Economic and Industrial Democracy 1–19 © The Author(s) 2016 Reprints and permissions: sagepub.co.uk/journalsPermissions.nav DOI: 10.1177/0143831X16635830 eid.sagepub.com Overturning Italy’s Article 18: Exogenous and endogenous pressures, and role of the state Tod Rutherford Department of Geography, The Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs, Syracuse University, USA Lorenzo Frangi Département d’organisation et ressources humaines, ESG Université du Québec à Montréal, Canada Abstract Since 1970 Article 18 provided important employment protection for workers in larger firms in Italy. Its core aspect (i.e. reinstatement in the case of unfair dismissal) was recently overturned by the Jobs Act for employees hired after its approval. To explain Article 18’s abolition, the authors assess the explicative power of (1) stronger exogenous pressures from economic international institutions, and (2) weaker endogenous pressures from unions and business organizations. Documentary analyses and semi-structured interviews with key informants reveal that while these two forces are critical, they tend to ‘read off’ the state policy decision making role, which, the authors argue, is central to explaining the overturning of Article 18. Keywords Article 18, employment protection legislation, Italy, Jobs Act, trade unions Articolo 18? E’ solo totem, inutile discutere d’abolizione. [Article 18? It is just a symbol, it is useless to speak about abolition.] (Premier Matteo Renzi, La Repubblica, 12 August 2014) Introduction In the autumn of 2014 Italian political debate was dominated by the image of Marta, a low paid, precarious worker with few, if any, employment rights. Marta’s insecurity was Corresponding author: Tod Rutherford, Department of Geography, Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs, Syracuse University, Syracuse, NY 13244, USA. Email: trutherf@maxwell.syr.edu 635830EID 0 0 10.1177/0143831X16635830Economic and Industrial DemocracyRutherford and Frangi research-article 2016 Article at Syracuse University Libraries on November 17, 2016 eid.sagepub.com Downloaded from