Abstract

The paper traces, from Italy to Switzerland, until François Guizot’s France, the itinerary of the jurist Pellegrino Rossi, who was both a student and later professor at the University of Bologna. His journey was that of a European intellectual capable of carving out a new profile in the social sciences of the time. Originally a constitutionalist, Rossi became one of the most active figures in the struggle for free trade. His capacity to synthesize and open up diverse fields of the new social sciences was extraordinary. His ambition was to build a socially modern Europe, but he did not survive the 1848 revolution and the advance of democracy in Europe.