One-stop government in Italy and the Lebanon: When the law alone is no silver bullet

Abstract

The paper investigates the implementation of One-stop government in Italy and the Lebanon. The Italian government’s One-Stop Business Shop (‘SUAP’) programme is first analyzed to discover why it has taken 12 years of legislation to get Italy’s municipalities fully on board, and whether it has returned the expected benefits by effectively lightening the administrative load that drags on the competitiveness of the country’s business sector. The critical discussion of the “innovation by law” approach identifies the stumbling blocks that have deterred the Italian government from achieving its mission to set up the One-Stop Business Shops and to deliver e-government. From the analysis of the Italian case some lessons are drawn that can be useful to guide the implementation of One-Stop Business Shop in Lebanon where the process is still at the beginning also due to the effects of the instability that affected the region during the past years.