Province of Catania: 2003 Report

The political and administrative decentralisation process that has affected the Italian institutional system and brought power closer to the places and subjects directly involved in decision-making processes has also led to a profound transformation of the socio-economic research paradigms and the criteria for interpreting the various territorial realities. In accordance with the new institutional framework, Eurispes considered it essential to design a territorial research system aimed at reading and analysing local socio-economic dynamics and the structural transformations that characterise the main sectors of administrative intervention. With this in mind, the Second Report of the Province of Catania has once again made it possible to apply a territorial analysis model capable of exploring in depth the most significant social phenomena (from the economy to employment, from the environment to the territory, from justice to cultural policies and welfare). The systemic model of territorial analysis has been integrated with techniques and tools of social investigation that are increasingly close to the participatory needs of the population, surveying the opinions, expectations and needs of citizen-users, and thus providing valuable indications to guarantee the legitimacy of decision-making processes.