The Culture of Control in the Italian Administrative System

This article analyses the topic of controls in relation to select evolutionary aspects and cultural data that have — and still do, to this day — profoundly influence the Italian administrative system. The in-depth analysis of this “cultural” dimension aims to demonstrate how, in the Italian legal system, the subject of controls has been characterized not by a coherent and homogeneous trend or approach, but rather by different visions and stratified conceptions, which at times may even contradict one another, to the point that there seem to have been — and to be still — multiple “cultures of control”. For the purposes of this article, two aspects in particular are considered. These aspects relate, respectively, to the affirmation of “a culture of control” in the Italian administrative system, and to how the influence of certain foreign models was borne out in this area.