The course aims to provide students with the critical-hermeneutical tools to understand and interpret:

a) the main modern philosophical-political theories;

b) the main modern political categories, particularly victimization, stereotyping and racial discrimination in contemporary society.

These tools of analysis and philosophical-political study aim to facilitate the understanding and treatment of complex and recurring social phenomena of labelling, marginalization or discrimination in the professional sphere.

The course is divided into two parts.

The first part (36 hours first semester offers an overview of the leading Western philosophical-political theories from classical antiquity to today.

The second part (36 hours, second semester) addresses the theme of political evil, explicitly referring to the life-power relationship, the construction of the political order and the principal modern political-philosophical categories (sovereignty, property, freedom). The considerations developed are contextualized by the development of theories of race from the second half of the 18th century to Nazism. Critical reflection focuses on the processes of victimization and "construction" of deviant or abnormal otherness and the problem of obedience and mass consensus.

Program

First part (36 hours - First semester)

The construction of the political order: nature, power, rights.

-Lesson 1. Introduction: the "territories" and questions of political philosophy.

-Lesson 2. Plato's Republic.

-Lesson 3. Aristotle and the forms of democracy.

-Lesson 4. Aristotle and the theme of slavery.

-Lesson 5. Machiavelli: principalities and republics over time.

-Lesson 6. Hobbes and the politics of the moderns.

-Lesson 7. Locke's Liberalism.

-Lesson 8. The Liberalism of Tocqueville and Stuart Mill.

-Lesson 9. Rousseau's Social Contract.

-Lesson 10. The concept of law in Kant.

-Lesson 11. Kant and cosmopolitan philosophy.

-Lesson 12. Hegel: civil society and the State.

-Lesson 13. Theories of peace and theories of war: Kant and Hegel.

-Lesson 14. Marx and the criticism of liberalism.

-Lesson 15. Hannah Arendt: citizenship and public sphere.

-Lesson 16. Norberto Bobbio: The French Revolution and human rights.

-Lesson 17. Norberto Bobbio. The foundation of rights.

-Lesson 18. Concluding reflections. Fundamental rights and democracy.

Second part (36 hours)

Life-power relationship between community and political immunity

-Lesson 19. Introduction. The construction of political order.

-Lesson 20. René Girard's victim paradigm.

-Lesson 21. The concepts of mass and power in Elias Canetti.

-Lesson 22. Will to power and will to life in Friedrich Nietzsche.

-Lesson 23. Theories of "compensatio": Helmut Plessner and Arnold Gehlen.

-Lesson 24. The community and political immunity: the immune paradigm of Roberto Esposito.

-Lesson 25. The immune political categories of modernity: sovereignty, property and liberty.

-Lesson 26. Sovereignty and bere life: Carl Schmitt and Giorgio Agamben.

-Lesson 27. The exception and the ban relation.

-Lesson 28: Michel Foucault: archaeology, genealogy and analytics of power.

-Lesson 29. Michel Foucault: The insane, the delinquent and the abnormal.

-Lesson 30. Michel Foucault: the discipline of the body.

-Lesson 31. Michel Foucault: the biopolitics of the population and the government of the living.

-Lesson 32. The origins of totalitarianism: Hannah Arendt

-Lesson 33. Nazi Tantopolitics: eugenic policies and State racism.

-Lesson 34. Nazi Thanatopolitics. Antisemitism and mass consensus.

-Lesson 35. The banality and the modernity of evil: the problem of responsibility and obedience in the face of authority.

-Lesson 36. Concluding reflections. The camp as a biopolitical paradigm of the modern.

None

To pass the exam, students must:

a) Demonstrate having understood the main contents of the course, by means of a study that is not merely mnemonic. Demonstrate having acquired a critical view, through the ability to re-elaborate the main political-social categories and analyzing with a diachronic perspective the historical transformations object of the program (knowledge and understanding).

b) Demonstrate discussing theoretical problems and knowing how to expose them with properties of language and argumentation. Being able to make interdisciplinary connections. Being able to extrapolate theoretical contents and practical examples presented a "situated" knowledge that can be related to professional experience (applying knowledge and understanding).

c) Demonstrate having the ability to autonomously integrate one's knowledge, and develop curiosity and a critical spirit, through active participation in debates with other students. Actively participating in the moments of reflection proposed by the teacher starting from stimuli presented in the classroom and be able to argue an anthological passage or other supporting teaching material (making judgments).

d) Knowing how to expose theoretical concepts effectively and clearly. Acquiring the technical language of the discipline (communication skills).

e) Be able to develop learning meta-skills and the ability to independently and critically evaluate one's own study method. Learning from the relationship with the teacher and other students (learning skills).

The teaching material prepared by the lecturer in addition to recommended textbooks (such as for instance slides, lecture notes, exercises, bibliography) and communications from the lecturer specific to the course can be found inside the Moodle platform › blended.uniurb.it

In-depth materials (e.g. anthological texts) will be made available on the blended platform

Teaching

-Frontal lessons.

-In-depth study with the reading of the anthological texts.

-Dialogue lessons and guided debates (Debate)

Innovative teaching methods

The lessons may be integrated with group laboratory activities (debates, reality tasks), also proposed through the Moodle platform, followed by collective discussion in the classroom.

Attendance

Attendance is not compulsory

Course books

First part:

-Henry B., Loretoni A., Pirni A., Solinas M. (a cura di), Filosofia Politica, Mondadori, Milano, 2020, charter 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 18 (226 pages).

-Bobbio N., L’età dei diritti, Einaudi, Torino, 2014, part I, part II and conclusion (“I diritti dell’uomo”, oggi) (170 pages).

Second part:

-Castorina R., In relazione. Potere, vita, male politico, Mimesis, Milano, 2022.

-Esposito R., Immunitas. Protezione e negazione della vita, Einaudi, Torino, 2020.

Assessment

The assessment will take place through an individual oral interview at the end of the lessons (summer session 2025). The evaluation will focus on the knowledge of the contents of the textbooks of the first and second part of the course and any other teaching materials provided by the teacher.

Students will optionally have the opportunity to take a partial exam (written test) at the end of the first part of the course (December 2024).

In this case, the exam will take place in two phases:

1. the assessment of the first part will take place at the end of the first semester through a written test with three open questions (max. 30 lines) and will take place in December 2024 (from 16/12-24 to 21/12/2024). The time to answer the proposed questions is 1 hour and 30 minutes. The test date will be communicated in November to all students attending and not attending in the classroom and with specific communication via the blended learning platform. Once the intermediate test has been passed, the student will have one academic year available to complete the exam, taking the oral test of the second part (until the winter session of 2026).

2. the assessment of the second part will take place through an individual oral interview at the end of the second semester of lessons (starting from the summer session).

The final mark will be given based on the average of the marks obtained by the student in the two partial exams (intermediate write exam and oral one).

Disability and Specific Learning Disorders (SLD)

Students who have registered their disability certification or SLD certification with the Inclusion and Right to Study Office can request to use conceptual maps (for keywords) during exams.

To this end, it is necessary to send the maps, two weeks before the exam date, to the course instructor, who will verify their compliance with the university guidelines and may request modifications.

Teaching

-Frontal lessons.

-In-depth study with the reading of the anthological texts.

-Dialogue lessons and guided debates (Debate)

Attendance

Attendance is not compulsory

Course books

First part:

-Henry B., Loretoni A., Pirni A., Solinas M. (a cura di), Filosofia Politica, Mondadori, Milano, 2020, charter 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 18 (226 pages).

-Bobbio N., L’età dei diritti, Einaudi, Torino, 2014, part I, part II and conclusion (“I diritti dell’uomo”, oggi) (170 pages).

Second part:

-Castorina R., In relazione. Potere, vita, male politico, Mimesis, Milano, 2022.

-Esposito R., Immunitas. Protezione e negazione della vita, Einaudi, Torino, 2020.

Assessment

The assessment will take place through an individual oral interview at the end of the lessons (summer session 2025). The evaluation will focus on the knowledge of the contents of the textbooks of the first and second part of the course and any other teaching materials provided by the teacher.

Students will optionally have the opportunity to take a partial exam (written test) at the end of the first part of the course (December 2024).

In this case, the exam will take place in two phases:

1. the assessment of the first part will take place at the end of the first semester through a written test with three open questions (max. 30 lines) and will take place in December 2024 (from 16/12-24 to 21/12/2024). The time to answer the proposed questions is 1 hour and 30 minutes. The test date will be communicated in November to all students attending and not attending in the classroom and with specific communication via the blended learning platform. Once the intermediate test has been passed, the student will have one academic year available to complete the exam, taking the oral test of the second part (until the winter session of 2026).

2. the assessment of the second part will take place through an individual oral interview at the end of the second semester of lessons (starting from the summer session).

The final mark will be given based on the average of the marks obtained by the student in the two partial exams (intermediate write exam and oral one).

Disability and Specific Learning Disorders (SLD)

Students who have registered their disability certification or SLD certification with the Inclusion and Right to Study Office can request to use conceptual maps (for keywords) during exams.

To this end, it is necessary to send the maps, two weeks before the exam date, to the course instructor, who will verify their compliance with the university guidelines and may request modifications.