Abstract

The author discusses Roberto Esposito's "Pensiero vivente. Origine e attualità della filosofia italiana" (Torino, Einaudi, 2010), where a rethinking of the Italian philosophical tradition is proposed in the light of recent currents in biopolitics, a rethinking centered on the resistance opposed by «life» to the repeated attempts to rationalize and historicize it (im- munitas). The author believes that it would be wrong to consider that interpretation - al- though founded and charming - as the sole or dominant as compared to at least two other possible connotations of Italian thought: the constant search for the relationship between history and philosophy and its civil-ethical dimension.