Public order between security models and constitutional limitations. Reflections on so-called red zones

Abstract

Prefectoral ordinances establishing the so-called red zones, adopted in several Italian cities, raise a serious issue of compatibility with the democratic form of the State. Exceptional measures under art. 2 T.U.L.P.S., conceived for contingent interventions, have become ordinary tools of urban governance, producing a surreptitious stabilization of the state of exception, in contrast with the principles of proportionality, reasonableness, and temporariness. The «Naples case» (TAR Campania, judgment no. 5699/2025) epitomizes this drift, highlighting the risk that a permanent emergency may erode fundamental rights and the system of legal sources