Think Tanks and the Fragmentation of the Italian Elites

Mattia Diletti and Loris Di Giammaria (Sapienza, University of Rome) Comments welcomed by the authors: [email protected] and [email protected] Paper presented at the XXXIII IPSA – World Congress of Political Science, Montreal 19-24 July 2014.

Abstract Think tanks are a new phenomenon for Italy. They are about a hundred, and nearly half of them were born after 2004. This paper presents the results of the first survey conducted on Italian think tanks in the last decade. Four are the reasons of their sudden success: 1) the emergence of new models of governance, which has increased the access of experts into the decision-making process, 2) the breaking-up of parties organization, which has allowed the creation of «personal» think tanks, 3) the strategic use of think tanks by interest groups 4) the fragmentation of some important policy areas, which opens up new opportunities for who is able to offer expertise to policy communities. Fragmentation is a key word to understand the Italian case, and a good representation of Italian politics.

Many

think

tanks

prove

weak,

with

few

resources,

and little ability to influence decision makers and public opinion. Even when they are directly connected to political leaders, they do not seem to have the necessary means to influence public institutions and a wide audience. Rather, they seem an instrument of competition between a highly fragmented elite.

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One of the most important texts published during the last decade on the role of think tanks in the US political system and their influence in policy making is Think Tanks, Public Policy, and the Politics of Expertise by Andrew Rich. Starting with the title itself, it reminds us that experts are not neutral figures. American policy makers and interest groups have developed various ways of making tactical and strategic use of expertise, which differ according to the policy area in question, the ideological orientation and current trends in both public debate and debate within the community or the networks of a specific policy. At the same time, the policy experts have refined their marketing techniques to make themselves heard and visible, to acquire direct or indirect access (through the media) to the decision makers, executive power, key figures in government agencies and specific policy audiences (Rich, 2004). More recently, Thomas Medvetz also called upon us to adopt a realistic approach in his Think Tanks in America, using “the politics of knowledge” formula (Medvetz, 2012) to remind us how the battle for accessing, disclosing and developing knowledge targeted at structuring policies is first and foremost a battle for hegemony and control over a specific policy discourse. The enlightened spirit of “knowing in order to decide” (Einaudi, 1956) does not seem to be a particular feature of the US market of policy ideas, which is still by far the biggest and richest today. Taking a realistic approach to the matter, in the awareness of the existence of a “politics of expertise” that influences the progress of this market, helps us to tackle the advent of the think tank phenomenon in Italy without romanticism. But why do think tanks deserve a separate discussion in Italy too? Why might it be worth investigating the dynamics of the “politics of expertise” in the Italian case? Is this phenomenon really so important? In order to answer these questions, the Department of Social Communication and Research at La Sapienza University in Rome studied the world of Italian think tanks during the 2012–13 period, conducting the first detailed analysis of the phenomenon. The research involved gathering information on one hundred and five think tanks and performing seventy-one in-depth interviews with the directors of these organizations. This paper partially presents the results of this survey (the contents of the in-depth interviews are still being processed) and the types of think tanks that have been developed, making it possible to define and interpret the Italian case. Interest in the Italian case has been generated by the expansion of the phenomenon (more than one third of think tanks established in Italy appeared after 2005). If something new comes into being, grows and adapts to the political system and policy making processes, and is also recognized by other players, establishes its own models of organization and action, and becomes a tool used by the political class, but also by specific interest groups, it is to be supposed that it is worth seeing what

it’s all about. However, to date the Italian case has been the object of only a very small number of studies and texts. This is why a primarily descriptive approach has been chosen, bearing in mind the rapid evolution of the world of Italian think tanks.

1.1. The arrival in Europe: new think tank definitions and development conditions Not only has a rich and mature market has been created in the USA, but also plenty of niche literature that has become an indispensable reference for all scholars who intend to analyse the role of think tanks in other political systems (this literature is also taken into consideration by the directors of European think tanks, who continue to look to the USA for the purpose of improving their organizations). Comparative studies – or those conducted by European authors, who rarely go into the case of an individual country without considering the United States – tend to compare the various national cases with the American one, often coming up with definitions and types sui generis to be adapted to the context in question, but always based on US literature (Dickson, 1971; Dye, 1978; Polsby, 1983; Domhoff, 1983; Peschek, 1987; Gellner, 1995; Kandiah and Seldon, 1996; Denham, 1997; Stone, Denham and Garnett, 1998; Struyk, 1999; Stares and Weaver, 2002; McGann and Weaver, 2002; Stone and Denham, 2004; Braml, 2004; McGann and Johnson, 2006; Boucher and Royo, 2009; Diletti, 2009; McGann and Sabatini, 2011; Medvetz, 2012). This text will also follow this practice, considering the literature and phenomenon of think tanks in the US context. In the words of Marx, “the anatomy of man is a key to the anatomy of the ape”. The various European political systems have been subject to an inevitable delay in analysis because of the extent of the phenomenon and its effective significance, which used to be very modest (particularly when compared to the USA). As a result the subject was rarely tackled as a phenomenon in its own right, but rather as an epiphenomenon of other problems being studied, such as the role of experts in policy making or the role of ideas in policy change processes and in the creation of new policy paradigms, thanks to analytical outlines that focus on the regulatory and cognitive aspects of the policy process (Capano 2003; Daugbjerg 2003). Going back to the USA, thank tanks have been defined in many different ways, including: “public policy research institutes” (Polsby, 1983; McGann, 1992); “policy planning organization” (Peschek, 1987); “policy elite” (Smith, 1991); “independent public policy research institutes” (Rich, 2004); “nonpartisan policy research organization” (Hird, 2005). They have also been described as "relatively autonomous organizations engaged in the research and analysis of contemporary issues independently of goverment, political parties, and pressure groups" (Stone, 2001). The works of Diane Stone, one of the pioneers of think tank research in the 90's, suggest that five different traits characterize the think tanks of the American world: 1) independence, which recalls

the principle of autonomy of civil society with regard to political power (the result is the need for the research centres to have economic independence, rather than relying on public funding); 2) selfdetermination of the study agenda; 3) policy focus (the objective of influencing the policy-making process is the most important characteristic of a think tank); 4) a public dimension, as think tanks are involved in disclosure to the public; 5) an ascertained “policy professionalism” among think tank personnel, that is to say the presence of experts with a strong scientific background, accustomed to the use of revolving doors between think tanks, universities and institutions, who know how to study and how to work in governments (Stone, 1996; 2001; 2004). However, from the 1990s onwards, some comparative studies (Weiss, 1992; Radin, 2000; Stares and Weaver, 2002; Stone, Denham and Garnett, 1998; Stone and Denham, 2004) demonstrated the analogies and differences that characterize the various types of organizations that allow the experts to produce expertise, including those with directly links to the civil service, the corporations, the interest groups, the parties, and so on. This led to the coining and reuse of definitions such as contract research think tank, ministerial think tank, party think tank and research-oriented NGOs (Stares and Weaver, 2002), making it possible to create “grey” areas in which to identify as think tanks institutions that did not fully comply with the characteristics of the US standard. Thanks to this effort to expand the definition framework – which did not attempt to confine the phenomenon within restricted boundaries and canons that cannot be applied outside the US “homeland”, instead accepting the existence of types of think tanks sui generis and adapting the definitions to contexts and relational systems (Medvetz, 2012) that are not comparable with the US case – it is now easier to study, assess and analyse the role of these centres in the various political systems. These “grey” definitions tend to be widely used in Europe, highlighting the shared aspiration of centres and foundations, that is to say the attempt to direct and/or condition the policy-making process through research or the public intervention of experts, specialists and scholars. In fact, Selim Allili, Chairman of the Observatoire des Think Tanks, defines a think tank as “a permanent organization whose main vocation is to provide solutions for public policies” (Allili, 2008). This definition makes it possible to gloss over the structural dependence of many European centres on public funding or the absence – often due to economic issues – of permanent research structures. There are obviously reasons of a different kind that explain the relative weakness, in comparison with the American situation, of think tanks in all European countries, Italy included. Elements of an institutional type determine the quantity and quality of entry points for think tanks or interest groups that use expertise as a resource. These points vary according to the institutional framework of the country and the policy regime in place in a given sector; the various models of policy style, and interaction between public civil services, decision makers and stakeholders in a public policy; the characteristics of the spoils system on a national and local level, especially in the apparatus of

executive power; aspects of an economic and fiscal nature, due to the various regimes of tax exemption for donations in place in the USA and Europe; the persistence, in many European countries (first and foremost Germany), of organizations within the parties that continue to carry out a traditional role of research, analysis and political and cultural debate – with the exception of Italy, where the party-based centres have been replaced by personal think tanks and political culture foundations that are contiguous but formally autonomous from the parties; the presence of think tanks perceived as “quasi” governmental institutions, which act – in conditions of semi-monopoly – as bipartisan “research and development” centres for the political, bureaucratic and economic elite of an individual country (for example the role played by Chatam House in the UK). Having said this, a number of factors have also favoured the emergence of research institutions of this kind in Europe. Let us at least try to list these factors in brief: the first is the affirmation of new models of governance in which the think tanks are more likely to find themselves involved; then there is the tendency for strengthening local powers, regulatory bodies and monitoring agencies, which guarantees – as in the US case – a potentially higher number of entry points for the offer of expertise from think tanks; the multilevel dimension of European governance, which allows think tanks to offer expertise and policy solutions suited to dealing with this complex structure; the increasingly crucial role played by information and expertise production – on time, fit for the requirements, times and mind-sets of the decision makers and the policy audiences – in lobbying, an action that often makes use of external agencies (such as think tanks) to obtain this type of “product”; the importance of tools that are not only used to produce expertise, but also “culture”, thanks to the offer of policy solutions hinged upon a policy paradigm and a shared system of values. However, there are also other equally important reasons: the need, within increasingly fragmented policy sectors, to find real tools of “parallel diplomacy” through which to build and structure – either permanently or temporarily – relationships and dialogue; the emergence of new policy entrepreneurs, which leave the parties, administrations, companies and universities to set up “on their own”, founding think tanks and research organizations designed to influence and/or support the decision making processes; the exponential growth of the potential to access policy information, especially thanks to the development of the web (although, compared to the USA, the rise of real and proper television stars of policy analysis, some of whom are think tank experts and an integral part of the all-news television channel information system, is unthinkable); last but not least, the process of European policy personalization and presidentialization within the executive branches (Poguntke and Webb, 2005), which has occurred across Europe, although with unique characteristics in Italy, where the parties and personal currents (Calise, 2010) have been flanked by real “personal” think tanks linked to the individual political leaders (this is a characteristic that

explains the emergence of a type of think tank that alone accounts for around one third of the total). Throughout Europe, over the last twenty years, centres and think tanks have grown up around the individual national leaders, whether with task of reorganizing and disciplining the cultural coordinates of a party (Tony Blair’s Policy Network in the case of Labour, Jose Zapatero’s Fundacion Ideas for the PSOE, Terra Nova in France for as long as the Strauss-Kahn option remained standing for the 2012 presidential elections) or “to capture” the “heart of the executives” with a handful of trusted policy specialists, in order to ensure full control of the government agenda (this is what Thatcher did in 1979, placing the experts of the Centre for Policy Studies and the Institute for Economic Affairs in the Downing Street Policy Unit after having closed the Central Policy Review Staff, comprised of career civil servants, Rhodes and Dunleavy, 1995). This latter is a model case, encompassing an old theory put forward by the Israeli Yehezkel Dror, which described the growing tendency to form a direct relationship between political leaderships and experts, with the objective of isolating and/or flanking the technical structures composed of career civil servants available to the executives (Dror, 1987). The centrality of the rulers (Dror expressly backed up the need to use an unfashionable term such as "rulers") is also apparent in the functional dimension of the role of the heads of government. The intergovernmental and interministerial nature of policy problems increases the need for coordination and strengthening of their skills; the need to make structural adjustments in relatively short spaces of time requires the concentration of powers; the need for innovation requires both policy entrepreneurship and real powers. If the government leaderships have become the mainstay of the democratic political systems, claimed Dror, the functional capacities that guarantee their efficacy must be implemented; the expansion of the tasks and the responsibilities of the executive would therefore increase the need to make use of consultants, experts and policy specialists to uphold adequate standards and efficacy in the action of government (and/or in satisfying the demands of the reference constituencies, Dror, 1987).

2. The Italian case. Four types of think tank. One: personal think tanks

The first contributions on the Italian case appeared in 1998 and 2004 – the former by Radaelli and Martini, the latter by Radaelli and Lucarelli – both within a volume of a comparative nature. Although barely ten years have passed since then, the world of Italian think tanks has evolved very rapidly. In fact, the think tanks established from 2005 onwards account for around 50% of the total. The delay in the analysis of the phenomenon is due to the same reasons mentioned with regard to

the rest of Europe: for a long time the size and importance of these institutions was relative, with the emergence of just a few cases of any real interest. As already mentioned several times, the Italian case is characterized by the presence of "personal" type think tanks. The political leaders have preferred to use think tanks because of the large degree of autonomy they provide outside formal party structures, including as regards the construction of direct and personal relationships with interest groups. The greater the erosion of party organizations and political cultures (although it Italy it was more like a collapse, during the 90's), the stronger the affirmation of personal models of political organization (Calise, 2010). The less well-established and shared the borders of political culture, the stronger the tendency to create DIY political cultures and programme platforms, whether for the long or short term. The Italian context also includes cases of institutional revolving doors (although they can still be counted on one hand), with cabinet staff from a think tank or progressing from the latter towards position in government, in keeping with the model of “taking possession” of the executive technical structures typical of presidential systems. In the cases recorded to date, it has been observed that some centres, such as Arel, Italianieuropei, the Aspen Institute and the IAI, have regulary provided officials for the Prime Minister’s Office and the Foreign Ministry over the years. Moreover, the IAI, Italianieuropei, Magna Carta, Fare Futuro and others have provided assistants for the presidents of the House and Senate, as well as for individual MPs. Although the numbers are small, they are undergoing evident growth, particularly as regards personal think tanks. LIST OF THINK TANK: APPENDIX At the dawn of the new decade, Italy’s main parties appear to be federations of leaders, a group of key figures competing to take over the leadership. Although the permanent campaign model is used today in the political systems, we are witnessing the “permanent primaries” model in some parties. The fuzziness of the new Italian parties – incomplete identity, programme, organization – means, as has been said, that the think tanks fulfil the above-mentioned roles, which was formerly the prerogative of the mass parties. Today, these functions are permanently externalized (as moreover, are others, such as communication, see Sabato, 1982; Raniolo, 2006; Cacciotto, 2011), and “personalized”. In the Italian case, there are a good thirty-four “personal think tanks” linked to an individual political figure, accounting for one third of the total (which, we should recall, amounts to one hundred and five). LIST OF PERSONAL THINK TANK

The types of personal think tanks include organizations that have acquired visibility as a result of their number of years in activity, their continuity and ability. Others have a very low profile in terms of public intervention and research. Over time, the reasons behind the creation of a personal think tank have changed: on the one hand we find Italianieuropei, which was formed as a “generalist” think tank with the objective of influencing and restoring the debate surrounding the country and the Italian centre left; on the other, the innovation of "single issue" personal think tank (demonstrating the stable relations between a politician and specific interest groups in a policy sector): for example, ICSA, security and defence sector (founded in 2009), whose founder is the Under Secretary to the Prime Minister’s Office for Secret Services; or Mezzogiorno Europa (2000), which first and foremost deals with the southern question and is directly linked to the President of the Italian Republic, Giorgio Napolitano. Going back to the theme of the relationship between interests and think tanks – personal ones in this case – it is interesting to consider some interviews with the think tank donors, which revealed very different feelings: it appears evident how, for some, it is simply a question of accessing an entry point offered by the political system in order to formalize a relationship with political leaders. While we were accustomed to thinking that “in liberal democracies the most frequent targets of the access groups are the government, the civil service and parliament” (Mattina, 2010), in the democracies of "personal parties" (Calise, 2010) and think tanks, the leaderships themselves became an entry point, and think tank is the field of “privileged relationship”. When it is established with key leading figures belonging to different parties, this signals the possibility of making one’s message penetrate as many seats as possible, as well as being a measure of prestige. For others it is simply a case of building a relationship, almost as if the funding for a think tank were like acquiring a number in a phone book and thus a relationship (or, in some cases, maintaining a relationship, as happens with “militant entrepreneurs” who transfer the economic support that was once dedicated to a given political party). Eni, Enel, Edison, Glaxo, Erg, Finmeccanica, Fincantieri, Allianz, Sky, Trenitalia, Fastweb, Bombardier, Lottomatica, Rai, Generali, Poste Italiane, Sisal, Acea, Unicredit, Monte dei Paschi, Intesa San Paolo are just some of the companies – the most active “clients" of Italian personal think tanks – that have funded the activity of ten different think tanks at least once (from advertising to sponsoring a conference, almost all the companies mentioned have provided bipartisan funding). For the major donors this represents normal public relations work. It becomes part of a broader communication plan when the company wants to influence public opinion and elite policies on a specific issue. In this case the interaction with the think tanks produces a "strategic” public initiative.

To conclude, let us now try to sum up a list of functions that these think tanks seem to perform in relation to their reference leaders: a) they provide personnel and specialist knowledge for the leader and/or the reference area; b) they are centres of development for policy proposals in the areas of interest to the individual leaders (since the definition of issues characterizing the individual candidate are an integral part of the image building process for the leader and his/her brand: Barisione, 2001); c) they are centres of training for networks within a policy area, to which interest groups and/or epistemic communities belong; d) they are a funding tool for a personal political staff; e) they permit the maintenance of permanent tools of intervention for public and/or specialist debate (magazines, policy papers, virtual online communities, conferences, interventions in newspapers and magazines); f) they guarantee support for the creation of electoral platforms; g) they are a cultural battle tool for the reorganization of the political field (because of this they define themselves as “political culture foundations”); h) they represent a training ground for the government-in-waiting of a political leader or exile following a political and/or electoral defeat. 3. Italian think tank: "Policy forum", "Policy-oriented research centres", "memory and culture foundations" A lot of space is dedicated to the personal think tank type, as this represents the most specific element of the Italian case. However, three other types of think tank have been identified; the “policy-oriented research centres”, the “policy forums” and the "memory and culture foundations” (their characteristics are explained below). A fifth type, which we have chosen not to include because of its non-autonomous nature (as a direct emanation of other institutions and organizations), is that of the “in-house study centres”, which, in the majority of cases, also produce

research typical of think tanks: for example, the Centro Studi of the Banca d’Italia or the IRES of the CGIL (Italy’s main trade union). Types of think tank % Personal Policy-oriented Policy forum Memory and culture Total

32.1 41.5 7.5 18.9 100

There are thirty-four think tanks classed as personal, forty-four policy-oriented think tanks, eight policy forums, and twenty institutes of memory and culture. In greater detail, the personal think tanks have been found to have the following percentages of political orientation. Political orientation (personal think tanks) % Centre-left Centre Centre-right Bipartisan Total

50.0 14.7 32.4 2.9 100

Exactly half of the personal research centres can be attributed to the centre-left. Of the remaining personal think tanks, 14.7% can be attributed to the centre and 32.4% to the centre-right, while the rest (2.9%) are bipartisan. As regards the year of foundation, the following chart shows the number of think tanks founded each year from 1934 onwards. GRAPH Radaelli and Lucarelli proposed dividing the Italian case by types, splitting the think tanks into centres of a “party–trade union” stamp, “independent think tanks” (which intervene in the cultural political debate, but with very little in the way of proposals and policy analyses), “professional” think tanks, which interact first and foremost with the public administrations in terms of consultancy and assessment of the activities of the latter, and “policy clubs”, which are discussion forums where the economic, cultural and political elite can debate and discuss policies (Radaelli and Lucarelli, 2004). When formulating our proposals we took this initial typing was taking into account, encompassing

the “policy clubs” (which we have chosen to call “policy forums”); partly adopting the “independent think tanks”, the so-called “policy-oriented research centres”, which today have a greater capacity for intervention and a more structured offer than in 2004, thanks in part to more marked attention from private backers and some interest groups in the tool itself; and leaving aside the "party-trade union” think tank for two reasons: the decision not to include in-house centres – typical of Italian trade unions – and due to the absence of expressly party-specific think tanks, which have been replaced by “personal” ones. The policy-oriented research centre is the most similar to the traditional, English-speaking think tank model: a think tank that usually produces research in-house, participating in the debate on the community policies in question and offering expertise on the ideas market. The legitimacy of independent policy experts has without doubt increased (together with lack of trust in the realization capacity of public officials), offering support from experts in reducing the complexity of policy issues. This type of think tank is characterized by the production of fact-based analysis and policy proposals founded on scientific research. The first exponents of these think tanks, as early as the 1950s and 1960s, belonged to an executive class formed within the state, which had the objective of promoting the development of the country on new grounds in the post-war period. This was the reason for the creation of Svimez (an association for industrial development in southern Italy), founded in 1946. In this example, the clash of ideas regarding the development of southern Italy was played out on very advanced technical and cultural terrain against the background of the titanic battle for the construction and consolidation of capitalism regulated by social goals, which differed from the American version but opposed the experiment of Soviet planning. In short, the debate between the culture of Italian planning in the 1950s and its opponents (Luigi Einaudi, for example) unfolded in centres of discussion and comparison supported by men who lived within the state (Eni, Iri, Banca d’Italia) and outside the state. Moreover, in the 1960s, part of the liberal culture found support in the social sciences and in the United States, including in terms of economic support for its business. The IAI (Istituto Affari Internazionali), for example, was founded in 1965 on the initiative of Altiero Spinelli and the Associazione del Mulino, together with the Fondazione Adriano Olivetti and the Nord/Sud study centre. Italian and foreign groups were mobilized, such as Fondazione Ford, Fondazione Olivetti, Camera di Commercio di Milano, Eni, Esso, Euratom, Fiat, Gulf, Ifi, Imi, Montecatini, Snia Viscosa: the elite of “thinking” Italian enterprise at the time. This paved the way for the creation of research centres that invested in economic and social studies: in the 1970s, a very active figure in the sector of research enterprise and the diffusion of ideas was the demochristian Beniamino

Andreatta, involved in the creation of Prometeia (on the side of economic analysis, in 1975) and Arel (on the political and electoral studies front). The 1990 onwards marked the establishment of those we have already defined as “captains of fortune”, promoters of predominantly single-issue think tanks, who exploited the conditions we have described above: independence, competence, managerial skills, increased interest from lobbies and interest groups, but also the civil commitment of academics and experts who want to play a public role in disclosing information and raising awareness. Whatever their nature, around 50% of think tanks in this category were founded after 2000. Likewise, the number of potential donors for these centres – and for all think tanks in general – is on the rise, as private and public companies have become more interested in “issue lobbying” (thanks in part to the development of the Italian lobbying and institutional relations industry in the last decade). This is a more sophisticated lobbying tool than simple pressure on the legislator. Iit regards the construction of frames through which community policy actors interpret data and information (the construction, in short, of the frame within which the traditional lobbying strategy will be implemented at the same time). The production of research and specialist information plays a key role in the “issue lobbying process”, simply by tackling an issue as such, without necessarily being explicitly in favour of this or that solution (the issue priming technique applied to public policies). In Italy, we can find examples of the use of this technique – or at least admissions of having tried to use it by the subjects involved in first person, policy experts interviewed said – in the sectors of agriculture, defence and armaments, energy and health. When policy makers and interest groups face with an increasingly fragmented environment policy, strategies for “disciplining” the policy debate are chosen: in short, an attempt is made by means of communication and contents. Today some of these centres have adopted the model used by legal firms and lobbying associations, with a core group of associates that donates to the think tank part of the proceeds made on the market thanks to its clients – which may request a policy opinion, a sector study and/or the organization of a conference that puts the client into contact with the decision maker in a public context, expendable by the media – and keeps the rest of the profits for itself. This provides an incentive to produce on a market that remains relatively poor (see the budgets below) and with a number of employees per think tank that rarely exceeds five units (very often the studies are produced by working with networks outside the think tank).

Average and minimum/maximum budget

Average Minimum Maximum

800,000 15,000 5,000,000

The think tank budgets are very variable, despite maintaining a relatively low average. From a minimum of 15,000 euros, it is also possible to identify structures with a budget of around 5,000,000 euros. The following table shows the budget bands of the think tanks for which this measurement was possible. Budget in euros % Up to 500,000 euros Over 500,000 euros Total

46.9 53.1 100.0

The world of think tanks seems to be split down the middle as regards the budget. 53.1% of the structures for which this information was available declare a budget of more than 500,000 euros. 46.9% declare a budget of less than 500,000 euros. Another operating model is that typical of think tanks that produce ideologically oriented policy studies. A good example is the Istituto Bruno Leoni, inspired by the US Heritage Foundation: it offers policy positions – enviably on time compared to many of its Italian competitors – structured expressly within a liberal and liberalist ideological framework, at the centre of which is the cultural platform of an entire advocacy coalition, an interlocutor for leading figures in the media and politics associated with this area, as well as an investment catalyst for businesses that share the policy proposals supporting liberalization, deregulation and tax exemption projects for certain economic sectors. We also find cases of “ad hoc think tanks”, established to create temporary and “reflective” advocacy coalitions, which choose expertise as a strategic tool in their operations. A typical example is the Forum Nucleare Italiano, which developed out of the partnership between nineteen partners working on the development of the sector in the Italian economy. The Forum was a centre for the irradiation of expertise, knowledge and information that would be used to inform stakeholders and public opinion about the advantages offered by the use of nuclear energy in Italy. In this case, the full merger between lobbying, communication strategies and expertise production is evident. The Fukushima disaster in 2011 stopped the project.

Not to mention the former Institute for Agriculture & Development Policy, a think tank established in 2009 by some bipartisan policy makers (“driven” by the Minister for Agriculture at the time, Luca Zaia), as well as by a number of businesses and trade associations. The project was conceived within a Roman lobbying association, Open Gate Italia, with the objective of imagining a think tank able to intervene in the public debate on multiple levels, given the complexity of the governance and the turbulence that emerged in the 1990s and 2000s in that area of policy (Lizzi, 2002). Another type of think tank – the policy forum, the least numerous – regards the centres that essentially act as an arena, a place for discussing proposals and points of view (and not necessarily for formulating specific proposals). They are often free and officially bipartisan zones, such as the Aspen Institute Italian or VeDrò, established as an under-40s generational think tank, promoted by the former Prime Minister Enrico Letta, but in which the active participation of many exponents of the centre-right can be observed (places of parallel diplomacy for the political and economic executive classes of the country, where it is possible to search for a minimum common denominator on some key terms); or “walls”, to use a term borrowed from the web, on which to post policy proposals. The web metaphor is not a coincidence: while, in the USA, the Internet has led to growth in the value of think tank activities (the simple possibility of infinitely increasing the potential for the diffusion of products has made investments in the sector more attractive), in Italy we should mention the success of Voce.info, an economic expertise platform constructed almost at zero cost (with various attempts at imitation) and the case of Lo Spazio della Politica, a “generational” think tank formed by young academics and professionals, which has almost exclusively – and with success – activated 2.0 communication strategies, focusing particularly on social networks. The web facilitates the birth of communities with shared points of view, in which shared opinions and policy proposals are developed and strengthened. Returning to the case of Lo Spazio della Politica, reference can be made to the collective development work carried out around the theme of policies in support of Italian venture capitals, despite the lack of any real in-house research on the topic. In this case, the web shows itself to be a tool that promotes the birth of permanent policy forums. The think tanks that come under this type therefore include two almost opposite models: that of exclusivity typical of Aspen Italia (based on the traditional association model), in which the "Chatham House Rule” applies, creating an ideal debate arena for the creation of relationships between groups, decision makers, experts and journalists; and that of sociality and sharing, with platforms that operate essentially on the web for the purpose of sharing the skills and knowledge of the reference community on social media (communities with shared languages, ages, interests and attitudes towards the use of 2.0 communication tools).

Lastly, the “memory and culture foundation” type, linked to the political and cultural tradition of an area or a reference leader (Gramsci, Sturzo, Einaudi, etc.). Many of these do not restrict themselves to the function of “memory archive”, but play an active part in the public debate. It is opportune to observe how the most consistent peaks of think tank “births” took place over the last twenty years. In particular, the year when most think tanks was founded was 2009, with fourteen structures founded. Moreover, thirty-three institutes were founded during the five year period from 2008–2012, accounting for almost 32% of the total number of recorded think tanks. The following table enables us to attribute the birth of certain types of think tank to different moments in the history of the Republic.

Type

of think tank by period of foundation Period of Total foundation Pre-1981

Types of think tank

Total

Personal Policyoriented Policy forum Political memory and culture

0.0

9.1

1981– 1994– 1993 2007 37.5

57.1

72.7

40.0

21.2

41.0

4.8

9.1

7.5

9.1

7.6

38.1

9.1

15.0

15.0

19.0

100.0

100.0

100.0

2008– 2012 54.5

32.4

1 0 100.0 0 , 0

P