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The broad themes of investigation taken by Norberto Bobbio in his writings on political philosophy are traced. Bobbio was interested in the possible relation between political philosophy & political science. Early on, he distinguished between four types of political philosophy: the description & theoretization of the ideal model of the state; research on the fundamentals of power; politics as an activity autonomous from ethics, econonics, law, & religion; & political philosophy as a critical discourse about the assumptions of objectivity & validity in political science. Bobbio's work Estado, gobierno, sociedad ([State, Government, Society] 1991) was the culmination of ten years of development of a general theory of politics, which differentiates political philosophy & political science. M. Pflum

The differences among political philosophy, political theory, & political science are distinguished to clarify the confusion between them even in academic circles. Philosophy treats principles, properties, & ultimate causes working with the logical-deductive method. Political philosophy is philosophy directed toward politics to study ideal forms of government, the bases & justifications for the state, the nature of politics, & the analysis of political discourse (Bobbio, 1971). Political theory is speculation or hypothesis building on political practice, or a proposal to solve a political problem. Scientific political theory is subject to testing. Political science attempts to explain facts & realities of society & the state & elaborate on theories through empirical testing; it formulates general laws in its own language & methods. M. Pflum

This article seeks to question the Manichean understanding of the theoretical approach to politics, on the one hand, a kind of political philosophy equated with a specific type of moral philosophy oriented to ground the politics, & on the other one, the political theory as a second-order theorizing of political science or a mixed (empiric-normative) form of inquiry in politics. Arguing against that contrasting & entrenched dualism, the following pages advance a reinterpretation of the nature of political philosophy in the contemporary context through an examination of its distinctive tasks, promoting unexplored missions & bringing to bear an interdisciplinary & action-oriented perspective for the normative theory building about politics. The general hypothesis developed in this paper is that political philosophy & normative political theory are interchangeable, thinking & evaluating the political life not in terms of abstract & ahistorical moral language but getting an insight more sensitive to the real world of politics. In order to do so, the political philosophy concerns to capture properly a political domain & its varied dimensions, evaluates political institutions & tries to identify the possibilities of changes. In any case, although normative political theory cannot make dictate what the citizens have to do, it can help them to choose & to form a reasonable, attentive & therefore prudential political judgment. References. Adapted from the source document.

Discusses the prevalence of Hegelian elements in postmodern Mexican culture, arguing that the philosopher's concepts are underestimated & underacknowledged in contemporary postmodern sociopolitical literature despite his universal prominence. Georg Hegel's influence on Marxism is shown as a current running through much of today's liberal ideology on social class, pluralism, industrial society, & social justice. General examples of mimesis between Hegelian thought & postmodernism are offered from recent Mexican political science & from ideas on civil society expressed by Octavio Paz & Carlos Fuentes. It is contended that much of what is mistakenly considered as original postmodern thought is actually a reconstruction of Hegelian philosophy. 11 References. Adapted from the source document.

Based on the point of view of the philosophical anthropology by Martin Heidegger & the illustrated philosophy by Immanuel Kant, the author of this paper analyzes here the position of the French philosopher Etienne Balibar about the category of citizenship, considered as a basis to draw the general principles of a renewed philosophical anthropology. Starting from a kantian conception of citizenship, Balibar outlines the proposal of a philosophical anthropology structured around three pairs of poles: the pair man-subject, the pair subjetus-subjectum, & the pair cosmos-polis. The author shows the way the category "citizenship" organizes each of the previous pairs of terms & concludes with some considerations about the advantages of the balibarian proposal. Adapted from the source document.

The decade of the 1970s marked not only the emergence of neoliberalism, but also the birth of a new disciplinary field: the environment. The intervening decades have seen an explosion of social movements with an environmental orientation, & much academic research has been done in this area. This study discusses several viewpoints on the relationship between the environment & development. The intention is not to present a specific perspective, but to present a general panorama of what has been written on this relationship. To this end, the essay goes beyond economic theory to engage with some of the debates in sociology, political science, & philosophy. Because it is not possible to cover so broad a subject in any great depth, a bibliography is appended to aid the reader. Adapted from the source document.

Regulation is at the core of the policy design system in the European Community/European Union (EC/EU), & is much more important -- compared to other government functions -- there than at the national level. This is why any significant change in the philosophy & methods of EC regulation has great repercussions in the policy design system. Modifications of the institutional framework & of general political conditions in the EU produce immediate effects on the effectiveness of the EC's regulatory policies. Based on the discussion of three specific processes, the article illustrates this mutual dependency: the harmonization of national rules & regulations since the mid 1970s; the growing gap between increasingly complex regulatory tasks & an old fashioned administrative infrastructure; & the political & institutional consequences of the continuous parliamentarization of the European Commission. Adapted from the source document.

Gustavo Fondevila, a scholar of philosophy & law & presently Director General of the Ronda Cuidadana Foundation, interviews Ernesto Garzon Valdes, Political Science Professor at the University of Magnucia, Germany, & published author. Garzon rejects the tie between juridical positivism & authoritarian regimes, citing cases like Norberto Bobbio in Italy. Some of his articles have embraced a separation between the law & the moral, while others have not; he clarifies that his concern was to analyze whether there was a form with which to provide a rational basis for moral evaluations. He discusses the role of judicial power in Latin American democracies where the democratizing function of juridical power can lead to a fault in confidence in the judiciary, the juridifcation of politics, & the politicization of justice. The problem of juridical corruption & the rule of law, & the limits of tolerance when tolerance breeds immorality are also discussed. M. Pflum