Bibliografia di Gaetano Mosca
Firenze: La Nuova Italia Editrice, 1949. First edition (in Italian). Octavo. Stapled wraps, 6.5 x 9.5 inches, 82 pp. Minor toning to edge of wrappers with edgewear to spine; bending to wrappers, else near-fine. Item #71
Early bibliography in Italian of the works of foundational elite theorist Gaetano Mosca (1858–1941). Mosca is today considered a founding father of the Italian school of elite theory together with Vilfredo Pareto and Robert Michels, and is perhaps best remembered for his Elementi di Scienza Politica (1896) (later translated into English and published as The Ruling Class in 1939). In the tradition of Machiavelli, Mosca endeavored to understand political power as it actually exists rather than as it ought to exist (or as we may desire for it to exist). As such, Mosca focused much of his scholarship on advancing scientific principles in opposition to metaphysical abstractions. In Elementi di Scienza Politica he advanced the doctrine of the “ruling class,” asserting that all societies are, in fact, comprised of the ruled, on the one hand, and the elites that rule them, on the other. Mosca’s doctrine of the ruling class would influence contemporary and future elite theorists, including James Burnham, who immortalized Mosca, Pareto, and Michels in his influential 1943 book The Machiavellians: Defenders of Freedom. This early bibliography traces Mosca’s thought throughout his life as a scholar, journalist, and politician. A valuable resource for the Mosca completist.
Price: $75.00