Ricerc@Sapienza

The article examines the
Maastricht Treaty in a historical and comparative perspective, focusing on its economic
and constitutional implications. The Maastricht Treaty is therefore contextualised in a
historical process, highlighting the attempts
of the European constitutional state to deal
with the crisis of the so-called “embedded liberalism” after the fall of Bretton Woods. This
process had significant economic and political
backlashes worldwide. In Europe, the Seventies were characterized by high economic instability, especially considering the currency
system and the growing public debt. Since
then, the need for a new form of capitalism’s
democratic embeddedness arose with the aim
to shape a new balance between capitalism
and democracy. Though full of contradictions,
the Maastricht Treaty represented an attempt
to cope with this changing economic and political world order. At that time, the Italian political system was facing an in the long run
unbearable economic instability and the
Maastricht Treaty represented an opportunity
to foster a reform of the political and economic system “from outside” through an “external constraint”, as Guido Carli defined it.
It was not the first time in the Italian history.
A new process began and, full of contradictions and inadequacies, is still ongoing