Las Torres de Lucca. International Journal of Political Philosophy
The Journal Las Torres de Lucca. International Journal of Political Philosophy (ISSN: 2255-3827) is an electronic scientific publication edited by the Department of Philosophy and Society of the Faculty of Philosophy focused on political philosophy with an eye on our historical present.
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Civil War and Hobbes: Origin and Foundation of Politics between Schmitt and Agamben
The research argues that civil war is an origin phenomenon of modern politics, which cannot be reduced to a chronological event or the linear flow of time. It is a historical force that interrupts and transforms politics, even during moments when order is being established. Hobbes is regarded as a thinker situated at the vortex of this origin. Through a dialogue with Schmitt and Agamben, the research explores the discrepancy between civil war and political order, revealing how the history of the state confronts its truth at the cessation of command. Civil war, as an ontological phenomenon, condenses time into a continuous present, creating a gap that demands rethinking the categories of political order. This duality is unveiled: as a mark of the collapse of order and as its most radical source, always tied to the inherent risk of the political.
Copyright (c) 2025 Las Torres de Lucca. International Journal of Political Philosophy
The vertical emancipation of philosophical orientation
One of the most widespread criticisms of philosophical counselling in academic environments is that its sessions are normalizing and pay homage to productivist and individualist ideologies. This argument conflicts not only with Gerd Achenbach’s works, one of the world's first philosophical counsellors, but also with the theories and work of the leading theorists in the field. This paper aims to analyse the legitimacy of this condemnatory judgement by examining the thinking of three prominent national and international theorists: Ran Lahav, Mónica Cavallé and Nacho Bañeras. On this basis, the emancipatory possibilities of these philosophical encounters will also be explored.
An obsession called "Oneself". A political cartography of neoliberal techniques of the self
This study aims to analyze key aspects of the production of neoliberal subjectivities and ways of life through the array of discourses, techniques and practices that individuals are encouraged to apply to themselves. These neoliberal techniques of the self are explored in terms of their philosophical assumptions, cultural expressions, and political implications. Their main dimensions include the emphasis on voluntarism, the imperative of adaptability, the standardization of habits and routines, and the therapeutic privatization of distress caused by performance pressure and continuous mobilization. In this sense, the study explores and advocates for the perspective of politicizing distress, seeking to establish connections between individual symptoms and their structural conditions, as a fundamental task of contemporary critical theory.
Rethinking “sincretismo” in Mexico: between the sacred and the profane
Syncretism constantly occupies a standpoint based upon double critique that generates clashes and perplexity between different worlds. On such a basis, I intend to reinterpret some doubts regarding the artwork "Sincretismo" by the Mexican artist Ismael Vargas, using a filter of readings that amalgamates current paradigms and ideologies through its impact in Mexico recently. This piece of art provoked a strong echo of controversy and utterances of repudiation and criticism regarding syncretism as a phenomenon in this mestizo country. With such practices and models of domination, a new socio-cultural and even economic structure emerged via an ontological vision of politics that looks towards a ‘’crisis of identity’’. This sudden change in conception towards “Sincretismo” may contribute to the need to re-signify these cultural elements, which confer ethnic and identity issues in particular. Therefore, it argued to understand the need to organize such elements, especially with a new sociopolitical and philosophical yield of this new nation where the indigenous and the European converge.
The Ecosophy of Félix Guattari: Views from the South
In the context of the ecological debate of the 1980s, Félix Guattari formulates his ecosophy, a response to the warning of climate change, but above all to the production of subjectivity in Integrated World Capitalism. It is the elaboration of an expanded notion of ecology and the eminently practical roots of his political reflection that distinguish this proposal. This article seeks to resituate ecosophy in the current political and ecological debate. To this end, it begins by analyzing the crisis of the production of subjectivity in current capitalism, a problem that has repercussions not only in the psychological sphere, but also in the social and environmental, forcing the construction of an ecology that transversally integrates such registers. Later, the review of Guattari's visit to Chile will allow us to analyze the tensions that nourish the political and ethical scope of the ecosophical practice. Finally, the analysis of Guattari's link with Latin America will allow us to understand the impact of his fieldwork on the conception of the aesthetic paradigm that sustains ecosophy as a response to the desire for catastrophe expanded by the discourses on the crisis.
Justice beyond borders. A critical theory of transnational justice
This article proposes a review of a critical theory of transnational justice based on the human right to justification, with aim of assessing a normative model to address injustices beyond the borders of the nation-state. First, it presents the three main theoretical approaches to justice in global contexts: international justice (IJ), global justice (GJ), and transnationa justice (TJ). Then, it reconstructs two normative perspectives on transnational justice focused on rights and obligations. Finally, Rainer Forst's proposal develops as the foundation of a critical architecture of global justice, in which the right to justification and the concept of freedom as non-domination allows for overcoming the limitations of existing conceptions. This proposal offers a coherent and normatively robust alternative for building legitimate, democratic, and emancipatory transnational structures.
The aim of this article is to problematize the relationship between the passion for glory and the dynamics of power in Hobbes. To this end, it examines how Hobbes presents the passion for glory, as a manifestation of the desire for recognition and superiority, constituting itself as a form of power acquisition. This connection highlights how glory transcends the desire for recognition, revealing itself as a fundamental driver for obtaining the appropriate means to establish security as a necessary guarantee for achieving a pleasant life. The hypothesis intended to be evidenced pertains to the idea that the attainment of a pleasant life is linked to the recognition of power exercised through the passion for glory, a necessary condition for achieving security. Thus, the passion for glory is presented not only as an element that amplifies conflict among men but also as a central component in the dynamics of power and recognition, which underpins that condition of security that encompasses the material and spiritual development of individuals.
Neoliberalism and Education: An Analysis of Key European Educational Policies on Entrepreneurship
The aim of this study is to analyse European educational policies on entrepeneurship and the promotion of entrepeneurial spirit from theoretical-philosophical perspective. To achieve this, a documentary analysis was conducted using a selection of key texts issued by the European Comission over the past two decades. The units of analysis were drawn from the EUR-Lex platform of the European Union. This research is guided by two core questions. First, under what social, political, and economic conditions do these entrepeneurial selves operate? Second, what are the educational implications of understanding the process of human formation as a strategy of personal investment? Guided by these questions, the study argues that educational policies on entrepeneurship can be understood as a questions, the study argues that educational policies on entrepeurship can be understood as a technology of governance -in the Foucauldian sense- designed to shape individuals into "entrepeneurs of the self". These policies aim to instil an ethos of self-valorisation that serves as a new mandate for subjective regulation. The ultimate purpose is to align individuals' bejaviour with enterprise model, positioning eduation as a key instrument in this process.
Between Marxism and the Kyoto School. Kakehashi Akihide's political-economic theory as a development of Lenin's and Nishida's thought
Japanese is the language that has produced the gratest amount of Marxist theory after English, German, and French. However, Eurocentric tendencies still prevail in the intellectual circuits of this field, relegating the theory of important Japanese Marxist thinkers to a secondary plane or even rendering them invisible. This article aims to contribute to countering this intellectually impoverishing Eurocentric tendency by exploring the political-economic theory of Kakehashi Akihide, whose life and work represent an ideal bridge for traversing the transition from the most internationally well-known Japanese thought, that of the Kyote School circle, to Marxism. Kakehashi believed that the Marxist system of thought should be refined through the incorporation of Nishida Kitaro's philosophy, and that Nishida's philosophy should be refined by providing it with a Marxist foundation mediated by Lenin's philosophy. The originality of Kakehashi's theory made him a prominent figure in the fisrt decades after World War II, contributing to the emergence of a political movement, the Japanese New Left, articulated around the valorization of subjectivity, direct action, and the goal of revolution as an alternative to the objectivism and economism of the institutional left, especially the Communist Party.
Undoing work, preserving abstraction? A critique of the post-capitalism narrative of the “end of work”
The aim of this article is the critique, from a conception fo capital as abstract domination, of the theoretical proposals of post-captialism of, on the one hand, Paul Mason and, on the other hand, Alex Williams, Nick Srnicek and Helen Hester. In these authors there is the idea of buiding a post-capitalist horizon where human beings stop working and break with mercantile logic through the use of information technologies. However, is it enough to stop working in order to exit capitalism? After presenting the main ideas of these authors, the text argues that their emphasis on the abolition of work does not address the dundamental split between concrete and abstract labor. Finally, some future research directions are briefly suggested, focused on how to think about emancipation without falling back into the abstraction of labor or the logic of the commodity.
Remembering or Forgetting the Civil War: Reflections on a Core Problem of State Formation
In this article we focus on the relationship between civil war, memory and oblivion. If civil war is the worst evil of a political community and a people wants to avoid falling back into it, should they forget it or remember it? Hobbes offers a good understanding on this subject, despite the distance, from which we can extract a set of reflections for the contemporary world. Our text carries out a critical evaluation of this possible Hobbesian response.
Identidad del enemigo y civilidad política: una lectura de Hobbes desde Balibar
In this paper, I propose a critical reading of the figure of the enemy in the political thought of Thomas Hobbes, contrasting it with Carl Schmitt’s characterization and bringing it into dialogue with Étienne Balibar’s notion of “ultrasubjective violence.” Although Hobbesian philosophy is often associated with a pessimistic view of human nature and the justification of absolute sovereign power, I will argue that his theory contains elements that can be interpreted as strategies of civility –ways of avoiding the dehumanization of the other even in contexts of extreme violence. In contrast, Schmitt’s friend-enemy opposition, insofar as it depends on an identitarian rather than merely circumstantial logic, opens the door to forms of ferocious violence that Hobbes manages to avoid. The aim, therefore, is to recover certain aspects of Hobbes’s proposal as useful tools for critically thinking about contemporary politics, marked by forms of enmity that overflow the political sphere and result in exclusions, discriminations, and forms of violence justified by supposedly incompatible essences.
Critique, Genealogy, Normativity. Koselleck, Foucault, and the historic-critical reflection on law
In contemporary political philosophy, an ongoing debate concerns the relationship between genealogy and normativity, according to which the two are seen as mutually exclusive. This controversy is framed within the coordinates of the Anglo-Saxon context, where the value of Foucault’s analyses for thinking the legal domain has often been sidelined. This paper therefore proposes to revisit the connection that, in Foucauldian thought, links critique with genealogy as a method of philosophical inquiry, and with normativity as one of the dimensions of this relationship. The aim is to reassess the relevance of genealogical approaches within the legal field and to reinsert law as a valid object of historical-critical reflection. The article is structured in three parts: the first focuses on the notion of critique in the works of Foucault and Koselleck, both of whom explored how this issue has been shaped in the West since modernity. The second part addresses genealogy as a critical philosophical method in Foucault's thought. The third part examines how normativity lies at the core of Foucauldian philosophy, and explores the types of characterizations and distinctions Foucault made regarding it during the 1970s.
Hobbes and his monsters: on the possibility of a Hobbesian zoopolis
Through a textual, conceptual, and comparative analysis of Hobbes’s work, this article proposes a reinterpretation of his political philosophy from a zoopolitical perspective. This approach, which incorporates humans, nonhuman animals, and monsters, challenges the anthropocentric foundations of modern political thought. A comparative examination of Aristotelian and Hobbesian zoology highlights the semiotic framework Hobbes assigns to animality, bestiality, and monstrosity, showing that his political ontology contains conceptual resources for thinking community beyond the boundaries of the human species. Using a hermeneutic approach centered on the distinction between animality and brutality, and on the conception of the State as a monstrous automaton, I argue that the internal logic of the Hobbesian system provides theoretical grounds for expanding the social contract toward a “Hobbesian zoopolis.” I contend that Hobbes recognizes in nonhuman animals an ontological equality with humans, while locating brutality as an exclusively human condition. Likewise, his conception of sovereignty—directed toward the preservation of life, collective prosperity, and happiness—allows the Commonwealth to be reinterpreted as a project aimed at guaranteeing the stability and flourishing of all forms of life that sustain it. This logic opens the theoretical possibility of reimagining the modern State as a multispecies Commonwealth.
In the shadow of the Leviathan: political representation in party democracy
This article explores the possility of understanding the crisis of contemporary democracy in light of the challenges posed by the Hobbesian concept of representation. Through a methodological and substantive dialogue with the work of Giuseppe Duso, we will analyze the evolution of modern representation based on the dialectic between conceptual and political order. Starting with Hobbes, and taking into account the divergences among Elements, De Cive, and Leviathan, we will show how his logic permeates modern constitutions, displacing medieval representation, but it is inverted—or even dissolved—with the goverment of public opinion in the early 19th century, the emergence of mass parties, and the constitutionalization of multiparty systems after World War II. In all these moments, however, we remain within the conceptual horizon of political modernity, where the reference of representation to an ideal unity and the prohibition of the imperative mandate are unquestionable elements. Based on a conceptual clarification of the current crisis and on the above background, we will conclude that the issue is not so much about locating the genesis of the concept of representation in the Leviathan, but rather about recognizing that, insofar as we remain modern, Hobbes is—still today—a lurking specter.
Gnoseological scepticism as a consequence of Thomas Hobbes’ epistemic position: the limits of political artifice
Thomas Hobbes states in Leviathan that, in order to secure lasting peace, we might secure lasting conditions of sovereignty. Accordingly, a number of mechanisms of eternity of life or artificial immortality are established: the succession of the sovereign; the government of doctrines and opinions; and the good government of the sovereign. However, if we consider the Hobbesian epistemic position, we find an intrinsic limitation for political science, since we are not able know with the same degree of certainty about human nature, whose action we want to restrict on the basis of politics, as we are able to know about the effects of the very mechanisms artificially constructed for this purpose. Consequently, Hobbesian gnoseological scepticism reveals itself as a fundamental limitation for politics.
¿Dónde va el cuidado de sí de Michel Foucault?
El objetivo del presente artículo es ponderar la propuesta etopolítica de Michel Foucault en relación con las corrientes morales contemporáneas, específicamente respecto de aquellas variantes particularistas: la ética del cuidado y el particularismo moral de Jonathan Dancy. Frente a una tendencia interpretativa actual a estrechar la relación entre ética del cuidado y ética del cuidado de sí, asociada al pensamiento de Foucault, proponemos una revisión teórica y conceptual del desarrollo de su propuesta ética, dimensión esta última muy descuidada. Sugerimos que, en diálogo con estas posiciones morales, la ética foucaultiana estaría, en realidad, más cerca del particularismo de Dancy que de la ética del cuidado, sobre todo respecto del alcance teórico-práctico desde el que ambas se levantan. Las razones para sostener esto son principalmente dos: una posible compatibilidad entre el análisis foucaultiano de la microfísica del poder respecto de la motivación interpretativo-metodológica que inspira el trabajo teórico de Dancy, y la compatibilidad entre la pretensión práctica expresada explícitamente por Foucault para su ética, que se identificaría con la pretensión práctica de Dancy en Ethics Without Principles (2024)
Infrastructure and sovereignity: ¿Leviathan vs Behemoth again?
What is the relevance of Hobbes' works regarding contemporary challenges to the State posed by the privatization of infrastructure and logistics? To answer this question, in the first section we review Chapter XXIV of Leviathan and we discuss the "nutrition" of the Republic as a form of sovereign management of material infrastructures and logistics necessary to attain the salus populi. In the second section, we propose a brief review of the emergence of critical infrastructure, from ports and roads to digital platforms, linking its evolution to the development of modern states. The third section presents two contemporary cases of state withdrawal or absence in relation to the administration of critical infrastructe: drug trafficking and private drainage services, and how these cases enable forms of criminal or ground-root quasi-sovereignty, as well as forms of parasitic infrastructure and logistics. These cases are compared with the growing relevance of private digital platforms in contemporary social life. In the fourth section, we present three infrastructural threats: social dependence on platforms, the privatization of knowledge about the population, and the inherent fragility of interdependent infrastructures. The conclusions argue for the urgent need to rethink the ties between sovereignty and infrastructure in the context of the privatization of essential services. Drawing on Hobbes, the article argues for the need to recongifure state power as ultmately responsible for an expanded form of salus populi.
Del Estado soberano al Leviatán zombi. Una reflexión hobbesiana sobre el narcotráfico en América Latina
This article reinterprets Latin American drug trafficking through the lens of Thomas Hobbes' Leviathan (1651), complemented by Friedrich Schiller's notion of aesthetic education. Building on Hobbes's dictum protego ergo obligo, it argues that when state institutions are infiltrated by criminal networks, the "state of nature" resurfaces inside the polity: the state becomes a zombie Leviathan—institutionally intact yet powerless and illegitimate. The argument is developed through a comparative analysis of three hotspots selected for their high homicide rates and distinct patterns of state capture. In each setting, drug cartels exploit Hobbes's triad of passions—competition, diffidence, and glory—to create parallel orders that deliver "selective security". These dynamics nurture an aesthetic of terror and ostentatious illicit wealth that endows violence with cultural legitimacy. Purely coercive state responses prove short-lived; lasting pacification demands a dual strategy: re-establishing the state's monopoly on coercion while reshaping collective emotions and imagination. Drawing on Schiller, the article outlines "counter-imagination" policies—community arts programs, neighborhood-based creative economies, and pedagogies of alterity—that can redirect fear, desire and hope away from criminal glamour and back toward civic life. The study thus offers a novel analytical framework linking sovereignty, passions, and aesthetics, bridging empirical work on criminal governance with political-philosophical debates on legitimacy, and highlighting the sensory dimension that underpins illicit authority.
Presentation of the dossier. Present of the philosophy of Thomas Hobbes
Mattei, Eugenia y Losada, Leandro (Coords.) (2024). Maquiavelo, el pueblo y el populismo. Historia, teoría política y debates interpretativos. Instituto de Investigaciones Gino Germani - CLACSO. 340 páginas.
Becoming-minority as antagonist of becoming-black
Starting from Mbembe's Critique of Black Reason, we take two concepts from Deleuze and Guattari's philosophy (potency and Power) with which to read the problem of racism and other forms of discrimination. By examining the production of slavery, with its three dimensions (corporal, social and symbolic), we will arrive at the becoming-black of the world, a concept proposed by Mbembe to explain the current expansion of that first racism of the African slave trade. Against this becoming-black, we will raise, again from the hand of Deleuze and Guattari, the becoming-minoritarian, with its three attributes (anomaly, nomadism and celebration), in struggle against any form of discrimination.
Resurgence of Realism: Contrasts and Convergences with International Political Theory
Realism is one of the most influential theoretical perspectives in the field of international relations. It is based on an anarchic world, where States are the main actors and the search for power is the driving force of international politics. However, in the second half of the 20th century, a new study approach called International Political Theory (IPT) emerged, which sought to challenge the realist hegemony of international relations, but has taken a different course in the study of this discipline. This article analyzes the resurgence of realism in contemporary political theory and its impact on international relations, exploring its foundations in the Westphalian system and its contrast with International Political Theory. First, an outline of realism in contemporary international relations theory is provided. It then explains IPT as a critique of that position, and discusses the most important perspectives of IPT. Third, the key elements of the return of Realism in political theory and philosophy are outlined.
The pedagogical principles of the Institución Libre de Enseñanza: a valuable contribution to reflect on equality in and through the school today
Although equality of opportunity is part of the public political culture of Western countries, socioeconomic inequalities continue to grow and the mass democratic school, far from contributing to curb this trend, proves incapable of ensuring equality among children while preserving merit. This paper aims to explore what ideas we can extract from the pedagogical principles of the Institución Libre de Enseñanza, based on the Krausist philosophy, to achieve equality –both gender and socioeconomic– in and through the educational system.
Complexity of key factor interactions in peacebuilding in a post-pandemic world
The study is framed within the context of the COVID-19 pandemic and the need to comprehend the complexity of interactions among factors influencing peace-building in the face of escalating inequalities and social tensions. The objective was to analyze the intricate interplay between security, culture, inequality, citizen participation, and education in promoting peace. The methodology relied on a qualitative exploratory literature review approach to capture the diversity of perspectives on this underexplored topic. Analysis identified patterns through synthesis and categorization. The results reflect a complex interplay between factors, with security, equity, participation and cultural transformation crucial to peace. Finally, it emphasizes the need for a comprehensive approach to promote peace, whose findings should guide effective strategies in times of uncertainty.
The Case of the Centinel: Utility and Merit in Adam Smith's Theory of Justice
Within the framework of moral sentimentalism, Adam Smith develops a conception of justice that combines the retributive justice of his predecessor, Joseph Butler, with the proto-utilitarian elements of his contemporary, David Hume. Smith blends these two traditions through a compound judgment in which he articulates the resentment caused by the harm done by an equal with the social utility of punishment. By identifying the various components that are coordinated in Smith's judgment of justice (resentment, utility, spontaneous sentimental reaction, judgment of the impartial spectator), the richness and nuance of Smith's moral psychology are verified. This allows us to explain, without contradiction, the case that simpler psychologies cannot justify: the guard condemned for falling asleep on duty.
“A great desire to dominate”. Machiavelli and the greats
After decades hegemonized by the Machiavelli of republicanism, many specialists have proposed a radical-popular interpretation of his thought. Accepting this reading requires a questioning of the way in which the role of the great has traditionally been interpreted in his work. In contrast to the nobility imagined by the humanists, which seemed to function as the guarantor of moderate republican order, Machiavelli understood that the elite was the main source of instability for institutions that had to be protected by the law and by the action of the popular stratum itself.
The contradiction between labour and capital as a political antagonism
This article actualises the Marxist approach to the antagonism between capital and labour. Following an attentive reading of some of his texts –but especially Capital– I suggest the idea that this conflict is not between world conceptions but between material forces and mystified forces. Accordingly, I simply want to suggest that this antagonism involves a class struggle between labour as the insertion of human beings into materiality and capital as an articulation of founding and preserving violences that prevent the emergence of that materiality. I also point out that capitalism in its contemporary form has increasingly intensified its mystifications, transforming its violence into an extreme violence that allows for the valorisation of capital. To support these two hypotheses, the text focuses, first, on the Marxist concept of labour and, second, offers a brief genealogy of violence in capitalism. Finally, it focuses on the relationship between labour and anti-violent strategies.
Antinomianism and new legitimation. Contemporary philosophical interventions on the dyad “messianic life-law” in the messianism of Paul of Tarsus
This article offers a critical interpretation of a central philosophical-political motif within Pauline Messianism: the nexus between the “messianic life” or “post-Christ existence” and the law (nomos). This reconstruction takes cognizance of significant contributions from contemporary philosophical ruminations, including those proposed by Giorgio Agamben and Alain Badiou in the European context, alongside insights from Enrique Dussel and Franz J. Hinkelammert in the Latin American sphere. This scrutiny reveals the concept of “messianism” outlined in the Pauline epistles can be construed either as a philosophical-theological-political validation of radical antinomianism (as articulated by Agamben and Badiou), or as the discursive articulation of a novel criterion for political legitimization (as posited by Dussel and Hinkelammert).
From the rift to the metabolic mismatch: ecological crisis, materialism and philosophy of nature
In this article I advocate for the importance of a materialist approach to the discussion of whether there is a radical separation between human beings and nature caused by capitalism. I argue that capitalism establishes a relationship in nature characterized by its singular violence, insofar as it pretends to capture the contingency of natural processes as a function of the abstract temporal logic of capital valorization. First, I discuss Friedrich W. J. Schelling's philosophy of nature, one of the first in modern philosophy to raise the question of the separation between man and nature. Second, I argue how Marx's thought and ecomarxism allow us to locate this problem in the concrete historical conditions of capitalism. Finally, I present a Marxian interpretation centered on the notion of contingency that seeks to offer an alternative in the ecomarxist dispute and to radicalize Schelling's philosophy of nature.