Contributions à l’idée de représentation politique au XIXème siècle: Gioacchino Ventura et Philippe Buchez

Abstract

In the first half of the 19th century, following the revolutionary events that had inflamed the whole of Western Europe, the debate on political representation became more intense. From France to Italy, a number of thinkers faced the problem, aware of the need to give a theoretical foundation. The report aims to highlight the contribution of Gioacchino Ventura and Philippe Buchez. Both of them, in elaborating their theories, are affected by the events that cross their respective nations of origin; both of them participate, even if in different ways, to the revolutionary events of 1848; both of them conceive a proactive thought in which the link between political theory and representative institutions stands out and in which it is possible to recognize elements that today are still present in our political system: a cleavage between a legal country and a real one, a flawed relationship between rulers and governed people, a lack of ethical values of reference.