The Reform of Italian Law on Cultural Property Export and its Implications for the ‘Definitional Debate’: Closing the Gap with the European Union Approach, or Cosmetics? Some Systemic Considerations from a Criminal Law Perspective

Italy has a long tradition of pervasive regulation of its national cultural heritage, including strict control over the export of cultural objects. In contrast to the lack of a definition of “national treasures” which affects EU law, Italian law has striven to achieve an effective definition of the terms “cultural heritage” and “cultural property”, and even more to design specific identification rules for cultural objects. Nonetheless, the issues of definition and related protection on the one hand, and identification on the other, do not always go hand in hand in a legal framework which is made even more complex by the coexistence of two separate models of criminal law protection, as well as by the frequency of reforms, the most recent of which directly affected the export of cultural property. So how has the legal definition of “cultural property” changed over the years within the Italian legislation? How do the peculiarities in the construction of criminal offences “muddle” the overall picture? How much has the 2017 reform affected said definition? Finally, the question arises whether and how all this will possibly impact the gap between national and EU approaches to cultural “goods”. These issues are the main focus of this article.