Spoils system e dirigenza pubblica (nota a sentenza della Corte costituzionale n. 52 del 2017)

In the public sector the power to manage public affairs finds its source of legitimacy in consent or knowledge. Popular consent and technical know-how are the two criteria for the selection of public administrators: politicians in the first case, managers in the second one. Politicians plan the long-term objectives and make the strategic choices. Managers instead – as custodians of knowledge about organizational, economic and legal processes – coordinate human and financial resources to achieve these objectives. For this reason, the selection and recruitment of public managers have a crucial relevance.With judgment no. 52 of 2017, the Italian Constitutional Court has declared the constitutional illegitimacy of the rules of Law of Region Valle d’Aosta no. 22 of 2010, which extend the spoils system to the role of regional commander of the fire fighters. The article, after having examined the sentence, focuses on the two models of selection of public managers – the fiduciary model (spoils system) and the neutral model (merit system) – and on the reform of public management attempted by Law n. 124 of 2015, better known as “Law Madia”.