Maurizio Isabella

Historian Professor Maurizio Isabella says there was a popular constitutional culture running through the revolutions in Italy, Sicily, Greece, Spain and Portugal in the early 19th century.

Isabella describes a new revolutionary movement in southern Europe following the Napoleonic wars and the Congress of Vienna’s attempt to secure peace and stability in Europe. Similar uprisings in the 1820s saw attempts to establish constitutional governments across southern Europe. Isabella looks at the roles played by secret societies, elections, petitions, protests, the experience of war, and the politicising of new sectors of society. He says the liberalism that emerged across southern Europe was different to those seen in Britain and France.

Isabella is professor of modern history at Queen Mary University of London. His previous books include Risorgimento in Exile and, as co-author, Mediterranean Diasporas: Politics and Ideas in the Long Nineteenth Century.

Part of the festival’s programme of Italian literature and culture.