Domenico Losurdo

Domenico Losurdo (Sannicandro di Bari, 1941) is an Italian philosopher, historian, political theorist and Marxist intellectual.

Life

Losurdo obtained his doctorate in 1963 from the University of Urbino.^[1] He is Dean of the Faculty of Education at the University of Urbino.^[2]

Thought

Losurdo criticizes the concept of totalitarianism, especially in the works of Hannah Arendt. He argues that totalitarism is a polysemic concept with origins in Christian theology, and that applying it to the political sphere requires an operation of abstract schematism which makes use of isolated elements of historical reality to place fascist regimes and the USSR in the dock together, serving the anti-communism of Cold War-era intellectuals rather than reflecting authentic intellectual research.

Losurdo asserts that the origins of fascism and Nazism are to be found in the colonialist and imperialist policies of the West, in which administrative genocides and political control over entire populations were carried out for the first time, as well as in the traditions of racism and anti-semitism, including slavery and racism in the USA, where the Ku Klux Klan and the legal exclusion of black population were important influences on Nazi leaders.

Losurdo examines the intellectual and political positions of intellectuals on modernity. In his view, Kant and Hegel were the greatest thinkers of modernity, while Nietzsche was its greatest critic, followed by Marxist thinkers such as Max Horkheimer, Ernst Bloch, Marx and Gramsci, who were at the same time critics and defenders of modernity.

Works

• Autocensura e compromesso nel pensiero politico di Kant, Napoli, 1984
• Hegel und das deutsche Erbe. Philosophie und nationale Frage zwischen Revolution und Reaktion, Köln, 1989
• La comunità, la morte, l'Occidente. Heidegger e l' "ideologia della guerra", Torino, 1991. Traducido al castellano como La comunidad, la muerte, Occidente : Heidegger y la "ideología de la guerra" Buenos Aires : Losada, 2003
• Hegel e la libertà dei moderni, Roma, 1992
• Democrazia o bonapartismo: trionfo e decadenza del suffragio universale, Bollati Boringhieri, Torino, 1993;
• La Seconda Repubblica. Liberismo, federalismo, postfascismo, Bollati Boringhieri, Torino, 1994.
• Controstoria del liberalismo, Roma-Bari : Laterza, 2005. Traducido al castellamo como Contrahistoria del liberalismo Mataró (Barcelona)] : El Viejo Topo, D.L. 2007
• Il linguaggio dell'Impero : lessico dell'ideologia americana Roma- Bari : Laterza, 2007

References

1. ^ "Losurdo Domenico" (in Italian). Università degli studi di Urbino « Carlo Bo ». http://www.scienzeformaz.urbino.com/Prodotti/SchedaProdotto.asp?PathID=329.402&IDDB=1&Lan=IT. Retrieved 22 January 2011. 
2. ^ "Faculties: Faculty of Education" (in English). University of Urbino. http://www.uniurb.it/it/portale/index.php?mist_id=12000&lang=ENG&tipo=ENG&page=1070. Retrieved 22 January 2011. 

External links

• http://domenicolosurdopresentazazing.blogspot.com/
• "Domenico Losurdo: Demokratie dank Sozialismus" (in German). KomInform. 30 May 2007. http://www.kominform.at/article.php?story=20070530163545732. Retrieved 22 January 2011. 

Nazisme racisme colonialisme - Domenico Losurdo http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p2I5RAEjNjU

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Name	Losordo, Domenico
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