The future of welfare and social development in Italy will involve multi-layered cooperation between the public, private and third sectors, with a model that focuses on innovation and whose goal must be to repair the country’s regional and social fractures. In this framework, dialogue is key to addressing today’s challenges, from digital transformation to the ageing population, to economic inequality.
Moreover, there is a growing awareness that welfare can no longer be limited solely to public-sector institutions – in view of their diminishing resources, if nothing else – but must be conceived as a project shared among different actors in the social sphere. Of these, businesses are playing an increasingly strategic role, not just through social responsibility initiatives but also as frontline players in producing collective well-being. The most interesting prospects involve the creation of innovative ecosystems: from corporate foundations involving dozens of different actors to regional and local welfare projects to initiatives for the most vulnerable and fragile sectors of the population. All of these initiatives are accelerated and facilitated by integration with the new technologies.
The main challenge, however, is to place the various actors’ experiences on a systematic footing and to create stable points of reference as opposed to occasional interventions. To this end it is important to measure results and create a framework in which the skills and expertise of each actor can be used to best effect. Government, with its legislative levers; the private sector, with its management expertise; and the third sector, with its first-hand knowledge of communities’ real needs.
If the most virtuous and innovative examples are to bear fruit, the need to repair any fragmentation and create integrated, scalable projects remains key. In a framework of this nature subsidiarity is a guiding principle: the state must not step in for, but rather enhance and support, the energies that society already possesses. The community must therefore re-appropriate the concept of “public”, and the importance of working on a common good that does not belong either to government or to business, but to all citizens, must be reaffirmed. To achieve this, mutual distrust between the public and private sectors must give way to an approach based on trust and cooperation.
A long-term vision is needed, as regards both the capacity to ensure financial stability for the projects and the need for wide-ranging investment in vital training and capacity building for the third sector. A recurrent issue is the need to involve the younger generations, notably “Gen Z”. This means not just helping them become members of the active population, but giving them a key role in decision-making processes. Making space for young people, recognizing their digital skills and their ability to “read the present”, means beginning to measure ourselves against the effects that the demographic crisis is already having – effects that will be felt even more keenly in the future – on welfare systems.
The crucial point, however, is and remains a cultural one: the focus must be on building shared knowledge by working together and maintaining a constant dialogue between different generations and different worlds. And this dialogue must be capable of repairing complex systems and restoring dignity and opportunities to places and to people.