Questo saggio affronta la dottrina politica di S.N.H. Linguet, analizzando l’uso sistematico dei paradossi al suo interno. La critica dell’ideologia fisiocratica consente a Linguet di individuare il nesso tra scienza e politica quale fondamento dell’ideologia della società e della sua critica. La costellazione concettuale formata da proprietà, appropriazione, patrimonialismo e patriarcato stabilisce le coordinate della sua teoria politica dei concetti sociali. La categoria di rapporto sociale non esprime la coordinazione tra soggetti indifferenti, ma la subordinazione di alcuni (...) individui al potere sociale dei proprietari. La critica di Montesquieu, del suo concetto di legge e di dispotismo asiatico, conduce Linguet ad affermare la necessità di uno Stato burocratico che, grazie al suo diritto positivo sia in grado di governare i movimenti della proprietà che per Linguet è il centro reale del sistema politico. (shrink)

Starting from the doctrine of ideology proposed by Destutt de Tracy in the late eighteenth century, the paper reconstructs its historical relationship with the social science, of which it was originally meant to be the ultimate expression. The historical necessity of ideology as a political science of the social is found in its ability to mediate and legitimize power relationships. It is not for chance that the Marxian critique of ideology is a radical critique of the constitution of power in (...) a capitalist society. The attempt of the social science to neutralize the problem of power through the abandonment of the value judgments leads instead to the declaration of the end of ideologies. In the last part, the paper analyses the way in which ideology, after its identification with the forms of total domination, returns as a neoliberal tool of legitimizing market as a society without history. (shrink)

RiassuntoL’articolo prende in esame un ben noto frammento degli «Aitia» di Callimaco che offre la più importante testimonianza del culto dell’ecista nelle colonie siciliane. Una più approfondita indagine dei vv. 40–41 consente di istituire un parallelo con le norme rituali concernenti i Tritopatreis nella lex sacra di Selinunte (A 9–15). In entrambi i casi a un sacrificio animale con sversamento del sangue segue una libazione senza vino e un banchetto sacro. La sequenza rituale è inusuale e la sua diffusione nel (...) mondo coloniale siciliano mette in luce sia la complessità del culto dell’ecista dal punto di vista religioso, sia l’intimo nesso che lo connette con la memoria sociale e l’identità della comunità politica. (shrink)

En este artículo Maurizio Viroli muestra que aunque el patriotismo republicano tiene una dimensión cultural es, sobre todo, una pasión política basada en la experiencia de la ciudadanía. Patriotismo es el amor por una república libre y por su forma de vida: il vivere libero. En este sentido, el patriotismo es casi lo opuesto al nacionalismo. Para los nacionalistas el patriotismo es el amor por una libertad más modesta: la libertad de disfrutar a la sombra del trono, y en (...) paz, de la casita y el majuelo. Para los patriotas republicanos el amor por la patria es una pasión artificial, para los nacionalistas es natural. Como conclusión, Viroli sugiere que el patriotismo republicano es capaz de responder a los dilemas de la democracia moderna al ir más allá de la elección entre el mito del nacionalismo cívico y el horror del nacionalismo étnico. (shrink)

Il saggio ricostruisce la specificità della costellazione algoritmica che si affermata a livello globale dal 2001. Esso identifica le piattaforme quali configurazioni asimmetriche di poteri che consentono l’accumulazione mentre operano una centralizzazione che consente una riconfigurazione del sociale rispetto alla società in rete. Grazie a esse gli algoritmi svolgono due specifiche funzioni politiche: la mediazione tra contenuti computazionali e culturali e una funzione di comando che impone agli individui specifici comportamenti conformi alla loro esistenza digitale. Le piattaforme non solo una (...) nuova forma di impresa, ma anche un modello politico che investe lo Stato che, rinunciando a elementi della sua sovranità, riafferma il proprio ruolo specifico all’interno della forma politica algoritmica. (shrink)

The essay maintains that, despite the significant successive transformations, a ordoliberal moment operates within the neoliberal program. Ordoliberalism establishes a specific political anthropology based on the centrality of economic action and on an a-revolutionary temporality that enhances the normative continuity of the tradition. Even against the specific configurations that the State can assume, especially the democratic one, it also aims at the constant reactivation of a political as a fundamental decision in favor of the economic.

The experience of the post-colonial State underlines the transformations of the modern State. In fact, some features of the post-colonial State which were regarded as being overcome or at least inconsistent with the constitutional, democratic and rational form of the State, are now emerging also in those States that never made experience of colonization, or have been colonizers. The essay analyses the transformations of the modern State aiming to articulate the concept of Global State. In this case, the question of (...) origins does not represent a principle of legitimation, as it was with the doctrine of social contract. Rather, the symbolic and historical discontinuity defines a cut between the origin and the functioning of the State, corresponding to a transformation of the legitimating sources of the State itself. Within the global State, sovereignty is not anymore a monopoly, but a widespread practice enacted by several social structures. (shrink)

The thematic section of this issue of «Scienza & Politica» is focused on the problem of ideology. It is assumed that, though in the last decades its end has been repeatedly announced, ideology is still alive. Within the processes of globalization, the references to ideology and its critique regain a central place both in historical research and in political theory. Ideology and its critique seems to be strictly bounded with each other since the origin of the concept, which aimed (...) to pave the way for a new understanding of the world and of the language adopted to name it. The critique of ideology, therefore, has historically been a contestation - performed by particular subjects - of a way of interpreting the world scientifically, thus legitimating the existing relationships of power. (shrink)

1. Dialettica, metafisica e cosmologia -- Dall'anima alla prassi etica e politica.

Objects come in three kinds: physical objects that exist in space and in time, and are independent from subjects knowing them, even though they may have built them, as for artifacts ; ideal objects that exist outside of space and time, and are independent from the subjects knowing them, but which, after having been discovered, can be socialized; social objects, that do not exist as such in space, since their physical presence is limited to the inscription, but last in time, (...) and whose existence depends on the subjects who know, or at least can use, them and who, in certain cases, have constituted them. This latter circumstance display us the fact that social objects, for which construction is necessary, depends on social acts, whose inscription constitutes the object. As I show through the law Object = Inscribed Act, social objects consist in the recording of acts that encompass at least two people, and are characterized by being inscribed, on a physical substrate what so ever, from marble to neurons, passing through paper and computers. If all this is true, then a theory of social objects develops naturally into a theory of the document, understood as an inquire centered on the definition of what I call “documentality”, namely the properties that constitute, in each case, the necessary and sufficient conditions to be a social object. At last, there is no society if there are no documents, and documents are records with a particular social value. (shrink)

Traditionally, from Aristotle to Hegel, has been considered as valuable the following sequence: Thought → Word → Writing. In this essay I claim that the right order of the sequence is utterly the opposite: oral language does not come first, gesture does; writing is independent from language both because gesture comes first and because writing, differently from language, can record; finally the capacity of recording and of communicating is typical of the soul seen as a tabula.

In the wide critical reviews that the enterprise of Begriffsgeschichte has triggered, the difficult relationship that conceptual history – in its Koselleckian declination – entertains with systemic theory has remained maybe underexposed until now. Moving from the tension between experience and historicity in Koselleck, the article reflects on the tensions that the historical-conceptual structure reveals as soon as it comes into contact with the problems of historical semantics that accompany the Luhmannian attempt of operating, in the register of second order (...) observation, a temporal dislocation and a de-paradoxification of the paradox activated by Derrida’s différance, as constitutive of historicity. The blind spot at the bottom of Luhmannian gaze cuts out the borders of the “history” continent along the lines of the shipwreck of the classic semantics of modernity. (shrink)

On the occasion of the almost contemporary publication of two interesting books on Thomas Paine, SCIENZA & POLITICA has addressed the two authors – Matteo Battistini and Maurizio Griffo – with some questions about the different approaches of their works. The result is a long-distance dialogue, which explores not only the significance of the American revolutionary and constitutional events, but also the influence that the English legacy and the French revolutionary experience have exercised on the American political thinker. (...) A Tale of Two Paines handles the problem of its attribution either to liberalism or to democratic radicalism; it also faces the preoccupation with the defence of liberty in the historical reconstruction of the State in the light of the affirmation of the sovereignty of society. (shrink)

This introduction opens the monographic issue starting from 1968 and arriving to neoliberalism as its most articulated answer, without the claim to give a complete picture but in order to illuminate the complexity and radicality of this caesura. In this reconstruction 1968 starts well before, so that it is not possible to establish a precise starting date and place. The contestation of authority, the questioning of patriarchy, the activation of heterogeneous and often “unexpected” subjects: the fierce critique of the current (...) state of things produced a crisis of legitimacy that involves the State, society, capitalism and science. In this sense 1968 was an unaccomplished and therefore never finished revolution. (shrink)

L’obiettivo del presente articolo è mostrare che, come sostentuto da Armstrong, il pensiero agostiniano si caratterizza per un’attitudine positiva nei confronti del mondo sensibile e del corpo. A tal fine, saranno analizzate le riflessioni di Agostino presenti nel primo libro del De Libero Arbitrio e nel decimo libro delle Confessioni. La presente indagine si articolerà in tre momenti. In primo luogo, esaminerò le analisi dell’Ipponate relative alla natura del peccato per mostrare che, per Agostino, agire bene è amare i beni (...) eterni. In seguito, traccerò le riflessioni agostiniane dedicate al peccato e all’ordine della natura umana per chiarire perché, per l’Ipponate, dominare le passioni è realizzare la propria natura. Infine, esaminerò le analisi agostiniane dedicate ai concetti di uti e frui per mostrare cosa l’Ipponate intenda per uso corretto dei beni temporali e per dominio della ragione sulle passioni. Sarà così possibile evidenziare che, per Agostino, contenere le passioni non significa astenersi da esse e allontanarsi dalle creature, ma utilizzare entrambe correttamente. Parole chiave: Agostino; peccato; mondo sensibile; uti; frui. (shrink)

INDICE -/- Note biografiche Introduzione, di Riccardo Faucci -/- Parte I - Da Verri a Toniolo 1. Jeremy Bentham: Contemporary Interpretations, di M.D.A. Freeman 2. Su Helvétius, Beccaria e Bentham, di Letizia Gianformaggio 3. L'etica utilitaristica di Pietro Veti, di Vincenzo Polignano 4. ll liberismo interventista di Vincenzo Emanuele Sergio, di Anna Li Donni 5. Il concetto di " felicità pubblica, nella << Genesi del diritto penale » di Romagnosi, e il rapporto Romagnosi-Bentham, di Robertino Ghiringhelli 6. « La più (...) grande felicità per il maggior numero » all'Accademia dei Georgofili ( 18)0-1850), di Gabriella Gioli 7. Una nota su Manzoni critico dell'utilitarismo, di Maurizio Mori 8. Sul concetto di utile in Francesco Ferrara e in Maffeo Pantaleoni, di Daniela Parisi Acquaviva 9. Sul pensiero sociale cristiano di fronte all'edonismo, di Luciano Avagliano 10. Giuseppe Toniolo e il recupero cattolico dell'utile e del valore, di Anna Camaiti -/- Parte II Aspetti di storia del pensiero economico nell’età classica -/- 1. La filosofia economica di Thomas Hobbes, di Marco Bertozzi 2. Ordinamento del sapere, modelli metodologici ed economia politica in Adam Smith, di Sergio Cremaschi 3. Elementi classici nel pensiero di Adam Smith: giurisprudenza romana e morale stoica, di Gloria Vivenza 4. Il “lusso” negli economisti italiani del Settecento, di Cosimo Perrotta 5. Prezzi naturali, prezzi di mercato e legge degli sbocchi nel dibattito fra Malthus e Ricardo, di Lilia Costabile 6. Marx e la moneta, di Roberto Petrini -/- . (shrink)

En un libro reciente, Maurizio Viroli sostiene que en El Príncipe Maquiavelo delinea la imagen del fundador que la teoría política republicana necesita, la que recibe su encarnación paradigmática en Moisés y sus acciones. Aquí propongo que para una comprensión adecuada del Moisés de Maquiavelo resulta clave la interpretación que éste ofrece del incidente del becerro de oro (Discursos III, 30), al que interpreta como una revuelta contra Moisés motivada por la envidia. Este episodio, sugiero, ejemplifica las acciones necesarias (...) para asegurar las instituciones de un estado libre recién constituido en el contexto del conflicto permanente entre grandes y pueblo. (shrink)

This article sets the stage for a genealogy of the postgenomic body. It starts with the current transformative views of epigenetics and microbiomics to offer a more pluralistic history in which the ethical problem of how to live with a permeable body – that is plasticity as a form of life – is pervasive in traditions pre-dating and coexisting with modern biomedicine (particularly humoralism in its several ramifications). To challenge universalizing narratives, I draw on genealogical method to illuminate the unequal (...) distribution of plasticity across gender and ethnic groups. Finally, after analysing postgenomics as a different thought-style to genomics, I outline some of its implications for notions of plasticity. I argue that postgenomic plasticity is neither a modernistic plasticity of instrumental control of the body nor a postmodernist celebration of endless potentialities. It is instead closer to an alter-modernistic view that disrupts clear boundaries between openness and determination, individual and community. (shrink)

Mirko Garasic (2021) argued that space travel and, by extension, the colonization of other planets could morally justify using technologies and interventions capable of profoundly modifying the characteristics of astronauts and future Martian generations. According to Garasic, however, the fact that space interventions such as human (bio)enhancement or reproductive technologies such as artificial wombs may be morally justified does not mean that they are morally acceptable technologies to be used on Earth as well. Garasic’s thesis is that we should resist (...) the temptation to establish or reinforce a continuity between the ethical standards that apply to space travel and those that apply on Earth because what applies in space (or on other planets) does not necessarily apply to our planet. Garasic argues that in space, genetic enhancement interventions are morally acceptable, as they are essential for survival. On Earth, however, we can survive even without any form of (bio)enhancement. In a previous article (2022), we presented several arguments against Garasic’s thesis regarding the exceptional morality of what is morally acceptable in space. In this article, we examine and reply to Garasic (2022), showing that he fails to defend his thesis from the objections we previously advanced. Garasic’s mistakes are: (1) assuming nature (and consequently what is “natural”) as a normative point of reference which allows establishing what is moral and what is not moral; (2) defending the choices concerning reproduction as an insufficiently demanding and therefore unsatisfactory moral principle (according to Garasic we should not bring into the world people who can have a quality of life or a condition of well-being superior to mere survival); and finally (3) of not explaining clearly what it means to defend a principle of moral exceptionalism for space travel (Garasic does not explain whether this position applies to any behavior, for which what on Earth is a virtue, in space is a vice or is not a general principle, but he makes this case only for enhancement and reproductive technologies). Through our analysis, we not only refute Garasic’s position but also show that any attempt to address space travel issues as “special” moral issues faces several difficulties and, ultimately, is doomed to failure. (shrink)

On the basis of a critique of the notion of collective intentionality employed by John Searle to explain social reality, the article argues Searle’s constitutive rule that, for social objects “X counts as Y in C” raises more problems than it solves. Searle was perfectly right to say that Derrida’s formula “there is nothing outside the text” is false. But we can vindicate (and emend) Derrida by saying “ there is nothing social outside the text”: social objects are identified with (...) the inscrbed acts that give rise to them. (shrink)

The paper takes into consideration the different degrees of power and control that can be exercised by the mediator/arbitrator. This issue is investigated with particular regard to such aspects as the nature of the ADR procedure adopted, the cultural context in which the procedure takes place, and the formulation of specific legal norms. The analysis both of a few arbitration rules and some data from real arbitral proceedings shows great reliance on the arbitrator’s discretion and use of common sense, which (...) is in line with the idea itself of arbitration. Moreover, the high degree of power autonomy enjoyed by the arbitrator during the whole procedure derives from the presupposition that the parties accept the arbitrator’s personal opinion and final judgment and from the fact that the majority of the disputes in international commercial arbitration are of a technical and complicated nature. The analysis also shows that the legal background of most arbitrators tends to surface even when they are involved in alternative dispute resolution proceedings and is clearly visible in the orderly allocation of turns and the strict control over the procedures to be followed. Especially when arbitrators are lawyers or judges, they tend to promote a feeling of belonging to the same professional community, which induces a greater spirit of cooperation and a lowering of the control level. (shrink)

This book studies a central but hitherto neglected aspect of Rousseau's political thought: the concept of social order and its implications for the ideal society which he envisages. The antithesis between order and disorder is a fundamental theme in Rousseau's work, and the author takes it as the basis for this study. In contrast with a widely held interpretation of Rousseau's philosophy, Professor Viroli argues that natural and political order are by no means the same for Rousseau. He explores the (...) differences and interrelations between the different types of order which Rousseau describes, and shows how the philosopher constructed his final doctrine of the just society, which can be based only on every citizen's voluntary and knowing acceptance of the social contract and on the promotion of virtue above ambition. The author also shows the extent of Rousseau's debt to the republican tradition, and above all to Machiavelli, and revises the image of Rousseau as a disciple of the natural-law school. (shrink)

Nationalism and patriotism are two of the most powerful forces shaping world history. In this paperback edition of a highly successful, wide-ranging study, Maurizio Viroli shows exactly why patriotism is a political virtue and nationalism a political vice.

Tomorrow’s politics will be a politics of multiplicity. Contemporary Marxism, in its political and trade-unionist manifestations, appears as a major obstacle, given its inability to escape from totalising categories and to reflect upon the political need for innovation . Maurizio Lazzarato attempts to show that this double inability originates in an ontological view of relations, present in Marx himself, a view which needs to be reconsidered in light of the philosophy of multiplicity developed during the same period. William James’ (...) pragmatism, for instance, allows us to understand how deeply Marx’s ontology of relation is indebted to the idealist philosophy of the 19th century, thus revealing the ontological limits of Marxist politics. (shrink)

The debtor-creditor relation, which is at the heart of this book, sharpens mechanisms of exploitation and domination indiscriminately, since, in it, there is no distinction between workers and the unemployed, consumers and producers, working and non-working populations, between retirees and welfare recipients. They are all "debtors," guilty and responsible in the eyes of capital, which has become the Great, the Universal, Creditor.--from The Making of the Indebted Man Debt -- both public debt and private debt Has become a major concern (...) of economic and political leaders. In The Making of the Indebted Man, Maurizio Lazzarato shows that, far from being a threat to the capitalist economy, debt lies at the very core of the neoliberal project. Through a reading of Karl Marx's lesser-known youthful writings on John Mill, and a rereading of writings by Friedrich Nietzsche, Gilles Deleuze, Felix Guattari, and Michel Foucault, Lazzarato demonstrates that debt is above all a political construction, and that the creditor/debtor relation is the fundamental social relation of Western societies.Debt cannot be reduced to a simple economic mechanism, for it is also a technique of "public safety" through which individual and collective subjectivities are governed and controlled. Its aim is to minimize the uncertainty of the time and behavior of the governed. We are forever sinking further into debt to the State, to private insurance, and, on a more general level, to corporations. To insure that we honor our debts, we are at once encouraged and compelled to become the "entrepreneurs" of our lives, of our "human capital." In this way, our entire material, psychological, and affective horizon is upended and reconfigured. How do we extricate ourselves from this impossible situation? How do we escape the neoliberal condition of the indebted man? Lazzarato argues that we will have to recognize that there is no simple technical, economic, or financial solution. We must instead radically challenge the fundamental social relation structuring capitalism: the system of debt. (shrink)

In this paper I deal with ethical factors surrounding germline gene therapy. Such implications include intergenerational responsibility, human dignity, moral status of embryos and so on. I will explore the relevance of the above mentioned issues to discuss the ethical implication of human germline gene therapy (HGLT). We will see that most of arguments claimed by bioethicists do not provide valid reason to oppose HGLT. I will propose an alternative view, based on personal identity issues, to discuss the ethics of (...) human inheritable gene modification. (shrink)

Sex robots are already a reality: in this provocative text, Maurizio Balistreri explores the fascinating world of future sex, exploring the ethical questions raised by the existence of a sex robot industry.

The authors analyze deficiencies and perils of the European Convention on Human Rights and Biomedicine , in particular the concept of human rights as given by natural law and the Conventions stand on germline therapy and its refutation of therapeutic enhancement.

This book presents a critical examination of Machiavelli's thought, combining an accessible, historically-informed account of his work with a reassessment of his central ideas and arguments. Viroli challenges the accepted interpretations of Machiavelli's work, insisting that his republicanism was based not on a commitment to virtue, greatness, and expansion, but to the ideal of civic life protected by the shield of fair laws. His detailed study of how Machiavelli composed The Prince offers a number of new interpretations and he further (...) contends that the most challenging--and underestimated--aspect of Machiavelli's thought is his philosophy of life, in particular his conceptions of love, women, irony, God, and the human condition. (shrink)

In recent years, a proliferation of books about empathy, cooperation and pro-social behaviours (Brooks, 2011a) has significantly influenced the discourse of the life-sciences and reversed consolidated views of nature as a place only for competition and aggression. In this article I describe the recent contribution of three disciplines – moral psychology (Jonathan Haidt), primatology (Frans de Waal) and the neuroscience of morality – to the present transformation of biology and evolution into direct sources of moral phenomena, a process here named (...) the ‘moralization of biology’. I conclude by addressing the ambivalent status of this constellation of authors, for whom today ‘morality comes naturally’: I explore both the attractiveness of their message, and the problematic epistemological assumptions of their research programmes in the light of new discoveries in developmental and molecular biology. (shrink)

An analysis of how capitalism today produces subjectivity like any other “good,” and what would allow us to escape its hold. “Capital is a semiotic operator”: this assertion by Félix Guattari is at the heart of Maurizio Lazzarato's Signs and Machines, which asks us to leave behind the logocentrism that still informs so many critical theories. Lazzarato calls instead for a new theory capable of explaining how signs function in the economy, in power apparatuses, and in the production of (...) subjectivity. Moving beyond the dualism of signifier and signified, Signs and Machines shows how signs act as “sign-operators” that enter directly into material flows and into the functioning of machines. Money, the stock market, price differentials, algorithms, and scientific equations and formulas constitute semiotic “motors” that make capitalism's social and technical machines run, bypassing representation and consciousness to produce social subjections and semiotic enslavements. Lazzarato contrasts Deleuze and Guattari's complex semiotics with the political theories of Jacques Rancière, Antonio Negri and Michael Hardt, Paolo Virno, and Judith Butler, for whom language and the public space it opens still play a fundamental role. Lazzarato asks: What are the conditions necessary for political and existential rupture at a time when the production of subjectivity represents the primary and perhaps most important work of capitalism? What are the specific tools required to undo the industrial mass production of subjectivity undertaken by business and the state? What types of organization must we construct for a process of subjectivation that would allow us to escape the hold of social subjection and machinic enslavement? In addressing these questions, Signs and Machines takes on a task that is today more urgent than ever. (shrink)