The Congress of State holds executive power which it exercises through its Ministers (no-more than 10). The Congress of State assigns to each Minister specific competences and administrative sectors, for which they are politically and directly responsible. Under Constitutional Law on the Congress of State No. 183/2005 and Qualified Law on the Congress of State No. 184/2005, each Minister is required to cooperate with his colleagues whenever his area of competence overlaps with that of other Ministers and in any case whenever so requested by a colleague or the Congress of State. This means that Ministries can cooperate to achieve common objectives, though this is not always the practice.
The Ministry of Education, Culture, University, Scientific Research, Social Affairs and Equal Opportunities cooperates mainly with the Ministry of Labour, Cooperation and Information, with the Ministry of Internal Affairs, Public Functions, Justice and Relations with Local Authorities, with the Ministry of Tourism and with the Ministry of Foreign and Political Affairs. Such cooperation, however, is not systematic and mostly involves joint funding of specific events. Recent examples of cooperation between public institutions and private bodies are the staging of Giuseppe Verdi’s Aida; “Allegro Vivo”, an international piano competition; and an international singing competition dedicated to Renata Tebaldi.
Whenever necessary, the Congress of State can appoint inter-ministerial technical working groups, made up of representatives from the various Ministries. These working groups have no autonomy or decision-making powers and their task is limited to the study of specific issues, on which they have to report to the government.
In November 2006, San Marino took over the Chairmanship of the Committee of Ministers of the Council of Europe. In line with the country’s century-old tradition of peace, the main themes and priorities of San Marino’s six-month Chairmanship concerned violence against women and children, education on human rights and democratic citizenship, protection and promotion of cultural diversity, as well as support and promotion of intercultural and interreligious dialogue, with full respect for diversity and by favouring understanding and mutual knowledge among cultures, both within Europe and in the relations with non-European countries. In order to achieve this last objective, a group of officials of the Ministry and of the Department of Foreign Affairs, in close cooperation with the Secretariat General of the Council of Europe, organised a forum with the participation of the major religious representatives, held in San Marino in April 2007.
Another event, held in the Republic, in March 2007, was a conference involving the European jurists who were studying the proposals to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of the European Court of Human Rights. The Colloquy, which saw the participation of Representatives of States, NGOs, Academic Institutions and Juridical Experts – reiterated the need for Protocol 14 to the Convention on Human Rights to come into force soon, since the Russian Federation had not ratified it yet. In 2009, the Russian Federation signed Protocol 14, thus allowing this international instrument to enter into force. However, when the conference was organised, it was quite impossible to envisage a comprehensive change in the system of protection of human rights without the implementation of Protocol 14. The objective of the reform process is to provide the Court with the instruments to process all applications in reasonable times. The Colloquy resulted in useful suggestions for the preparatory works of the 117th Session of the Committee of Ministers of the Council of Europe (held on 10-11 May 2007).
At the level of inter-ministerial collaboration, the drafting of the Framework Law on the Implementation of Youth Policies No. 91/2007 underlines that the issue of youth policies is not just a responsibility of the Ministry of Labour, but it also interacts and integrates with the social policies addressed to other people. Cooperation is therefore carried out actively and in synergy with the government authorities responsible for labour, training, education and culture, leisure, health, etc.
At intergovernmental level, the communication project “Who said we are isolated?” was launched in 2015 involving San Marino, the Canary Islands and Malta. The project is aimed at creating and sharing a digital platform to promote and facilitate the creative interaction of contents. The project is expected to involve, at different stages, students and stakeholders of the three countries, including civil society, schools, companies, associations and offices. The commitment is focused on enhancing strategically the cultural heritage of the three countries, in order to set up start-up companies and joint ventures promoting culture. The initiative, sponsored by UNESCO, also aims to develop project ideas to be submitted to the European Union for co-financing through official channels such as Interreg Med, Europe Creative and Horizon 2020.
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