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This article deals with the growing interest in social sciences about the analysis of institutional performances. Two different aims are pursued. The first one is to provide a review about publications in political science, as in sociology as well in the economic literature including the concept (or sometimes only the word) of institutional performance. This topic is treated trough a broad range of essays and books crossing boundaries and sub sectors in these disciplines: comparative politics, democratic consolidation, evaluation research, social capital, public policies and so on. The review examines the conceptual definition and the methodological implication comparing the different interpretation of the meaning performance in the various branches of the social sciences. The second aim is to explore the epistemological and theoretical background of the concept analysing the ethimological roots, the economic origins and paradigmatic implications. An interpretative schema is adopted presenting a classification that switches the concept of performance in two different properties: the procedural performance and the political performance. The first one belongs to institutional activities that are institutionalised (such as law making or performance management). The second one belongs to relationships between institutions and society (such as Putnam’s researches). An additional classification is provided in this category, distinguishing between institutional performance(analysis of the relationships assuming the point of view of society), and political capacity (analysis of the relationships assuming the point of view of institutions).

The essay concerns the topic of national parliaments as democracy firming bodies in the European policy process. Although direct parliamentary involvement in EU affairs has been considered rather integration hindering than promoting factor, assembly plays an important role in legitimisation and implementation of political agreements. The paper focuses particularly on the influence that national parliaments have on national and thus European decision-making process. The aim of the study is to figure out variations in the level and type of legislative engagement in the European affairs. To illustrate this ever-complicating law and policymaking process, the essay refers to four Member States. Those are Denmark, Finland, Sweden and Italy a group of states representing both EU newcomers and a founding country, parliamentary versus semi-presidential systems and also, mono- versus bicameral parliament. Finally, referring to the European attitude of politicians of these four countries, the text outlines the perspectives of parliamentary involvement in the European multi-level system.

In this essay the Nice Charter is read through the lenses of modern constitutionalism history. After discussing the Preamble, going through the theoretical debate over the controversial issue of European moral and spiritual heritage, the author examines the Charter as far as its formal structure is concerned discussing the validity of the new criterion introduced to group rights, one which apparently goes beyond the traditional tripartition (civil, political and social rights), being based on four values and two principles. The thesis put forward is that this is a mainly formal innovation since behind the re-ordering by values we find two classical classifying principles: an objective one, based on the different content of rights, and a subjective one, which points to those who are entitled to these rights. From the combination of these two criteria not always applied in a consistent fashion, inconsistencies come up.

The essay analyses the foundations of the legitimacy of the EU institutions’. Moving from the assumption that the well-intended legitimacy of public power can only be a democratic one, the a. argues that after the creation of the Communities a partially autonomous public power has grown, which is neither directly derived from the institutions of the member states nor shows any tendency to decrease. Traditionally, nation-states assured the legitimacy of such power by inserting in the fundamental law adequate formulations stating the derivation of the public power from the people. Nothing similar is given for the Union. The lack of any reference to a European people, can eventually be explained in two different ways: first by the non-necessity of such a reference because of the unbroken legitimating process which would grow up from the democratic institutions of the member states to the bodies of the Union; second by the self-contradiction which would affect the very concept of a European people. Dellavalle rejects both arguments suggesting that a full democratic legitimacy of the European institutions by European citizens and specifically European bodies (i.e. in particular by the Parliament), along with the legitimacy still coming from the member states, is both possible and desirable.

War and law might appear a topic which does not deserve attention any longer either because war is taken to be a straight denial of law or, though quite surprisingly, because war is supposed to have vanished long ago, with the League of Nations and the outlawing of aggression. Contrary to these two views, the main contention of this paper is that the topic at stake is worth of being paid attention in order to figure out whether law can still be conceived of, along with Kelsen’s famous contention, as a means to maintaing peace. In other words, the aim of this paper is to inquire whether and to what an extent, despite of all the shortcomings it can be blamed of, law can still be taken to be a necessary means to protect fundamental rights, further democracy and secure the maintainance of peace. In order to attempt an aswer to such a query, both a recognition of current international and domestic legal provisions on warfare, and a survey of some main (un)lawful characters of the three main armed conflicts in the last decade will be previously taken into account.

Peronism and Justicialismo: Different Meanings in Italy and South America (by Mario G. Losano) The terms populism, peronism and justicialismo are often used to mean phenomena belonging to the same conceptual area. At the same time, though, each one of them has got many meanings, which vary in connection with the historical and geographical context in which they are used. The author analyses the different meanings of the three terms, both in their technical usage and in common speaking, going back to their historical background and enphasizing the rather deep differences of usage in Italy and South America. A case in point is that of justicialismo which, in Latin America, is the political doctrine of peronism, based on a mixture of social reform and populistic techniques of power management, while, in Italy it ended up pointing to the theory and practice of using trials for political ends by judges.