Books by Guido Parietti
Oxford University Press, 2022
"Power" is the central organizing concept for politics. However, despite decades of debate across... more "Power" is the central organizing concept for politics. However, despite decades of debate across political science, sociology, and philosophy, scholars have not yet settled on a proper definition of power. Existing definitions fail because they are either circular or so far removed from the ordinary, quotidien meaning of power that they cannot credibly claim to be about the same concept. Political science has looked at how power works, but according to Guido Parietti, fails to define what power means.
In On the Concept of Power, Parietti proposes a more proper definition of power--as the condition of having available possibilities and representing them as such--and examines its implications for the study of politics, both empirical and normative. By neglecting the category of possibility, significant portions of political science and philosophy become incapable of conceptualizing power, and therefore politics. Specifically, Parietti asserts that the main failure of political science is in obscuring power's correspondence to the category of possibility in favor of causality and probability; political philosophy, on the other hand, tends to prioritize various forms of a teleologically oriented normativity. All these approaches end up discarding possibility in favor of oriented potentialities, ultimately anchored to various forms of necessity, and are therefore incapable of properly conceptualizing power in accordance with its meaning in ordinary language. Bringing together different disciplinary discourses, On the Concept of Power concludes by examining the conditions for power to have an actual referent; in other words, for politics to appear in our world. In this original and ambitious critique of the prevailing approaches to political theory and political science, Parietti examines what it means to have power and what may endanger our access to and exercise of it.
La filosofia politica di Hobbes è tradizionalmente letta come una giustificazione prudenziale del... more La filosofia politica di Hobbes è tradizionalmente letta come una giustificazione prudenziale dell’obbligo politico: l’obbedienza a un sovrano assoluto sarebbe giustificata, dal punto di vista individuale di ciascun suddito, dal desiderio di evitare i gravi pericoli dello stato di natura anarchico. Per quanto diffusa, questa interpretazione è fondamentalmente errata, incompatibile com’è con le posizioni filosofiche effettivamente espresse dall’autore del Leviatano. Se, infatti, non v’è dubbio che il punto di arrivo sia la sovranità, la via percorsa da Hobbes non è però prudenziale, bensì sistematicamente normativa e razionalista. È proprio a partire dall’analisi del concetto di razionalità e delle sue implicazioni epistemologiche, metafisiche e politiche che si può meglio comprendere la più profonda rilevanza, anche contemporanea, della lezione hobbesiana: da considerazioni finalistiche è impossibile derivare un’obbligazione politica normativamente valida.
La crisi delle forme tradizionali della rappresentanza democratica ha suscitato una vasta discuss... more La crisi delle forme tradizionali della rappresentanza democratica ha suscitato una vasta discussione su come attivare e mettere in circolo nuove forme di partecipazione politica dei cittadini. Le teorie della "democrazia deliberativa", di cui il volume traccia una mappa completa ed esauriente, rimettono al centro della riflessione sulla politica il tema della formazione dell'opinione pubblica e della qualità del confronto tra i cittadini. La notevole diffusione che l'approccio deliberativo ha conosciuto negli ultimi vent'anni corrisponde alla necessità di elaborare una teoria democratica capace di tenere realisticamente assieme la più ampia partecipazione politica e la qualità, anche cognitiva, delle decisioni prodotte. Il volume presenta criticamente i risultati di questa ricchissima discussione, nella quale si sono confrontati gli esponenti di punta del liberalismo, della teoria critica e della scienza politica empirica.
Papers and Articles by Guido Parietti
NPSA 55th Annual Conference, 2023
Judgment – the difficulties of judging and its role as a condition of possibility for politics – ... more Judgment – the difficulties of judging and its role as a condition of possibility for politics – is recognized as a central theme in Arendt, with Kant being the main point of reference and comparison. Arendt’s engagement with the Kantian notion of judgment focused on the first part of the third Critique, with a rather dismissive evaluation of the second one, concerning teleological judgment. As a result, interpretations of, and reactions to, Arendt’s treatment of judgment have been concerned primarily with aesthetics (and secondarily morality) rather than teleology. This, however, results in a limited view of judgment and its relevance for politics, if anything because the two Kantian judgments are significantly more intertwined than Arendt allows. One can only wonder whether, had she not died too soon, Arendt’s engagement with judgment might not have evolved to be more encompassing. This paper moves in that direction, considering teleological judgment in order to shed new light on Arendt’s own theory. This allows a deeper comprehension of the tension between philosophy, history, and politics, which was at the forefront of Arendt’s thought and is no less problematic for us today.
Politica & Società, 2019
Deliberative democracy is usually understood through the lens of a developmental, progressive nar... more Deliberative democracy is usually understood through the lens of a developmental, progressive narrative. We shall show how this narrative is historically fallacious and effectively obscures the theoretical fault lines within deliberative theory. Setting the narrative straight is thus the first condition to recover the real stakes of the deliberative debate, which has long removed, but never solved, the conflict between procedural and substantive interpretations. This opposition was itself mis-framed by questionable narratives, hiding the deeper contrast between teleological and deontological understandings of deliberative democracy. The latter represents the only path to formulate a theory that would not be internally contradictory.
European Journal of Philosophy, 2017
Starting from considering how radical Hobbes' rejection of teleology was, this paper presents a c... more Starting from considering how radical Hobbes' rejection of teleology was, this paper presents a coherent reading of Hobbesian reason, as applied to the justification of political obligation, striking a more perspicuous third way between the 'orthodox' (based on self-interest and conse-quentialism) and the 'revisionist' (moralizing, or variously substantive) readings. Both families of interpretations are partial to some elements of Hobbes' thought, therefore incapable of providing a coherent reading of its whole. A precise rendering of Hobbes' deontological reason allows a better hermeneutical understanding of his philosophy as well as a keener appreciation of its relevance for past and present political thought.
La Cultura, 2017
Starting from observing the prevailing confusion about the meaning of "political theology", this ... more Starting from observing the prevailing confusion about the meaning of "political theology", this paper individuates three main meanings for the concept, then showing how each of them is "impossible" in the specific sense of contradicting the validity claims it would itself raise. The main argument proceeds by reprising Augustine's philosophical critique of the first meaning of political theology, then showing how and in what sense the other two are also subject to it. The conclusion is that "political theology" may be useful as a sociological/descriptive concept, but it is not an appropriate object of philosophy, not even as a polemical foil, except than to demonstrate its impossibility.
""Power” is the modal concept of politics; nevertheless, as a concept, it is significantly under-... more ""Power” is the modal concept of politics; nevertheless, as a concept, it is significantly under-theorized. This may seem an unlikely proposition, given the frequency of discussions of power; however, for decades the debate revolved mainly around empirical and operational questions, while a proper conceptual definition has rarely, if ever, been thematized. The question of what power is has been implicitly reduced to the question of how power works. But the two are not the same, and in fact any hope of solving the latter presupposes a proper answer to the former.
I will show how most discussions of power – across political science and philosophy, from Weber to Lukes, including Dahl and Searle amongst others – are not conceptual, even when explicitly presented as such, but rather empirical and operational. In fact, these discussions revolve mainly around factual implications and preconditions of power, while the presupposed concept does not vary much (with few exceptions, which are anyway untenable on their own merits). Commonly employed definitions can be reduced to a single form, which is tautological: “one has power if one can (=has the power to) do such and such”. This circularity is due precisely to the shared presupposition that power is just like a phenomenon or an object, to be empirically observed. To better understand the concept of power we should, instead, examine its categorial form – “power” represents not a thing, but a condition under which certain things may be done and thought – corresponding to possibility, as opposed to necessity.
The best way to see this is to turn to Arendt, whose often misunderstood idea of power is the key to a proper comprehension of this basic category of politics. While the link between power and communication has been a staple of Arendtean studies, it has often been reduced to normative or aspirational understandings, which tend to obscure its deeper significance. It is rather the formal aspect of the concept of power which allows us to get right its categorical role in defining politics, including the crucial role of persuasion within it. Some implications of this way of looking at the concept – chiefly the stark distinctions necessity/freedom and society/politics for which Arendt is still notorious – seems to be very unpalatable for current social science and political theory. However, absent an adequate non-circular definition of power, this way deserves at least to be tried."
The relation between power and its limits is a longstanding problem which became all the more int... more The relation between power and its limits is a longstanding problem which became all the more intractable in the age of popular sovereignty and of the rule of law. Traditional ar- gumentative strategies to circumvent the question have been hindered by their own conceptu- al frameworks, usually letting fall their commitment either to democracy or to law. My con- tention is that Arendt’s conception of politics is the appropriate starting point for confronting the issue. Considered together, her assessments of power, law and authority allow us to con- ceive of a properly participative and yet legalistic democratic republic, in a way that no other political thought could support. A nice side-effect is to shed light on a more coherent render- ing of Arendt’s overall political theory.
Il Mulino, 2017
Ente di afferenza: Università la Sapienza di Roma (Uniroma1) Copyright c by Società editrice il M... more Ente di afferenza: Università la Sapienza di Roma (Uniroma1) Copyright c by Società editrice il Mulino, Bologna. Tutti i diritti sono riservati. Per altre informazioni si veda https://www.rivisteweb.it Licenza d'uso L'articoloè messo a disposizione dell'utente in licenza per uso esclusivamente privato e personale, senza scopo di lucro e senza fini direttamente o indirettamente commerciali. Salvo quanto espressamente previsto dalla licenza d'uso Rivisteweb,è fatto divieto di riprodurre, trasmettere, distribuire o altrimenti utilizzare l'articolo, per qualsiasi scopo o fine. Tutti i diritti sono riservati.
“Power” is the modal concept of politics; nevertheless, despite the mole of discussions about it,... more “Power” is the modal concept of politics; nevertheless, despite the mole of discussions about it, it is significantly under-theorized. For decades, the debate – across political science and philosophy, from Weber to Lukes, including Dahl and Searle amongst others – revolved mainly around em- pirical and operational questions, while a conceptual definition has scarcely been thematized. The question of what power is has been reduced to the question of how power works; but the two are not the same, and addressing the latter presupposes a proper answer to the former.
The definitions have been provided can mostly be reduced to a single tautological form: “one has power if one can (=has the power to) do such and such”. The circularity is due to the shared presupposition that power is like an object, to be empirically observed. To better understand the concept of power we should, instead, examine its categorial form – “power” represents not a thing, but a condition under which certain things may be done and thought – corresponding to possibility, as opposed to necessity. The best way to see this is to turn to Arendt, whose idea of power is the key to a proper comprehension of this basic category of politics. While the link be- tween power and communication has been a staple of Arendtean studies, it has often been reduced to aspirational understandings, which tend to obscure its deeper significance. It is rather the formal aspect of the concept of power which allows us to get right its categorical role in defining politics.
Society 50 (4), pp 391-394, Jul 2013
Peter Baehr highly praises Berger’s contribution to sociology, and yet sharply criticises his cla... more Peter Baehr highly praises Berger’s contribution to sociology, and yet sharply criticises his claim that unmasking or debunking is the signature method of sociology. Baehr hold such method of enquiry to be dangerously corrosive and in tension with the humanist intentions of Berger. I largely agree with this critique, but I have doubts that a viable alternative could be developed within the framework of the social sciences. Thus, I would suggest that Berger was right in linking unmasking/debunking with the humanist enterprise, despite the negative implications highlighted by Baehr.
European Journal of Political Theory, Jan 2012
There is a wide consensus that politics should not be considered as an end in itself, being inste... more There is a wide consensus that politics should not be considered as an end in itself, being instead instrumentally valuable, provided it is capable of producing good outcomes, however defined. Even when some intrinsic value is accorded to politics, it is thought to be dependent on some broader instrumental character. I shall argue for the reverse: that politics ought to be considered autotelic, and that the very possibility of any good outcomes depends on that. I will begin with a brief summary of how deep and widespread this rejection of the autotelic character of politics is. Then, mainly drawing on Arendt, I shall argue for a restatement of the question, which will clarify why and how a meaningful and coherent concept of politics should be autotelic. Eventually, I will sketch some of the implications for normative political theory.
La Cultura 47, no. 3 (2009): 495-516. , 2009
Some crucial aspects of Hannah Arendt’s political thought are situated within the chasm between n... more Some crucial aspects of Hannah Arendt’s political thought are situated within the chasm between nomos and lex. Recalling the distinct definition of the two concepts, two vistas unfold: the relation between law and action, thus power and politics; and the meaning of the concept of world. Arendt’s idea of law is not specialistic nor exceedingly systematic, making it a difficult object to insert in a philosophical-political discourse concerning law; a discourse, anyway, usually quite distant from most Arendtian studies. Nonetheless, the original reprise of some themes – taken from classical modernity and antiquity, but neglected in the main lines of political-juridical thought – remains relevant to understand meaningfully the nexus between law and politics. The divergence between Greek and Roman law corresponds also to the presence, in Arendt’s thought, of two concepts of ‘world’: one built through work, like the material stage of a theatre; the other originated by action itself, like the play enacted in it. But both of them for politics.
Book Chapters by Guido Parietti
in The Nature of Social Reality, 95-104, 2013
Book Reviews by Guido Parietti
tiene assieme un'accurata esegesi teoretica dell' opera Arendtiana e un'attenzione vera alle pras... more tiene assieme un'accurata esegesi teoretica dell' opera Arendtiana e un'attenzione vera alle prassi emergenti nel contesto, oggi più che mai drammatico, degli apparenti limiti delle protezioni giuridiche che i diritti umani, universalmente acclamati e ormai ufficialmente applicabili anche da organi giudiziari transnazionali, dovrebbero garantire teoricamente senza eccezioni. In
SYZETESIS - Rivista, 2009
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Books by Guido Parietti
In On the Concept of Power, Parietti proposes a more proper definition of power--as the condition of having available possibilities and representing them as such--and examines its implications for the study of politics, both empirical and normative. By neglecting the category of possibility, significant portions of political science and philosophy become incapable of conceptualizing power, and therefore politics. Specifically, Parietti asserts that the main failure of political science is in obscuring power's correspondence to the category of possibility in favor of causality and probability; political philosophy, on the other hand, tends to prioritize various forms of a teleologically oriented normativity. All these approaches end up discarding possibility in favor of oriented potentialities, ultimately anchored to various forms of necessity, and are therefore incapable of properly conceptualizing power in accordance with its meaning in ordinary language. Bringing together different disciplinary discourses, On the Concept of Power concludes by examining the conditions for power to have an actual referent; in other words, for politics to appear in our world. In this original and ambitious critique of the prevailing approaches to political theory and political science, Parietti examines what it means to have power and what may endanger our access to and exercise of it.
Papers and Articles by Guido Parietti
I will show how most discussions of power – across political science and philosophy, from Weber to Lukes, including Dahl and Searle amongst others – are not conceptual, even when explicitly presented as such, but rather empirical and operational. In fact, these discussions revolve mainly around factual implications and preconditions of power, while the presupposed concept does not vary much (with few exceptions, which are anyway untenable on their own merits). Commonly employed definitions can be reduced to a single form, which is tautological: “one has power if one can (=has the power to) do such and such”. This circularity is due precisely to the shared presupposition that power is just like a phenomenon or an object, to be empirically observed. To better understand the concept of power we should, instead, examine its categorial form – “power” represents not a thing, but a condition under which certain things may be done and thought – corresponding to possibility, as opposed to necessity.
The best way to see this is to turn to Arendt, whose often misunderstood idea of power is the key to a proper comprehension of this basic category of politics. While the link between power and communication has been a staple of Arendtean studies, it has often been reduced to normative or aspirational understandings, which tend to obscure its deeper significance. It is rather the formal aspect of the concept of power which allows us to get right its categorical role in defining politics, including the crucial role of persuasion within it. Some implications of this way of looking at the concept – chiefly the stark distinctions necessity/freedom and society/politics for which Arendt is still notorious – seems to be very unpalatable for current social science and political theory. However, absent an adequate non-circular definition of power, this way deserves at least to be tried."
The definitions have been provided can mostly be reduced to a single tautological form: “one has power if one can (=has the power to) do such and such”. The circularity is due to the shared presupposition that power is like an object, to be empirically observed. To better understand the concept of power we should, instead, examine its categorial form – “power” represents not a thing, but a condition under which certain things may be done and thought – corresponding to possibility, as opposed to necessity. The best way to see this is to turn to Arendt, whose idea of power is the key to a proper comprehension of this basic category of politics. While the link be- tween power and communication has been a staple of Arendtean studies, it has often been reduced to aspirational understandings, which tend to obscure its deeper significance. It is rather the formal aspect of the concept of power which allows us to get right its categorical role in defining politics.
Book Chapters by Guido Parietti
Book Reviews by Guido Parietti
In On the Concept of Power, Parietti proposes a more proper definition of power--as the condition of having available possibilities and representing them as such--and examines its implications for the study of politics, both empirical and normative. By neglecting the category of possibility, significant portions of political science and philosophy become incapable of conceptualizing power, and therefore politics. Specifically, Parietti asserts that the main failure of political science is in obscuring power's correspondence to the category of possibility in favor of causality and probability; political philosophy, on the other hand, tends to prioritize various forms of a teleologically oriented normativity. All these approaches end up discarding possibility in favor of oriented potentialities, ultimately anchored to various forms of necessity, and are therefore incapable of properly conceptualizing power in accordance with its meaning in ordinary language. Bringing together different disciplinary discourses, On the Concept of Power concludes by examining the conditions for power to have an actual referent; in other words, for politics to appear in our world. In this original and ambitious critique of the prevailing approaches to political theory and political science, Parietti examines what it means to have power and what may endanger our access to and exercise of it.
I will show how most discussions of power – across political science and philosophy, from Weber to Lukes, including Dahl and Searle amongst others – are not conceptual, even when explicitly presented as such, but rather empirical and operational. In fact, these discussions revolve mainly around factual implications and preconditions of power, while the presupposed concept does not vary much (with few exceptions, which are anyway untenable on their own merits). Commonly employed definitions can be reduced to a single form, which is tautological: “one has power if one can (=has the power to) do such and such”. This circularity is due precisely to the shared presupposition that power is just like a phenomenon or an object, to be empirically observed. To better understand the concept of power we should, instead, examine its categorial form – “power” represents not a thing, but a condition under which certain things may be done and thought – corresponding to possibility, as opposed to necessity.
The best way to see this is to turn to Arendt, whose often misunderstood idea of power is the key to a proper comprehension of this basic category of politics. While the link between power and communication has been a staple of Arendtean studies, it has often been reduced to normative or aspirational understandings, which tend to obscure its deeper significance. It is rather the formal aspect of the concept of power which allows us to get right its categorical role in defining politics, including the crucial role of persuasion within it. Some implications of this way of looking at the concept – chiefly the stark distinctions necessity/freedom and society/politics for which Arendt is still notorious – seems to be very unpalatable for current social science and political theory. However, absent an adequate non-circular definition of power, this way deserves at least to be tried."
The definitions have been provided can mostly be reduced to a single tautological form: “one has power if one can (=has the power to) do such and such”. The circularity is due to the shared presupposition that power is like an object, to be empirically observed. To better understand the concept of power we should, instead, examine its categorial form – “power” represents not a thing, but a condition under which certain things may be done and thought – corresponding to possibility, as opposed to necessity. The best way to see this is to turn to Arendt, whose idea of power is the key to a proper comprehension of this basic category of politics. While the link be- tween power and communication has been a staple of Arendtean studies, it has often been reduced to aspirational understandings, which tend to obscure its deeper significance. It is rather the formal aspect of the concept of power which allows us to get right its categorical role in defining politics.