Suchergebnisse

This work asks questions on the relationship between innovative collective actors, such as the 'new social movements' and the political institutions of representative democracy starting from an underlying hypothesis: the idea that civil society is the main source of political legitimation of liberal democracy. More precisely, what this monograph reflects on is the capacity of the social movements to concretely test alternative forms of democracy. The aim of the contemporary movements is to augment the fundamental values of the "democratic revolution", namely the principles of freedom and equality. They constantly lead to conflict and social antagonism: indeed new conflicts and new antagonisms arise every time that the movements implement radical experiences of democracy in the multiple and different spheres of social life. Only by accepting and setting value by these alternative democratic practices and experiences – and this is the author of this work's thesis – may democratic ideals be revived in contemporary society.

The book presents the proceedings of the conference held in the Aula Magna of the University of Florence on 28 and 29 October 2004. The objective of the conference was to study, through a multidisciplinary approach, the question of government and representation at local, national and European level. Among the central issues addressed during the meeting were models of representation, the links between representation and civil society and the functions of the representative organs. - Il volume raccoglie gli Atti del convegno che si è tenuto presso l'Aula Magna dell'Università degli Studi di Firenze nei giorni 28 e 29 ottobre 2004. Il convegno ha inteso studiare con approccio multidisciplinare la questione del governo e della rappresentanza in un quadro locale, nazionale ed europeo. Temi centrali di riflessione dell'incontro sono stati i modelli di rappresentanza, le connessioni fra rappresentanza e società civile e le funzionalità degli organi rappresentativi.

The unceasing change that science and technology have imposed on civil society brings into question fundamental issues such as birth, health, death, together with the 'legal instruments' designed for the self-determination. Not only the individual is affected by this tumultuous process but also the family institution, as the main place where the self exercises its personality. In this third volume of Verso un diritto europeo per la bioetica ("Towards a European bioethics law") the focus of the contributions by various authors (jurists, doctors, bioethicists) is centred on topics such as: responsible parenthood and artificial insemination, anticipatory profiles taken on by health and related protection needs, articulation of family models and redefinition of the parenting project. All of this is declined in the logic of Biolaw, which is an autonomous discipline but also an investigation and a working method for those who intend to approach the so-called biotechnological cases.

This book contains the proceedings of the conference held on 11 and 12 October 2004 in the Aula Magna of the University of Florence, in collaboration with the Fondazione Spadolini. The aim of the conference was to delineate the profiles of a series of emblematic figures, representative of the presence and activities of illustrious teachers from the University of Florence in local and national institutions and in civil society. The proceedings are conceived to act as permanent evidence of the close links between the University and the Institutions and of the major impact of the work of so many lecturers from the University of Florence in the recent history of Italian institutions. - Il volume raccoglie gli atti del convegno tenutosi nei giorni 11 e 12 ottobre 2004 presso l'Aula Magna dell'Università degli Studi di Firenze in collaborazione con la Fondazione Spadolini. Il convegno ha inteso delineare il profilo di una serie di figure emblematiche e rappresentative della presenza e dell'attività di illustri docenti dell'Università degli Studi di Firenze nelle istituzioni locali e nazionali e nella società civile. Questi Atti vogliono essere la testimonianza permanente degli stretti legami fra l'Università e le Istituzioni e dell'alto impatto assunto dall'opera di tanti docenti dell'Ateneo fiorentino nella storia recente delle istituzioni del paese.

After reviewing the development of "citizenship" under a historical and conceptual profile, as well as the many faces of this concept under a philosophical and analytical profile, the author discusses his belief that a generalized and extended idea of "citizenship" could be the core of a new philosophical and political paradigm, even more so, and better, than the inevitably abstract idea of "justice": exactly what contemporary societies need. Especially because, although we have become citizens in the public sphere of the state, we have remained subjects in the face of both public and private powers governing our lives in civil society, on all levels: local, national, European, global. To this end, the author advises reconsidering the subjective qualification we used to call "citizenship" as a bundle of functions: not only the elector-citizen in the stricto sensu political sphere, but also the producer-citizen, the reproducing and educating citizen, the consumer-citizen, the saver-citizen, the taxpayer-citizen, the user-citizen, the resident-citizen, and so on. Notwithstanding political democracy, for each of these functions it is possible, as well as necessary, to find new forms of representative democracy returning to the citizens the powers and the "voice" which they currently seem to be stripped of.

What is left of socialism ? This question, too, must be answered in a "project left." Certainly, socialism is no longer an accomplished or well-known model of society to tend tothrough daily political action. It can only be conceived as an uninterrupted search for the liberation of the person and his capacity for self-realization. It should be possible introducing elements of socialism into concrete society such as: equal opportunities, community welfare, control over the organization of work, the diffusion of knowledge as an instrument of freedom. This would overcome, from time to time, the contradictions and failures of capitalism and the market economy, making the person, and not only the classes, the keystone of civil coexistence. (From the cover of the first edition).

The researches accounted in the volume, being reported by historians who had different vocations, illustrate various aspects of medieval and modern history (laws, economy, society, church and civil institutions, architecture, art, urban planning); they are focused on single town realities and limited geographical-political areas. Among these, particular attention ought to be given to the city of Siena and its territory, which constitute one of the centres of interest for the illustrious scholar to whom is dedicated the series of four volumes, which the present also belongs to.

The Roman Republic of 1849 is one of the most exciting moment of the heroic season of the Italian Risorgimento, a short adventure in which the contemporaries recognized the opportunity to realize ideals of freedom, tolerance and democracy. This research aims to analyses the role played by religion in the political and social experiment that started in Rome after the pope's escape, when it was necessary to redefine relations between civil and religious authorities, as well as the role of religion itself in society: a task not at all easy if applied to a State reality, where political and religious powers had been superimposed for centuries, but that will set an inescapable precedent for the subsequent attempts to build a secular State.