From Mad in Italy: Law 180 , as is well known, was enacted thanks to the combination of a series of favourable circumstances (lucky and, in hindsight, perhaps not so lucky) due to the need to avoid referendums, one of which was promoted by the Radical Party, which called for the repeal of the Giolitti legislation on mental asylums and the mentally ill, which was still in force at the time, and due to the effect of the government crisis of January 1978, to which was added, in March, the kidnapping of the Honourable Moro, which contributed to speeding up the approval of the law.
Read the full article here and the English translation here.
