Abstract
The Renaissance was a fundamentally political phenomenon, a period of time in which questions about the purpose of political life and the nature of political legitimacy were raised, and in which actual Renaissance regimes took the first steps towards the modern state. Although the most influential studies have insisted upon a break with the medieval tradition and world outlook, much recent work by both medievalists and Renaissance historians has emphasized the continuity of political thought from the twelfth to the sixteenth century. Yet, proper attention must be paid to the remarkable cultural change within the social and political context that occurred in fifteenth- and sixteenth-century Europe. By that time, constitutional revolutions, expansionist conflicts, and the long dispute between France and Spain brought about the end of the established political balance in Europe and at the same time a crisis in old concepts of politics and government.
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Provvidera, T. (2020). Politics, Renaissance. In: Sgarbi, M. (eds) Encyclopedia of Renaissance Philosophy. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-02848-4_622-1
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