PHILOSOPHICAL ANTHROPOLOGY I

The course is part of the study path through an in-depth reflection on the relationship between ethics, anthropology and politics and on the argumentative methods that characterize applied ethics.

For the a.y. 2021/2022 the module will be taught in English.

Upon completion of this course the students will be able to:

1)Identify, compare and critically analyze different ethical approaches;

2)Identify and describe moral conflicts;

3)Justify, by means of critical reason, possible solutions to moral conflicts.

There is no requirement for course attendance.

The aim of this course is to discuss two main forms of ethics and their anthropological implications. The first one considers ethical principles (or values) of so much importance that they must be followed even at the cost of the destruction of the world (fiat iustitia, pereat mundus), ignoring how bad can be the consequences of good intentions or actions. We can nominate this Utopian ethics. The other one, which it is possible to nominate Machiavellian or realistic ethics, includes into its account the probable results of our actions.
1. Morality as utopia: an ideal of perfect society.
1.1. Thomas More and the principles of utopian thought. Every utopia, from More to our days, supposes some main points: 1) the current society is completely unhappy and unfair; 2) there is a single root for both unhappiness and injustice, i.e., happiness and justice are almost synonyms; 3) by uprooting such cause society will achieve a fulfilled state of happiness and fairness.
1.2. Rousseau and the ambiguous utopia. Rousseau assumes the two aforementioned points : he considers our present society as completely unhappy and devoid of justice, and attributes this situation to a single cause (amour propre) – but he does not consider it possible to implement (actually to reinstate) happiness and justice. He offers a “utopian” analysis of the past (or a dystopian genealogy of the present), but does not believe in a utopian future.
1.3. Marxism as utopia: a beautiful theory, a failed practice. Marxism considers itself as a science instead of a utopia, but the “really existing socialism” has shown itself to be a dystopia.
1.4. On the other side, have some utopias really come true? For instance: gender equality, the abolition of slavery, and several social, labour and environmental rights, the European Union, the Green New Deal. Since the age of revolutions, many proposals previously dismissed as impossible dreams have become real, thus improving human condition. Did they amount – taking them as a whole – to a sort of Utopia?
2. Ethics according to results: the morality of the ruler. Humans are not gods, perfection is impossible and politics, at least since the Greeks, and most of all in modern times, will be seen as the art of the possible in order to make imperfect, selfish, bellicose beings, in short, faulty men and women, able to coexist in a certain peace. Will an ethics for our real world be an ethics with discount, an ethic at a reduced cost?
2.1. Merleau-Ponty, Note on Machiavelli (1949). The French philosopher says a philosophy that does not take into account the likely consequences of our actions cannot be truly ethical. Merleau-Ponty thus destroys the Kantian moral of intention.
2.2. Isaiah Berlin, Introduction to Machiavelli. The liberal thinker Isaiah Berlin reads in Machiavelli’s main works (the Discorsi and especially Il principe) the confrontation of a Christian ethic, which the Florentine philosopher despises, and of a heathen ethic, which prioritises the polis and would be necessary for the collective life in this world.
2.3. Max Weber, Scientist and politician: two vocations. The curious thing about Weber’s famous lectures of 1917-19 about the huge difference between the scientist and the politician is that, even if he dwells heavily on Machiavelli's legacy, he seems to be unaware of this.
2.4.Designated Survivor, the attempt at an absolutely moral policy (2016). We will end our course by taking into account the first chapters of this American TV series, in which a non-politician unexpectedly raised to the US presidency systematically refuses to act immorally – and strangely succeeds in doing so. But is his success due to chance (in Machiavelli’s words, fortuna) or does it mean a new, truly ethical paradigm (a new virtus) is possible?

T. More, Utopia, Penguin Books, 2009; J.-J. Rousseau, The Social Contract and Other Political Writings, Penguin Books, 2012; M. Weber, The Vocation Lectures, Hackett Books, 2004; M. Merleau-Ponty, Note on Machiavelli, in Id., Signes, Northwestern University Press, 1964; I. Berlin, The Originality of Machiavelli, in Id., Against the Current: Essays in the History of Ideas, Princeton University Press, 1980; F. Furet, The Passing of an Illusion: The Idea of Communism in the Twenthieth Century, University of Chicago Press 2000; R. Crossman (Editor), The God That Failed, Columbia University Press, 2001.

The final exam will take place orally.

Lectures, discussions with students.

Italian

oral

This subject deals with topics related to the macro-area "International cooperation" and contributes to the achievement of one or more goals of U. N. Agenda for Sustainable Development