Percy A. Allum (1933–2022)

ABSTRACT

Percy Allum began his studies with law and history and graduated from Queens’ College, Cambridge in 1956 before going on to study political science and international law at Sciences Po in Paris (1959). In 1965, he completed his D.Phil. at Oxford under the supervision of the historian Christopher Seton-Watson and began his teaching career, working at English, French and Italian universities. His study Politics and Society in Post-war Naples was published by Cambridge University Press in 1973. From 1966 to 1993 he taught at the University of Reading, and from 1993 to 2005 at the University of Naples ‘L’Orientale’, a return to the city that was his first and favourite field of research.

RIASSUNTO

Percy Allum iniziò i suoi studi in storia diritto laureandosi al Queens’ College di Cambridge nel 1956, per poi studiare scienze politiche e diritto internazionale a Sciences Po, Parigi (1959). Nel 1965 completò il suo D. Phil a Oxford sotto la supervisione dello storico Christopher Seton-Watson e iniziò la carriera di insegnante, lavorando presso università inglesi, francesi e italiane. Il suo libro Politics and Society in Post-war Naples fu pubblicato dalla Cambridge University Press nel 1973. Dal 1966 al 1993 insegnò all’Università di Reading, e dal 1993 al 2005 all’Università degli Studi di Napoli ‘L’Orientale’, un ritorno nella città che fu il suo primo e prediletto campo di ricerca.

KEYWORDS:

• political sociology
• community studies
• comparative politics
• Naples
• P. A. Allum
• political machine

PAROLE CHIAVE:

• Sociologia politica
• Studi di comunità
• Politica comparata
• Napoli
• P. A. Alum
• Macchina politica

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

^1. The reference is to La Capria (1996, 134).

^2. De Masi’s recollection in Corriere del Mezzogiorno, April 30, 2022.

^3. C. Wright Mills’ book (1959) was published around this time. It criticized both ‘Grand Theory’ (i.e. Parsonsian functionalism) and abstract empiricism, specifically, the extent to which technical quantitative analyses were detached from historical and contextual analyses. Wright Mills’ contribution is well-evident in Allum’s work; indeed, in his works Allum referenced Wright Mills on several occasions.

^4. “Good-Bye Naples,” in La Repubblica, July 22, 2005.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Luciano Brancaccio

Luciano Brancaccio is Associate Professor in Political Sociology at the Department of Social Sciences of the University of Naples Federico II. He conducts studies on organized crime and politics from a historical-processual perspective. Some publications: “Le due vie weberiane del patrimonialismo. Potere personale e reti politiche,” SocietàMutamentoPolitica (2023); “Politica e criminalità organizzata in Campania dopo il terremoto,” in Gribaudi G., Mastroberti F., Senatore F. (eds.), Il terremoto del 23 novembre 1980 (2021); “Violent Contexts and Camorra Clans,” in Massari M., Martone V. (eds.), Mafia Violence. Political, Symbolic and Economic Forms of Violence in the Camorra Clans (2019); “Crisi del clientelismo di partito e piccole rappresentanze territoriali. Forme e spazi del consenso personale a Napoli,” Quaderni di Sociologia (2018); I clan di camorra. Genesi e storia (2017).