Italians care about what an agreement actually means and what it was intended to accomplish, not just what the words technically say. Fulfilling the letter of a contract while violating its purpose is considered a form of bad faith — technically correct but fundamentally dishonest. When questions arise about what was agreed, the Italian instinct is to return to what the parties understood and intended, not to parse contractual language for technical advantage.
This reflects the relational foundation of Italian agreements: when commitments are made between people who know each other, what they understood matters more than what a detached reader might derive from the text. Deal with your Italian partners in good faith. Focus on the purpose and intent of your agreements, not on exploiting ambiguities.
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