Paris and Bologna in the Nineteenth Century

It may seem paradoxical to draw a parallel between Paris, the city that Napoleon III, in the wake of his illustrious uncle, wanted to make the capital of continental Europe, and Bologna, a city that had known its most brilliant period at the time of the Renaissance but that was in decline at the beginning of the nineteenth century. However, the comparison makes sense if one tries to understand the different ways in which the two urban societies entered the path of modernity.