Bøger af Vincenzo Ferrone

Written by one of Italys leading historians, this book analyses the context and legacy of Gaetano Filangieris seven-volume Science of Legislation. The study engages with the unique history of Enlightenment Naples, the intellectual traditions upon which Filangieri drew, and the powerful repercussions of the American Revolution in eighteenth-century Italy to re-draw the map of Enlightenment republicanism and the early history of human rights and their political economy.Particularly, the book elucidates Montesquieus polyvalent influence on the development of Enlightenment political philosophy, the intricate relationship between natural law and natural rights (later human rights), the emergence of an idiom and a theory of constitutionalism as the only safeguard against absolutist abuses and democratic excesses (whether due to communitarian zeal or the influence of charismatic leaders), and the importance of Freemasonry as a school of political theory and a locus of political action and re-action at the time. This brings the book to a lengthy discussion of the tensions between liberalism and poverty as well as patriotism and cosmopolitanism in the Italian republican tradition themes all too relevant in todays historiographical landscape and Filangieris eventual contribution to these debates and to the institutionalization of the rights of man as a political category and an influence on political economy in Enlightenment Europe.The second part of the book deals with Filangieris legacy, engaging both with his immediate acolytes, such as Francesco Mario Pagano, drafter of the Neapolitan constitution of 1799, and his detractors, such as the conservative Vincenzo Cuoco. The book ends with groundbreaking chapters on Filangieris reception in France and in Europe at large, focusing on Benjamin Constants little-understood critique of Filangieri and the tensions between the constitutional republicanism of the late Italian Enlightenment on the one hand and the nascent tradition of liberalism on the other. In doing so, this book not only explains the common roots of these two traditions, but also why they diverged and what consequences this had for Italian and European history.

A compelling reevaluation of the Enlightenment from one of its leading historiansIn this concise and powerful book, one of the world's leading historians of the Enlightenment provides a bracing and clarifying new interpretation of this watershed period. Arguing that philosophical and historical interpretations of the era have long been hopelessly confused, Vincenzo Ferrone makes the case that it is only by separating these views and taking an approach grounded in social and cultural history that we can begin to grasp what the Enlightenment was-and why it is still relevant today. Ferrone explains why the Enlightenment was a profound and wide-ranging cultural revolution that reshaped Western identity, reformed politics through the invention of human rights, and redefined knowledge by creating a critical culture. These new ways of thinking gave birth to new values that spread throughout society and changed how everyday life was lived and understood. Featuring an illuminating afterword describing how his argument challenges the work of Anglophone interpreters including Jonathan Israel, The Enlightenment provides a fascinating reevaluation of the true nature and legacy of one of the most important and contested periods in Western history.The translation of this work has been funded by SEPS-Segretariato Europeo per le Pubblicazioni Scientifiche.