A constitutional referendum was held in

Italy Italy ( it, Italia ), officially the Italian Republic, ) or the Republic of Italy, is a country in Southern Europe. It is located in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea, and its territory largely coincides with the homonymous geographical ...

on 7 October 2001. Dieter Nohlen & Philip Stöver (2010) ''Elections in Europe: A data handbook'', p1049 The amendment was supported by the

Silvio Berlusconi Silvio Berlusconi ( ; ; born 29 September 1936) is an Italian media tycoon and politician who served as Prime Minister of Italy in four governments from 1994 to 1995, 2001 to 2006 and 2008 to 2011. He was a member of the Chamber of Deputies f ...

government. Voters were asked whether they approved of amending the constitution to give more powers to the

regions In geography, regions, otherwise referred to as zones, lands or territories, are areas that are broadly divided by physical characteristics (physical geography), human impact characteristics (human geography), and the interaction of humanity and t ...

on issues including agriculture, education, healthcare and taxation. The proposals were approved by 64.2% of voters. The resulting Constitutional changes are subject of conflicting opinions regarding the practical success of the amendment; in its most evident outcome, the text of Article 117 of the Constitution was inverted: whereas the original text listed the areas where the Regions had legislative authority, where the Regions and the State had shared authority, and leaving any other subject matter in the hands of the State, the new version of this article lists a series of subjects as areas of legislative authority of the State, with others having shared authority and anything that isn't specifically mentioned being included in the legislative authority of the Regions. Italians vote on extending rights to the regions
The Guardian, 8 October 2001 This solution, typical of

Federated States A federated state (which may also be referred to as a state, a province, a region, a canton, a land, a governorate, an oblast, an emirate or a country) is a territorial and constitutional community forming part of a federation. Such states dif ...

, was applied to Italy (a

Regional State A regional state, or a regionalised unitary state, is a term used to denote a type of state that is formally unitary but where a high degree of political power has been highly decentralised to regional governments. This contrasts with a state org ...

) with marginal effective results, due to a series of contributing factors that, in practice, reduced the Regions' ability to legislate to almost the same level as before the constitutional reform.

Results

References

{{Italian elections 2001 referendums 2001 elections in Italy Constitutional referendums in Italy October 2001 events in Europe