Diversity and pluralism in the post-unitary theories of order

Since the beginning of Western thought, social, political and legal order has always been conceived of as depending on the unity, internal coherence, hierarchy and often also homogeneity of the community seen as the basis for social interaction. In the last decades, yet, a new approach to the understanding of order has been developed, in which the plurality of norms and institutions is accepted as a desirable perspective. After introducing the fundamental elements of the unitary conception of order in its particularistic and universalistic variants, the article presents the three main ways of happiness» was not caused by the excessive subjectivity of happiness and its lack of fixity and certainty. In fact, the disappearance of the right to the pursuit of happiness has been a consequence of the reduction of the «abcivil society» in a «commercial society». This way, economics lost its ‘civil’ characterization. overcoming the unitary notion of order that have been recently elaborated (systems theory, post-modernism, communicative paradigm).

Sergio Dellavalle, Diversità e pluralismo nelle teorie post-unitarie dell’ordine in "SOCIETÀ DEGLI INDIVIDUI (LA)" 49/2014, pp 135-151, DOI: 10.3280/LAS2014-049011