María Cristina de Borbón y María Cristina de Habsburgo: dos regentes entre los modos aristocráticos y los burgueses

En el siglo XIX, la función política primordial de las reinas era contribuir a la estabilidad y perpetuación de la dinastía y de la corona, como esposas de reyes y madres de futuros reyes; mantener el buen funcionamiento del sistema político como regentes y, como reinas madre, dar de nuevo credibilidad a la monarquía dejando paso a los nuevos reyes. María Cristina de Borbón y María Cristina de Habsburgo fueron dos mujeres, dos reinas, que vieron condicionada su trayectoria personal por el hecho de ser regentes y su labor política por el hecho de ser mujeres. A medida que avanzaba el siglo XIX, las familias reales se mostraron de forma creciente como familias burguesas, para contribuir a ofrecer una imagen próxima y moderna de la corona. Sin embargo, las diferencias en este sentido entre las dos reinas son destacables, pues los modelos de género evolucionaron a lo largo de la centuria. Por otra parte, encarnaron dos momentos muy diferentes de la monarquía decimonónica: el punto de partida –una monarquía absoluta– y el de llegada –una monarquía constitucional–. María Cristina de Borbón, con mucha angustia personal y pánico a la revolución, vivió, muy a su pesar, el tránsito definitivo entre el Antiguo Régimen y el régimen liberal, mientras que María Cristina de Habsburgo ocupó el trono en la época dorada de la Restauración liberal, aunque su regencia tuvo que afrontar la crisis de finales de siglo.

Il valore del voto: Italia e Spagna nel dibattito sulla rappresentanza politica liberale (1860-1870)

During the 1860's and 1870's, Spain and Italy experienced a convergence of debates on the significance of political representation in the framework of Liberal State. Spain suffered a political and social crisis, ending with the Revolution of 1868 and the adoption of male universal suffrage in 1878. Its coeval Italy began to build its new Kingdom, anxious about state building, as well as the relevance of electoral processes in the Constitutional scheme. Although members of parliament and essayists of both countries well knew their neighbour's political reality, a dialogue on representation didn't occur. Nonetheless, we believe it is useful to analyse the survey drawn by the Italian publicist in the light of current knowledge of the opinions that prevailed in Spain. What sense did they give to the general election? How did they understand the value of the vote? Who were considered eligible voters? These questions comprise the main subjects of the essay.

Ecos de Europa: la representación parlamentaria en el Chile liberal del siglo XIX

This paper explores the significant influences of European liberalism, and in particular French liberalism, in the Chilean thought and political culture/praxis during the construction of the State in the mid-19th century. It reveals and discusses the significant circulation of ideas that an array of Chilean travelers and exiles in several European countries generated and promoted in Chile in the middle of the 19th century. Among the intellectuals and politicians treated by this article are Andrés Bello, Manuel Antonio Tocornal, Santiago Arcos, Francisco Bilbao, Manuel Antonio Matta and Ángel Custodio Gallo.

Visions of the Spanish Revolution: identities and conflicts in post-welfare societies

This is a case study that analyzes photographic documents of the social protest in Spain between 2011 and 2013. The analysis is qualitative and considers the use of space, the visual expression of the messages and the orientation toward the causes or effects of political, economic and social changes. Visual sociology allows us to appreciate, in the case of the Spanish Revolution, a dynamic of “reflexivity” unrecognizable from other research approaches. Two successive waves of social mobilization in response to two different shocks can be appreciated. The first is given by political corruption, unemployment and the threat to consumer society. The second shock is caused by the savage cuts in the Welfare State. Social mobilization is expressed differently in each phase, and the forms taken by the protests show how the class structure in post industrial society shapes the reactions to the crisis of the Welfare State.

No evolution but revolution: The future of the Dutch terraced house

Dealing with the environmental problems is one of the biggest challenges within the field of architectural technology. Solutions to this problem are mostly exclusively sought in materials and computer technology. However, far more attention should be paid to humans and their role in this problem. This paper presents a small part of our bachelor thesis, which started as an investigation on the Dutch terraced house and through research ended as a study on the human behaviour and motivation. The first part of this paper, the evolution, is focussed on the traditional way of problem solving. The second part, the revolution, is focussed on human behaviour and motivation. These two studies put together lead to our conclusion: The only way to structurally solve our environmental problem is to revolutionize our way of building by involving the human interaction into our solution instead of forcing it out.