Abstract This article considers the relationships between national administrative laws. According to a (diminishingly important) strand in public law, administrative law is simply part of the law of the State, of each State, and reflects its culture. Those who subscribed to this strand have not, however, proffered any coherent theory to explain the borrowings between national legal systems. The article begins by illustrating the difficulties which beset the less recent strand, by way of an analysis of the dissemination of the Austrian general legislation on administrative procedure. The focus then shifts on the Italian experience, with regard to the opinion according to which the Austrian codification has had a very limited influence, if not none at all. It is, however, argued in the remainder of the article that this thesis is neither coherent nor consistent with some developments which must be taken into due account. For the same reason, the thesis of the German influence is rejected.
