordination.