Tracce di ‘scienza politica’. Alcuni lineamenti del pensiero di Ruggiero Bonghi

A consolidated theoretical framework places in the last decades of the nineteenth century the birth of the theory that studies the political élite and, more generally, the genesis of Political Science. However, the scientific debate has not yet fully focused on some of the authors that in the mid nineteenth century have ‘anticipated’ a few assumptions that social scientists will analyze later, although from different points of view. The aim of this paper is to remember some tracks of the substantial work of one of these authors: Ruggiero Bonghi (1826-1895). Multifaceted personality (writer, university lecturer, member of parliament), Bonghi is engaged on several fronts in the political debate so as to leave, through parliamentary speeches and writings, many clues to fully understand the political and parliamentary system changes. Therefore, it is interesting to recall certain joints, particularly those aspects that are still considered fundamental in the analysis of political phenomena: the selection of élites, the function of political parties, the characteristics of electoral systems. In order to bring out some persistent regularity and to highlight the conceptual categories that still find space in the scientific debate on the transformation of political regimes.