CHIOVENDA, GIUSEPPE. - Jurist, born at Premosello (Novara) in 1872; died there on 5 Nov. 1937. He taught at the Universities of Parma, Bologna, Naples, and Rome.
He may be called the founder of the new Italian school of procedural law. An advocate of orality and procedural concentration, he is responsible, among other things, for the concept of action as a formative right, distinct from substantive right, and for that of the procedural legal relationship. C.'s work is also important for canon law, since many of his concepts have been applied and adapted, especially through the merits of Prof. Francesco Roberti, to the procedure dealt with in bk. IV of the CIC.
Principal publications: La condanna alle spese (1900); Romanesimo e Germanesimo (1901); L'azione nel sistema dei diritti (1903); and finally that substantial work first called Principi and subsequently Istituzioni di diritto processuale civile, which C. began in 1906 and continued to work on almost until the end of his life, and which was published in various reprints and revisions.