The author considers the mechanisms limiting women’s access to power and the validity of their advance to positions of authority. She uses research into two extremely different social institutions–the Italian Mafia and the Polish Sejm (parliament)–in an attempt to illustrate that the contemporary process of redefining traditional cultural concepts of gender is not only an indicator of the spread of pro-equality attitudes but could equally well be considered an element of activity intended to preserve the patriarchal order. From this viewpoint, the ad hoc reconstructing of cultural concepts of gender is chiefly aimed at maintaining the constituting principle of the patriarchy–maintaining men’s domination at the price of breaking men’s monopoly on power. This process could therefore be perceived also as a symptom of the durability of the patriarchal model of social ties.

The article presents the project and realization of Ivigna (in Merano, Italy) aerial cable car project designed by architect Roland Baldi. The boxed form has been boldly and confidently introduced into the surrounding mountains, despite distancing itself from standard references to genius loci of the natural landscape. This project presents an avant-garde, innovative and reliable approach to the composition of architecture in the context of a mountain landscape. Despite the severity of forms, a kind of architectural rhythm and lightness of shaping the object introduced in the context of an open space can be sense here. It is essential to seek new forms and technologies for communing with nature and culture, in order to shape interesting modernist architecture, entering the twenty-first century.

“A school of virtues, kindness, love”: Salani series of romances as modelling text for “New Italy” women – The woman, seen as a children /citizens educator, in United Italy’s nation-building becomes target of an educational action entrusted to publishing industry. The Salani Collection, which is here pragmatically and linguistically analyzed, represents an emblematic example of serial narrative: the author hides himself in the texts as well that the publishing house is the addresser; the novel becomes a model with a unique moral and behavioral message, spread by an accessible language shaped on Tuscan.

Józef Andrzej Gierowski’s academic profile is presented in the light of his interest in the problems of universal history in relation to events, but above all to phenomena which allow for a better knowledge and understanding of the mentality of the people of the time, their activities and their consequences. Gierowski’s studies on the history of Europe were closely linked to the history of the Polish‑Lithuanian Commonwealth (especially the period of the Saxon Wettin dynasty on the Polish throne), highlighting its international position and associations, and the resulting foreign policy of its rulers. Among the questions raised, there was no shortage of issues relating to the culture and ideology of the Baroque and the Enlightenment and, of primary interest to the researcher, the problem‑laden, not fully deciphered transition period between the two currents.
The second ‘part’ of the article emphasises Józef Andrzej Gierowski’s understanding of Europe as a certain whole, encompassing not only political history, social or economic affairs, but also cultural patterns and phenomena to which he was particularly sensitive.