PsychologyLawHistoryEconomicsMath and computer science

Nicolo Alessi

Nicolo Alessi
Post-doctoral Researcher

Postdoc researcher in European and Comparative Public Law

Nicolò P. Alessi is currently a postdoctoral researcher at the Faculty of Law.

He was adjunct professor of Comparative Public Law, postdoc researcher at he University of Bern and the University of Aosta Valley, junior researcher at the Institute for comparative federalism at Eurac research and guest researcher at the Institute of federalism of Fribourg/Freiburg.

He holds a joint PhD in Law and European and International Law from the Universities of Verona and Fribourg/Freiburg (CH). His PhD thesis has been awarded the International Prize Giancarlo Doria for the best dissertation in Italian and Comparative Constitutional Law.

His main research interests are European and Comparative Constitutional Law, Diversity Accommodation, Minority Rights, Federalism, Gender Studies and Climate and Commons Governance. He is also an expert on the Aosta Valley’s legal system. He has authored numerous publications, including a monograph and an edited book, on these topic areas.

Functions at UniDistance Suisse

Centre for Law and Sustainable Economic Globalization

  • Post-doctoral Researcher

Publications

Books

 

Scientific journal articles (peer-reviewed) – Selection

  • N.P. Alessi, Intersectionality as a Legal Concept? Applications and Implications of the Notion (Within and) Beyond Non-Discrimination Law, in BioLaw Journal-Rivista di BioDiritto, no. 1/2025,  ISSN 2284-4503 (forthcoming)
  • N.P. Alessi, Verein KlimaSeniorinnen and Others v. Switzerland Between Human Rights Protection and Human Rights Justifications, in Freedom, Security & Justice: European Legal Studies, no. 1/2025, ISSN 2532-2079 (forthcoming, open access version here)
  • N.P. Alessi, Consociational Systems and the Role of Opposition: the Case of Switzerland, in Rivista di diritti comparati, special issue I, 2024, ISSN 2532-6619 (open access version here)
  • N.P. Alessi, Book review: Tove H. Malloy, Levente Salat (eds.), Non-Territorial Autonomy and Decentralization. Ethno-Cultural Diversity Governance, in European Yearbook of Minority Issues – EYMI, vol. 20, 2021, ISSN: 1570-7865 (online ISSN: 2211-6117)
  • N.P. Alessi, Joint bodies: a Key Factor for Successful Autonomous Systems? The Cases of the Italian special Regions and the Ă…land islands, in Journal of Autonomy and Security Studies, Vol. 5, no. 1/2021, ISSN 2489-4265 (open access version here)
  • N.P. Alessi, R. Louvin, Un nouveau souffle pour les consorteries de la VallĂ©e d’Aoste/A new lease of life for the Aosta Valley’s consorterie, in Revue de gĂ©ographie alpine/Journal of alpine research, Vol. 109, no. 1/2021, ISSN: 1760-7426 (open access version here)
  • N.P. Alessi, The Maze of Languages in Aosta Valley (with R. Louvin), in European Journal of Minority Studies, Vol. 13, no. 3-4/2020, ISSN: 1865-1089
  • N.P. Alessi, Riflessioni a proposito delle Consorterie valdostane e di una recente proposta di legge regionale in materia, in Rivista di diritto dell’agricoltura, no. 1/2020, ISSN: 1720-4445
  • N.P. Alessi, Inequalities and Controversial Aspects of Land Reform in South Africa before the Constitutional Court, in federalismi.it, 15 July 2020, ISSN: 1826-3534 (open access version here)

 

Book chapters – Selection

  • N.P. Alessi, La recente legge regionale valdostana in materia di consorterie: situazione attuale e prospettive future, in R. Louvin, R. Calvo, Les communs fonciers dans l’espace alpin, ESI, Napoli, 2025
  • N.P. Alessi, Innovative Forms of Autonomy and the Role of Federalism: A Comparative and Theoretical Perspective, in N.P. Alessi, M. Trettel (eds.), Federalism and the Law of Diversity: The Theoretical Contribution of Federalism to the Explanation of Emergent Models for the Accommodation of Diversity, Brill, Leiden-Boston, 2025
  • N.P. Alessi, F. Palermo, Le fonti del diritto e le procedure di revisione dell’ordinamento finanziario, in A. Valdesalici (ed.), L’ordinamento finanziario e contabile delle Province autonome di Trento e Bolzano, ESI, Napoli, 2023
  • N.P. Alessi, La crisi come risorsa: riflessioni costruttive sui rapporti tra Stato e Regioni in Italia nella prospettiva della differenziazione, in F. Palermo – S. Parolari (eds.), Le tendenze del decentramento in Europa, ESI, Napoli, 2023
  • N.P. Alessi, Diritti delle minoranze, diversitĂ  culturale e media: la situazione italiana a confronto con gli sviluppi del soft law internazionale, in J. Bercelli – M. Macchia (eds.), Saggi di diritto dell’informazione, ESI, Napoli, 2022
  • N.P. Alessi, F. Palermo, IGR and Identity Politics in Italy, in Y. Fessha – K. Kössler (eds.), Intergovernmental Relations in Divided Societies: A Comparative Perspective, Palgrave Macmillan, London, 2022
  • N.P. Alessi, I sistemi di IGR delle Regioni ordinarie e delle Regioni a Statuto speciale. Modelli di regionalismo in una prospettiva evolutiva e il ruolo della legge indicata dall’art. 116, 3° comma, Cost., in G. Armao – F. Astone – M. Immordino – G. Moschella – V. Prudente (eds.), SpecialitĂ  e differenziazione. Le nuove frontiere del regionalismo italiano, Editoriale Scientifica, Napoli, 2022

Research focus

Building and Consolidating the Law of Diversity

The project focuses on the accommodation of diversity within constitutional traditions, with special regard to the most innovative approaches and legal instruments of the Global North and Global South. This field of study, traditionally dominated by a Global North approach based on majority-minority and rights-based discourse, is undergoing significant evolutions.

At the same time, the project aims to assess the appropriateness of the existing “mainstream” theoretical tools and concepts – in particular minority and minority-related concepts as well as rights discourse – to grasp the ongoing evolution of this field of law. Based on this, the publications in the framework of this project propose a reconsideration of the traditional conceptual categories and the introduction of the concept “Law of Diversity” as a theoretical framework to grasp the ongoing developments in this area.

Among the models studied in this work, those that are referred to as emergent models for the accommodation of diversity appear to be particularly in need of theoretical recognition. To this end, the theory of federalism is used to serve a rather unexplored theoretical function. Federal theory is put forward as a theoretical instrument to frame and explain the emergent instruments for the accommodation of diversity, as well as provide practical solutions for their development.

What this project and intends to demonstrate is that the time is ripe to complement established categories and approaches of public law in the areas of diversity accommodation (and federalism).

 

New Frontiers of Federalism

The core of the project is the use of federalism as analytical device to frame and explain emergent governance phenomena that perform significant public functions and do not correspond to full-fledged subnational entities, beyond the traditional federal focus on territorial government. Cases analyzed in this project are: innovative and less institutionalized models for the accommodation of diversity, such as legal pluralism, non-territorial autonomy, and participatory democracy; forms of common pool resources governance, and especially the commons.

The creation of a theoretical framework of understanding is key to providing a solid ground upon which the consolidation and development of those governance systems may be built and better perform their important functions. While governance may be seen as a challenge to federal theory, it also has the potential of enriching it by stimulating its renovation. The emergence of governance may indeed be seen as an opportunity to revise federal theory to adapt it to the contemporary times. In this sense, this project endorses an alternative – promising – reading of federalism that builds on that scholarship that has recognized in federalism far bigger scope and application. This theoretical perspective not only is conducive to a better framing of governance but also leads to unleashing a rather unexplored analytical potential of federalism, which may reveal being its 21st century main function.

The main reason why this is proposed is that it may lead to practical benefits as it provides a common ground of understanding for countless practices regardless of contingencies that characterize the time and place in which these phenomena take place.  Indeed, this project does not aim to provide an ontological account on what true federalism is. It instead considers that there is a commonality among numerous and manifold experiences of diffusion of power, and that this basic commonality can be called federalism. In turn, this pragmatically opens the door to analyze, explain and study all those phenomena through a federal lens. Thus, this project is not pure speculation to find the federal nature of some phenomena. Instead, it brings about new opportunities for understanding governance while at the same time renovating federal thought itself.

 

Post-Growth and the Law