Deep-dive

Identity and how the State is organised

Twenty regions (five with a special statute), provinces and metropolitan cities, municipalities. Italian is the official language and twelve minority languages are protected. CET/CEST time zone, twelve national holidays.

Sections: Geography · History · Population · Languages · Time zone · Public holidays

Regions, provinces, municipalities

The 20 regions are Piedmont, Aosta Valley, Lombardy, Trentino-South Tyrol, Veneto, Friuli-Venezia Giulia, Liguria, Emilia-Romagna, Tuscany, Umbria, Marche, Lazio, Abruzzo, Molise, Campania, Apulia, Basilicata, Calabria, Sicily and Sardinia. Five have a special statute with wider autonomy, above all fiscal and linguistic: Aosta Valley, Trentino-South Tyrol (where the two autonomous provinces of Trento and Bolzano hold most of the powers), Friuli-Venezia Giulia, Sicily and Sardinia. Below the regions sit the provinces and, in the largest urban areas, the metropolitan cities; at the base are the comuni, the everyday counterpart for civil registry, pre-school, local taxes and municipal police. Regions and municipalities have a directly elected president or mayor.

Official language and minorities

Italian is the official language. Law 482/1999 recognises and protects the languages of the Albanian, Catalan, Germanic, Greek, Slovene and Croatian communities and of those speaking French, Franco-Provençal, Friulian, Ladin, Occitan and Sardinian. In the areas concerned, protection means bilingual place names, use of the language in public offices and school teaching: German in South Tyrol (where it is co-official), French in Aosta Valley, Slovene in the provinces of Trieste, Gorizia and Udine, Ladin in some Dolomite valleys, Friulian in Friuli, Sardinian in Sardinia. Anyone moving to these areas will find documents and signage in two languages and, in South Tyrol, language requirements for public-sector jobs.

Time zone

Italy is in the Central European time zone: UTC+1 in winter (CET) and UTC+2 in summer (CEST), changing on the last Sunday of March and the last Sunday of October, as in the rest of the European Union. Times are written in the 24-hour format.

National holidays

National holidays are set by law 260/1949 and later amendments. On public holidays public offices, schools and many shops close; transport runs on reduced timetables. Each municipality also observes the feast of its patron saint (29 June in Rome, 7 December in Milan), when municipal offices and local schools are closed.