Giuseppe Ricotta

The Rhetoric of Management Control in Italian Cities: Constructing New Meanings of Public Action

This article deals with Italian administrative change. The introduction of management control and evaluation systems in Italian local governments is the best example of the managerial rhetoric of administrative change in Italy. Actually, it brings new meanings of public action and suggests new identities taken from the private sphere. The authors point out some critical aspects of this local governments reform in the frame of the neo-liberal ideology. Particularly, the reductive codification of the concept of effectiveness, which the reform laws describe as a verification of organizational output, supports an auto-referential system of control and evaluation.

Affrontarsi o confrontarsi? Il "rischio" immigrati sulla stampa italiana e nella periferia di Tor Sapienza a Roma

The article examines migration in the light of the distinction between the concepts of risk and threat. Through an analysis of representations in the Italian press, the authors argue that by framing immigration as a threat, media discourse ignores negative consequences for migrants as well as positive effects for reception’s society. A case study in a sensitive urban area in Rome, using a survey and a citizens’ jury, shows how residents’ negative if not violent reactions to migrants’ are often nurtured by a sense of relative deprivation and political neglect. More information and citizens’ involvement in local policies may facilitate dialogue and lead to more creative and shared solutions.

Sicurezza urbana e grandi eventi: le Unità di Polizia di Pacificazione nelle favelas di Rio de Janeiro

The Police Pacification Units (UPP) started their activity in Rio de Janeiro from 2008 to decrease the ostensive violence in the favelas by gangs’ drug trafficking, because of the mega-events that Rio has hosted in the last decade, including FIFA World Cup in 2014 and the Olympic Games in 2016. Through the evaluation of the first results due to the presence of UPP in the favelas and the spatial analysis of their location in the city, the authors argue that this policing operation is favoring a model of segregation between a privileged center and an excluded periphery.