Le Zone Economiche Speciali. Spunti di analisi e riflessione

The term Economic Zones includes a wide range of related types, including free trade zones, free ports, export processing zones, special economic zones (SEZ), areas of economic and trade cooperation, processing zones, economic and free zones. Despite the numerous variations of name and form, all these typologies recall the idea of demarcated geographical areas, placed within the national borders of a country, in which the rules of the economic and business environment are di erent from those prevailing in the national territory. is set of di erential rules generally concerns, as a matter of priority, the investment conditions, customs, taxation and the regulatory context. In the area, an environment is granted for the economic activities that choose it as a localization that appears to be more liberal and generally, more e cient from an administrative point of view than that found in the rest of the national territory. Considering all this, the paper intends to analyze the size of the SEZ phenomenon with particular regard to the EU member States and to Southern Italy, its di usion and the di erent choices of governance, as well as any barriers to development and the ability to become attractors of foreign direct investment.