A New Paradigm of Ownership in Italian Private Law?

Ownership is a topic that follows social, economic, and political changes more than others. On the other hand, the same rules established from time to time, in turn, influence the social, economic, and political vision of the people. As a result, ownership will play a crucial role in the current process towards achieving sustainability, but from this point of view, its long history cannot be neglected. For a long period of time, even if the Italian mainland was divided into several legal systems, property law expressed everywhere the idea of sovereignty: being an owner was like a status which ensured supremacy over lower social classes. When in the nineteenth century Italy was legally unified, ownership was ruled in the light of liberalism and, theoretically speaking, every person could have property, and enjoy it without any interference by public authorities. This view was outdated by the 1948 Italian Constitution, which directs ownership to the social function, as well. However, in the last decades, the sustainability paradigm has taken the stage, and the paper addresses the issue of the relationship between property law and sustainable development. Within the framework of Italian private law, the writer aims to check if this new outlook can be accepted into the current legal system, and how it might be developed.