Oltre la co-progettazione. Le politiche di coesione territoriale alla sfida dell’attuazione

Under the framework of the EU territorial cohesion policy, the Italian National Strategy for Inner Areas (SNAI) was established as an opportunity to test a place based approach to policy making, able to intersect the social innovation paradigm and the co-production perspective. However, the current phase of implementation of the SNAI is now posing speci!c challenges, some of which are specifically related to the difficult interaction between civil society and institutions.
This paper discusses results of an ongoing action research process focused on the SNAI implementation phase in the Simeto Valley, Sicily (IT), selected in 2014 as an experimental area of national significance. Here, a recent grassroot initiative has led to the establishment of a civic observatory aimed at facilitating such an interaction with the ultimate purpose of nurturing co-production. Despite some initial successes, there are still several open questions on the institutional capabilities required by genuine co-production.