Per un lessico giuridico della trasparenza. Pubblicità e segretezza in Francia tra Ancien régime e Rivoluzione

In this essay I define the concept of transparency – primarily intended as publicity of decision-making and antonym of secrecy – and its semantic evolution in France between the Ancien régime and the Revolution. The absolutist policy was based on the dogmas of religion, on the secrets kept by the sovereign and by corporations, and on the power of the judges. This legal and ideological structure is criticized by the Enlightenment which, in its various intellectual forms, denounced the secrecy of the power, the arbitrariness of judges and their functions carried out covertly. Public opinion and freedom of expression were conceived as powers to exercise against despotism, even in the legal field with the request to marginalize the secrecy of the process. However, only with the French Revolution, transparency – in the law making process, in the visibility of public affairs, in the administration of justice and in the control of power by the citizens – achieved a constitutional value.