THE CONTRADE, THE PALIO, AND THE BEN COMUNE: LESSONS FROM SIENA
THE CONTRADE, THE PALIO, AND THE BEN COMUNE: LESSONS FROM SIENA

Summary/Abstract: Siena’s unusually high level of both wealth and social capital and extremely low level of crime make it, in spite of all its specificity, an obvious object of lesson-drawing for other communities. The reason of Siena’s success seems to be the historic contrade system, which again is closely linked to the famous horse-race, the Palio. Based on recent literature, and corroborated in situ, this essay sets out to investigate how the Palio-contrade complex works today, what effects and side-effects it has, and what lessons might be drawn from it.

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