last updated: July 2026

Davide Ruggieri is a researcher in Sociology of cultural and communicative processes at the Department of Political Sciences, Law, and International Affairs of the University of Padova (Italy).

His main academic and scientific interests focus on the forms and the transformations of the social and cultural processes underlying the modern society and globalization, more particularly the  re-shaping of the social subjectivities (as well as arising forms of alienation), and more particularly the relation between culture and individualization within the social processes. His main theoretical frame matches new addresses of Critical Theory and relational sociology.

He is the author of scientific articles and monographs on Georg Simmel, Max Horkheimer, and relational sociology. He is a member of the scientific board of the Georg Simmel Gesellschaft (2022-…) and the editorial board of the “Simmel studies” review.

Selected Publications

Books

Ruggieri, D. (2021). Lo sguardo dell’altro. Cultura, individuo e socializzazione nel pensiero di Georg Simmel. Milano: MeltemiRuggieri, D. (2019). La sociologia relazionale di Georg Simmel. La relazione come forma sociale vitale. Mimesis: Milano.

Articles

In reverse chronological order

Ruggieri, D. (2023). Normative Reciprocity, Relational Sociology, and the Critique of Forms of Social Life, in E.Hałas (ed.), Methodology of Relational Sociology. Palgrave Studies in Relational Sociology. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham, pp. 295-315. 

Ruggieri, D. (2022). Being grateful to Georg Simmel. Emotions, gratitude, and the relational concern of sociology in the globalized society, in «Digithum. A relational perspective on culture and society», vol. 28, pp. 1-9, ISSN: 1575-2275.

Ruggieri, D. (2020). Relations, Forms, and the Representation of Social Life: The Challenge of Relational Sociology, in G.Fitzi (Ed.), The International Handbook of Simmel Studies, Routledge,London-New York, pp. 46-59, ISBN: 9780367277239

Ruggieri, D. (2019). “Constructing a New Storey Beneath Historical Materialism”: Georg Simmel and the Foundations of a “Relational” Critical Theory, in «BERLIN JOURNAL OF CRITICAL THEORY», vol. 3, p. 61-89, ISSN: 2567-4056

Ruggieri D. (2017). Georg Simmel and the “Relational Turn”. Contributions to the foundation of the Lebenssoziologie since Simmel, in «SIMMEL STUDIES», vol. 21, p. 43-71, ISSN: 1616-2552