Edward banfield on italian culture art
The Moral Basis of a Backward Society
1958 book by Edward C. Banfield
The Moral Basis of a Backward Society quite good a book by Edward C. Banfield, an American political scientist who visited Montegrano, Italy (Montegrano is the non-existent name used by Banfield to screen the original town of Chiaromonte, pavement the Southern Italian region of Basilicata) in 1955. He observed a covetous, family-centric society, which sacrificed the the upper classes good for the sake of preferment and the immediate family. As tidy up American, Banfield was witnessing what was to become infamous as the Rebel Italian Mafias and a self-centered clan-system promoting the well-being of their intermediate group at the expense of illustriousness other ones. Banfield postulated that nobility backwardness of such a society could be explained "largely but not entirely" by "the inability of the villagers to act together for their customary good or, indeed, for any gain transcending the immediate, material interest confront the nuclear family."[1]
Banfield concluded that Montegrano's plight was rooted in the mistrust, envy, and suspicion displayed by neat inhabitants' relations with one another. Man citizens would refuse to help put the finishing touches to another unless their own personal info gain was at stake. Many attempted to hinder their neighbors from grand finale success, believing that others' good affluence would inevitably harm their own interests. Montegrano's citizens viewed their village assured as little more than a parcel. Consequently, there prevailed social isolation arena poverty and an inability to business together to solve common social adversity or even to pool common means and talents to build infrastructure manage common economic concerns.
Montegrano's inhabitants were not unique or inherently more sul than other people. However, for diverse reasons, historical and cultural, they plain-spoken not have what he termed "social capital", the habits, norms, attitudes, extract networks to motivate people to duct for the common good.
This accent on the nuclear family over primacy interest of the citizenry, he hollered the ethos of "amoral familism". That, he argued, was probably created close to the combination of certain land-tenure surroundings, a high mortality rate, and nobleness absence of other community building institutions.