Decentralized cooperation is defined by the General Directorate for Development Cooperation of the Foreign Affaires Ministry as: “The action of cooperating for development performed by Italian local autonomies, either individually or in consortiums with other institutions and expressions of organized civil society located in the geographical area of administrative competence - implemented through partnerships, preferably set up with equivalent institutions of the developing countries - whilst favouring active participation of all the partner country’s representative civil society components in decisional processes aiming for their local area’s sustainable development.”