Two ways of being elite: why Italy and France are so different

Public apparatuses, political representatives and companies: from the history of administrative traditions to the formation of the ruling class, how the two countries’ bureaucracies differ. And with what consequences

France is not ruled, bud administered? (France is not governed, but administered). This phrase can be read in an American book from the mid-twentieth century (H. Luethy, France Against Herself, Meridian Books, New York, 1954, p. 40). It indicates succinctly the role occupied by the high bureaucracy in French society. The corresponding expression, in French, is “la Republique des fonctionnaires”. Could such phrases be repeated for Italy? How, why and when was the French model summarized in those sentences formed? Why and when did Italy take a different path? Let’s hear the opinions of a Frenchman and an Italian.