Professor and Graduate Program Director
PhD Indiana University
Email: filippo [dot] sabetti [at] mcgill [dot] ca
Research interests
- Comparative and Canadian Politics
- Allocation and Justice Institutions
- Civic Theory and Civic Practice
- Federalism
- Religion, Society and Freedom
- Democracy in America and Europe
- History as Method of Inquiry and as Natural Experiment
Filippo Sabetti works on a range of issues across the subfields of Canadian Politics, Comparative Politics and Political Theory. His point of departure is whether the structure of basic social institutions is a primary instrument for advancing freedom and human welfare or an essential source of human adversity and misery. This has led to a reassessment of habitual assumptions and presumptions in the study of public affairs while opening a new territory in the art and science of institutional analysis: why often the search for good government leads to counter-intentional results; what can happen when those acting for the State regard ordinary people as passive voices in the game of life, and when a hegemonic or ruling group causes a subset of the population to be weak, while blaming the weak for lack of culture or public spirit; recast understanding of the relationship between democracy and culture, showing why people are not culturally or path-dependently doomed to bad government; and why centralization need not be an inevitable tendency of democracy.
His most recent study, Civilization and Self-Government: The Political Thought of Carlo Cattaneo (2010), reveals why the nineteenth-century pioneering analysis of Cattaneo merits a place, alongside Tocqueville, in our continuing debate about the meaning of civilization and liberty. Thanks to a three-year research grant from the Social Science and Humanities Research Council of Canada, Sabetti now seeks to extend that inquiry to about ten centuries of political thought and practice on the Italian peninsula and islands to better understand and fashion the civic theory and civic practice of the future.
To be sure, this is not the first time that an attempt is made to turn to the past to improve the future. Many modern analysts have gone all the way to Ancient Greece for insights on how to grapple with contemporary problems. Few areas of Europe can match Italian history for wealth of documentary evidence as a laboratory of creative constitutional artisanship. What is innovative about this new research, and what constitutes a departure from other projects, are its reach across the usual divides between medieval, Renaissance and early modern and modern history, between normative and empirical analysis, and between political science, law and economics. In opening new vistas for the affirmation of citizens as creators of the world in which they live, Sabetti’s new research program aims to give a hand to the creation of a new intellectual community and the growing public science of civics, thereby affirming the centrality of democratic citizenship in the art and practice of social science.
Select Publications
Books:
Filippo Sabetti (2010). Civilization and Self-Government: The Political Thought of Carlo Cattaneo. Lanham, MD: Lexington Books.
Filippo Sabetti, Barbara Allen and Mark Sproule-Jones, eds. (2009). The Practice of Constitutional Development: Vincent Ostrom’s Quest to Understand Human Affairs. Lanham, MD: Lexington Books.
Mark Sproule-Jones, Barbara Allen and Filippo Sabetti, eds., (2008).The Struggle to Constitute and Sustain Productive Orders. Vincent Ostrom's Quest to Understand Human Affairs. Lanham, MD : Lexington Books.
Filippo Sabetti, ed. (2007). Libertà e Liberali in Europa e in America [Liberty and Liberalism in Europe and America]. Milan: Edizioni Guerini.
Carlo G. Lacaita and Filippo Sabetti, eds. (2006). Civilization and Democracy: The Salvemini Anthology of Cattaneo’s Writings. Toronto: University of Toronto Press.
Filippo Sabetti (2004). Alla Ricerca del Buon Governo in Italia. Updated version of The Search for Good Government. Manduria-Bari-Rome: Piero Lacaita Editore.
Filippo Sabetti (2002). Village Politics and the Mafia in Sicily. 2nd edition of Political Authority. San Francisco: ICS Press, and Montreal: McGill-Queen's University Press.
Saverio Di Bella, Filippo Sabetti and Pierre Tremblay, eds. (2001). Il Crimine in America. Cosenza: Pellegrini Editore.
Filippo Sabetti (2000). The Search for Good Government: Understanding the Paradox of Italian Democracy. Montreal: McGill-Queen's University Press, paperback 2002. Shortlisted for Canadian Social Science Prize.
Filippo Sabetti (1993). Politica e potere in un comune siciliano. Updated version of Political Authority. Cosenza: Pellegrini Editore.
Filippo Sabetti and Raimondo Catanzaro, eds. (1991). Italian Politics. A Review. Vol. 5. London: Pinter Publishers.
Raimondo Catanzaro and Filippo Sabetti, eds. (1990). Politica in Italia. I fatti dell’anno e le interpretazioni. Edizione 1990. Bologna: Il Mulino.
Harold M. Waller, Filippo Sabetti, Daniel J. Elazar, eds. (1988). Canadian Federalism: From Crisis to Constitution. Lanham, MD: University Press of America.
Filippo Sabetti (1984). Political Authority in a Sicilian Village. New Brunswick, N.J.: Rutgers University Press.
Filippo Sabetti and Harold Waller, eds., (1984). Crisis and Continuity in Canadian Federalism. Special issue of Publius: The Journal of Federalism, vol. 14.
Select Journal Articles and Book Chapters:
“Stationary Bandits: Lessons from the Practice of Research from Sicily.” Sociologica 2/2011: 1-22.
“Cattaneo come Tocqueville?” [“Cattaneo like Tocqueville?”] Confronti nos. 1-2 (2011): 65-86.
“Constitutional Artisanship and Institutional Diversity: Elinor Ostrom, Vincent Ostrom and the Workshop.” The Good Society 20 (no. 1) 2011: 73-83.
"Italian Political Thought." International Encyclopedia of Political Science, ed. George T. Kurian. Washington, DC: CQ Press, 2011. http://library.cqpress.com/teps/enclyps_843.1.
“Institutions as Human Artifacts.” Pp. 3-14. In F. Sabetti, B. Allen and M. Sproule-Jones, eds., The Practice of Constitutional Development: Vincent Ostrom’s Quest to Understand Human Affairs. Lanham, MD: Lexington Books, 2009 (ed. with Barbara Allen and Mark Sproule-Jones).
"Democratization without Violence: Can Political Order be Achieved through Peaceful Means" Pp. 85-110. In M. Sproule-Jones, B. Allen and F. Sabetti, eds., The Struggle to Constitute and Sustain Productive Orders. Lanham: Lexington Books, 2008.
"Normative and Empirical Inquiries into Systems of Governance." Pp. 3-10. In M. Sproule-Jones, B. Allen and F. Sabetti, eds., The Struggle to Constitute and Sustain Productive Orders. Lanham: Lexington Books, 2008.
“Democracy and Civic Culture.” Pp.340-62. In The Oxford Handbook of Comparative Politics, ed.by C. Boix and S. Stokes. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007.
"Types of Federalism: Achieving Self-Governing Capabilities in Societies with Federal Potentials." Pp. 27-54. In The Dynamics of Federalism in National and Supranational Political Systems, ed. by M. Pagano and R. Leonardi. New York: Macmillan Palgrave, 2007.
“Libertà e Potere nel percorso del liberalismo classico [Liberty and Authority in the Trajectory of Classical Liberalism].” Pp. 11-25. Libertà e Liberali in Europa e in America, ed. by Filippo Sabetti. Milan: Edizioni Guerini, Turin: Centro Einaudi, 2007.
“Incivilmento e autogoverno nel pensiero politico dell’Ottocento: il contributo di Carlo Cattaneo in una prospettiva comparatistica [Civilization and Self-Government in Nineteenth-Century Political Thought: Cattaneo’s Contribution in a Comparative Perspective].” Pp. 453-484. In Città e Pensiero Politico Italiano dal Risorgimento alla Repubblica, ed. by R. Ghiringhelli. Milan: Edizioni Vita & Pensiero, 2007.
“Carlo Cattaneo and Varieties of Liberalism.” (with C.G. Lacaita). Pp. 3-52. In Civilization and Democracy, ed. by C.G. Lacaita and F. Sabetti. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2006.
“Dalla cultura civica al capitale sociale: progresso nella scienza politica comparata [From Civic Culture to Social Capital: Progress in Comparative Politics]." Rivista Italiana di Scienza Politica 36 (August 2006): 183-205.
The Mafia Misunderstood - Again." Journal of Modern Italian Studies 11 (no. 2, 2006): 232-239.
“Local Roots of Constitutionalism.” Perspectives on Political Science 33 (no. 2, Spring 2004): 70-78.
“Il Passaggio alla Modernita’: Riflessioni Teoriche sull’Esperienza di Francia, Italia e Spagna.[Passage to Modernity: Theoretical Reflections on the Historical Experience of France, Italy and Spain]” Teoria Politica 18 (no.3 2002): 21-43.
"Covenant Language in Canada: Continuity and Change in Political Discourse." pp. 259-284. In The Convenant Tradition: From Federal Theology to Modern Federalism, ed. by D. J. Elazar and J. Kincaid. Lanham, MD: Lexington Books, 2000.
"Cuestiones dificiles y solution de problema: reto del federalismo canadiense, antes y ahora [Problem Solving in the Organization and Practice of Canadian Federalism]." In Hacia in nuevo federalismo? Alicia H. Chávez, ed. Pp. 177-200. Mexico City: Colegio de México, 1996.
"Path Dependency and Civic Culture: Some Lessons from Italy about Interpreting Social Experiments." Politics & Society 24 (March 1996): 19-44. Reprinted in English, and translated in Catalan.
"Whose Law, Whose Justice? Of Crime and Punishment in Modern Times." pp. 129-144, in S. Hellman and G. Pasquino, eds., Italian Politics: A Review, vol. 7. London: Pinter Publishers, 1992. Published also in Italian.
"The Mafia and the Anti-mafia: Moments in the Struggle for Justice and Self-Governance in Sicily." pp. 174-195, in. R. Nanetti and R. Catanzaro. eds., Italian Politics. A Review, vol. 4. London: Pinter Publishers, 1990. Published also in Italian.
"Un precursore siciliano di 'Public Choice'? Francesco Ferrara e lo sviluppo delle scienze sociali in Nord America." Il Politico 54 (July - Sept. 1989): 409-423. Reprinted in 1990.
“The Historical Context of Constitutional Change in Canada.” Law and Contemporary Problems 45 (Autum 1982): 11-32. Reprinted in 1984.
“Reflections on Canadian Urban Governance Research.” Comparative Urban Research 8 (no.2, 1981): 87-112.
Other publications:
Review of Montesquieu and the Logic of Liberty (2008), and Soft Despotism, Democracy’s Drift (2009), by Paul Rahe, in Perspectives on Politics, forthcoming in December 2011.
“Thinking Theoretically and Comparatively about History.” Italian Politics & Society no. 56 (Fall 2002): 28-34.
“In Conversation: The Meaning of Democracy and the Vulnerability of Democracies.” Polycentric Circles 8 (no. 1 January 2002): 1-3 (with Barbara Allen).
Review of Agrarian Elites by Enrico Dal Lago. Journal of Modern History 80 (September 2008): 623-25.
Review of The Case for the Enlightenment: Scotland and Naples 1680-1760 by John Robertson. Canadian Journal of Political Science 40 (September 2007): 781-83.
Review of Politics as Religion by Emilio Gentile. Perspectives on Politics 5 (March 2007): 149-150.
Review of Mazzini and Marx: Thoughts upon Democracy in Europe, by Salvo Mastellone. Journal of Modern History, 78 (no. 2. June 2006): 468-69.
Review of Jane C. Schneider and Peter T. Schneider, Reversible Destiny. Mafia, Antimafia and the Struggle for Palermo (University of California Press 2003). In The American Historical Review 108 (no.5, December 2003): 1552-1553.
Review of Norberto Bobbio, Ideological Profile of Twentieth-Century Italy (Princeton University Press, 1995); and Carlo Violi, ed., Bibliografia degli Scritti di Norberto Bobbio (Laterza, 1995). In Canadian Journal of Political Science 30 (June 1997): 392-393.
Review of Benjamin Higgins and Donald Savoie, Regional Development Theories and Their Application (Transaction, 1995). In Canadian Journal of Political Science 29 (June 1996): 420-421.
Review of David M. Olson and C.E.S. Franks, eds., Representation and Policy Formation in Federal Systems, Canada and the United States (University of California Institute of Governmental Studies Press, 1993). In Canadian Public Policy 20 (December 1994): 445.
Review of M. Keating, Comparative Urban Politics (E. Elgar, 1991). In Canadian Journal of Political Science 26 (March 1993): 183-184.
Undergraduate Courses
- Introduction to Comparative Politics
- Comparative Local Government
- Issues in Canadian Public Policy
- Society and Politics in Italy
- Comparative Institutions and Policies
- Development and Public Policies in Western Europe
- State and Market in Comparative Analysis
- Making Democracy Work: A Comparative Perspective
- Canadian Public Administration
- Presidential and Congressional Politics in the US
- Hon. Seminar in Comparative Politics Developed: topics have included: Markets and Politics; Passage to Modernity in Europe and North America; Faith, Reason and Democratic Transformations
Graduate Courses
- Freedom and the City
- Introduction to Comparative Politics: Approaches and Issues
- Comparative Federalism
- Comparative Institutional and Policy Analysis
- European Politics
Graduate and Undergraduate Reading Courses
- Theories of Multi-Level Governance: Implications for Latin American politics
- Policies for Urban Growth in Europe
- Canadian Social Issues and Federalism
- Health Policies and Marginal People in Israel and Canada
- Religion and Public Life
- 18th and 19th Century Liberalism
- Nationalism and the Congress of Vienna
- Empirical Theory and Policy Analysis
- Public Choice Theory and Canadian Politics
- Women and the Catholic Church in Italian Politics