Learning objectives
The course was designed to foster an understanding of the way in which our contemporary era is symptomatic of a general situation of transformation – in terms of economic, social, political, cultural, environmental and urban factors – whose development is in part linear, and in part reveals fractures within a basically homogeneous phase.
Prerequisites
Basic knowledge of contemporary events, as covered by the secondary school curriculum, is required.
Course unit content
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Political involvement in the age of major transformation <br />
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The course is divided into two units: <br />
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Unit A: The age of great transformation. (5 credits). (From 20 February to 29 March) <br />
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Focusing on Europe, a historic profile of the 19th and 20th centuries will be provided, with particular attention to the origin, development and transformation of the features of contemporary society as a mass-based society (mass production and consumption, mass culture, mass politics). <br />
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Unit B:: Mass-based society, ideology and political involvement in the age of major transformation. (5 credits). (10 April to 17 May). <br />
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The origin and development of political parties, in their role as tools for mediation between a changing society and national institutions; they will be examined in relation to the various forms in which associative phenomena developed, the spread of universal suffrage (and the struggle through which this right was attained), the appearance of the need, on the part of new social groups, to express their material needs, their passions and ideals. <br />
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Full programme
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Bibliography
Unit one: G. Sabbatucci - V. Vidotto, Il mondo contemporaneo. Dal 1848 a oggi, new abridged edition, Laterza, Rome-Bari 2005 <br />
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Unit two: M. Ridolfi, Interessi e passioni. Storia dei partiti italiani tra l’Europa e il Mediterraneo, Bruno Mondadori, Milan, 1999, with additional material from M. Duverger, Partiti politici (in Enciclopedia del Novecento, Ist. Encicl. Ital., Rome 1972); M. Guadagnini, Partiti, (in Il mondo contemporaneo, La Nuova Italia, Florence 1981): at the Department of political and social studies <br />
Teaching methods
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Assessment methods and criteria
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Other information
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