Pietro Previtali

E‐government adoption in small Italian municipalities

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to explore the level of e‐government adoption in small Italian municipalities, in coherence with the action plans suggested by the main National Institution on the subject.Design/methodology/approach – The following setting is used: of 8,101 Italian municipalities, the majority (72 per cent) represent small municipalities accounting for 10,590,728 inhabitants out of a total of 58,571,711 nationally. Adopting an empirical approach, a survey was conducted on 49 small municipalities, through a questionnaire and in‐depth interviews with political and managerial decision makers and IT officers.Findings – The survey suggests some technical reasons concerning a lack of infrastructure and IT services (e.g. back‐up, security, disaster recovery) and some managerial reasons related both to a lack of strategic vision of information needs and to an inadequacy of requested skills and competencies.Research limitations/implications – The research reported here is based only on a sur...

Structuring supervisory board for an anti-corruption strategy: a new application of a compliance system

Purpose The aim of this paper is to examine a relevant innovation in terms of how corporate supervisory boards are structured for an effective measure of anti-corruption that concerns a new application of Italian Legislative Decree No. 231/2001 in compliance with the obligations set out by OECD Convention of 17 September 1997 on the fight against corruption. Design/methodology/approach The research hypotheses which lead the study are based on an empirical analysis of 119 nursing homes with the aim of investigating the state-of-the art of this innovative application especially regarding the composition, effectiveness and functioning of the supervisory board in the unique case when this compliance system becomes compulsory. Findings The results show how, even though a certain level of uncertainty and ambiguity have led to great variance in the ways the compliance system is drafted, was possible to identify a positive relation between supervisory board composition and performance – that is the effectiveness of anti-corruption system – and a negative relation between board size and performance. Finally, the results suggest the relevance of supervisory board in fostering knowledge as mediating role. Research limitations/implications The authors believes that future work using inter-temporal modelling could build upon and extend the insights presented here. A second area arises from those contrasts in board characteristics that are present across countries and/or across company’s size, small- and medium-sized enterprises or multinational companies and/or across industrial sectors. Practical implications The authors offers a more nuanced understanding of the linkages between corporate governance and anti-corruption. In particular, the paper suggests that for an effective anti-corruption strategy, larger supervisory board sizes are associated with weaker performance, and a greater external composition is preferable to an internal one. Originality/value The paper depicts a first and relevant step toward the identification of best practices of corporate governance as anti-corruption system, relating to an innovative and unique – to the date – application of a compliance system based on the supervisory board.

Discovering Blended Learning Adoption: An Italian Case Study in Higher Education

In the last decade, online education has become a fast-growing delivery method in higher education in Italy. According to data provided by the Italian Ministry of Education, Universities and Research during the academic year 2014–2015, 60,000 students were enrolled in a Telematic University, experiencing a 60% growth rate in the last five years. In this frame it is important to inquire about blended learning adoption and implementation in order to assist University leaders in changing policies that will lead to improvement of teaching and learning conditions. Using a case study and conducting a survey on online structure this paper aims: (a) to identify institutional strategy, structure, and support markers that would allow administrators to determine their progress in transitioning exploration of blended learning to implementation; (b) to understand what are the main factors affecting satisfaction of faculty involved in a blended learning experience.

The determinants of whistleblowing in public administrations: an analysis conducted in Italian health organizations, universities and municipalities

ABSTRACT The aim of this paper is to examine which variables are most important in encouraging whistleblowing in Italian public administrations, as a result of the compulsory application of the anti-corruption Law No. 190/2012. Our research is based on an empirical analysis of 365 public administrations: 86 hospitals, 137 health agencies, 39 universities, and 103 major Italian municipalities. The results show that whistleblowing seems to occur more frequently in large public administrations, to be associated with formal procedures and an organizational proceduralization that encourages individuals to actually blow the whistle, and that it is only partially correlated to training and education.

Social planning and local welfare. The experience of the Italian area social plan

ABSTRACT This article analyses the Italian experience of planning and governance in local welfare systems, after the adoption of a specific planning instrument called the ‘Piano di Zona’ (Area Social Plan), which has reached its sixth triennial review. Our goal is to explore the relationship between governance and performance by examining under which circumstances the social planning is successful, that is one Area Social Plan is preferable to another. Our research is based on the empirical observation of the nine Area Social Plans in the Province of Pavia which involves 188 municipalities. Our results demonstrate the fundamental role of public administrations and the negative effects that horizontal multi-level forms of governance may have on the planning of the Area Social Plan, almost as though there were a sort of path dependence from previous/pre-existing governance relationships.

Editorial Comment from Dr Porta et al. to Patterns of care among patients receiving sequential targeted therapies for advanced renal cell carcinoma: A retrospective chart review in the USA

interferons and interleukins commonly used in the past. It is also expected that the patterns of care for aRCC will hold an important role for the newer immunotherapy medications as they become more popular. We have no doubt that the programmed death-ligand 1 inhibitor drugs, nivolumab (Opdivo; Bristol-Myers Squibb Company, Princeton, NJ, USA) is already approved for aRCC, will be more commonly used for aRCC.

Further Applications of Compliance with Decree 231 and Anti-Corruption

This chapter discusses the evolution that is taking place in Italy with regard to compliance systems pursuant to Legislative Decree 231. In particular, it explores the application of compliance with Decree 231 as an accreditation system in various Italian regions through a comparative assessment of the different experiences that are currently in progress. A boost to this evolution took place in 2012 with the adoption of Law 190, the so-called anti-corruption law, which effectively extends the obligation of compliance with Decree 231 to all Italian public administrations, including subsidiaries. In the context of our main subject of analysis, this means extending its application not only to the VET sector but also to all education sectors, from primary schools to universities. Hence, we carried out an additional investigation into the application of the anti-corruption law in 52 universities; our conclusions show that Italy has yet to develop a culture of compliance, and thence a system of rules that can serve as an important tool in the support of ethical behaviour.

A More General Consideration About Accreditation Standards: From VET to Health Systems

The research introduced in this chapter also focuses on the application of compliance with Decree 231 as a compulsory requirement of an accreditation system. What changes is the sector analysed, Health Care. By analysing this sector, we can expand our reflections on the intertwined relationship between ethics and compliance, by outlining the pros and cons of the current applications made by the Italian government. In this sector too, critical aspects are confirmed, and compliance appears to be incomplete and unable to drive corporate behaviour towards ethics. Here too, the new institutionalism theory finds a perfect fit: both VET and health-care providers simply incorporate norms, in our case the organisational model under Decree 231, in order to gain legitimacy, resources and stability, while at the same time trying to avoid any real change in their functioning and organisation. In so doing, they enter into a sort of “institutional inertia”, which risks sterilising the effort made by the legislator.

Innovative Accreditation Standards: The Italian Experience in VET

The purpose of the research developed in this chapter is to present the application of an innovative accreditation standard in the Italian VET sector; the introduction of an organisational model pursuant to Decree 231 as a compulsory requisite to gaining accreditation and being able to access public funds. The data reported in this chapter are the results of research based on an empirical analysis of more than 500 VET providers in the Lombardy Region. Lombardy was chosen because it is compulsory for VET providers in this region to adopt Decree 231. Our principle focus was the supervisory unit, since this is the body appointed to oversee the adoption of the organisational model anticipated by Decree 231. We examined both the choices that were made with regard to the composition of the supervisory unit and the requisites that members of the said unit should possess, as well as looking at how it functions. Our results show that VET providers don’t plan the operation of their supervisory body by responding to the necessity for control, strategy and organisation, but they “simply” incorporate norms from their institutional environments and thus gain legitimacy, resources and stability. In this way, they “institutionalise” compliance with Decree 231. And this, in turn, shows that this illusion of compliance does not coincide with ethics. It is clear that there is a great risk of creating a merely formal paper-based compliance system, which has no real impact on organisational behaviour, despite the fact that compliance is compulsory and anticipated by a law.

Organisational Theories and Models

The intent of this chapter is to illustrate various organisational theories that were developed in the last century, beginning from “scientific management”, also called “Taylorism”, to the more recent theories of “population ecology”, “new institutionalism” and “transaction cost theory”. We will illustrate the current state of organisational theories and follow its evolution along paths both convergent and divergent, before arriving at a point where an unequivocal understanding of organisational theories and models is difficult. Our attention will then turn to neo-institutional theory, and we will explore how organisations attempt to incorporate norms by drawing from their environments. Here, we illustrate the concept of “institutional isomorphism” as a fundamental explanation for the homogenisation of organisational forms and compliance to norms and laws by articulating three distinct types: “mimetic isomorphism”, “normative isomorphism” and “coercive isomorphism”.