We did well enough. Systemic reforms, changes in recruitment procedures and the evolution of Italian political science

Italian political science has evolved over time, dealing with various reforms and changes in the structure of academic careers and procedures for recruitment that have characterised the recent decades of the Italian university system. This paper reflects on how these changes have challenged the foundational identity of Italian political science and how they have influenced its development as a community of scholars. Three relevant dynamics emerge: the shift from a national and centralised community to a set of local networks of scholars, the capacity to perform well in terms of professional standards, and the risk that the capacity to reproduce the discipline’s identity, or at least its foundational core, could be significantly weakened.