Information And Communication In Venice

The author of this article discusses how communication played a role in politics in Venice during the 16th and 17th centuries. He uses a variety of sources to make his case, and his analysis is insightful. This book is a valuable addition to the literature on early modern politics, and it will be of interest to historians of communication, political history, and Venice.

This is a unique investigation of the political uses of different forms of communication - oral, manuscript, and printed - in sixteenth and seventeenth century Venice. De Vivo uses a rich and diverse range of sources - from council debates to leaks and spies' reports, from printed pamphlets to graffiti and rumours - to demonstrate just how closely political communication was intertwined with the wider social and economic life of the city. The book also engages with important wider problems, inviting comparison beyond Venice. For instance, today we take it for granted that communication and politics influence each other through spin-doctoring and media power. What, however, was the use of communication in an age when rulers recognized no political role for their subjects? And what access to political information did those excluded from government have? In answering these questions, de Vivo offers a highly original reinterpretation of early modern politics that steers a course between the tendency of the political historian to view events from the windows of government buildings and the 'history from below' of social historians. As this account shows, neither perspective is sufficient in isolation, because even the most secretive oligarchs, ensconced in the Ducal Palace's most restricted councils, were constantly preoccupied by their vociferous subjects in the squares below. Challenging the social and cultural boundaries of more traditional accounts, the book goes on to show how politics in early modern Venice extended far beyond the patrician elite to involve the entire population, from humble clerks and foreign spies, to notaries, artisans, barbers, and prostitutes. Review: A valuable and stimulating study, which should be read by politcal and social historians with equal interest...a most impressive work. * Toby Osborne, European History Quarterly. * ...de Vivo's monograph [is] a tour de force. No study better lays bare how the Venetian government really worked... * Liz Horodowich, Reviews in History * An impressive first book, based on a formidable range of sources. De Vivo's perceptive comments on the management of communication should be read by all historians of early modern Europe and by scholars in media studies as well. * Professor Peter Burke, University of Cambridge * A very original and significant contribution, both for its methodology and for its uses of sources. Information and Communication in Venice is an example of first class scholarship, based on an impressive series of arguments, written in a vivid, compelling style. I would strongly recommend this book to anybody interested in political history; in cultural and intellectual history; in the history of communication; in early modern European history as well as, of course, in the history of Venice. * Professor Carlo Ginzburg, UCLA * DeVivo focuses on lines of transmission, patterns of exchange, pathways, regulations, and markets * Thomas Cohen, London Review of Books * ...a major contribution to the history of early modern Venice and also to the history of information and propaganda. Besides being original in its ideas and firmly based on the sources, the book is remarkable for something much rarer in historical monographs: its penetrating political insights. Indeed, the claim made in the book s subtitle is truly justified. * Board of the Leverhulme Prize 2008 *