Il dominio dell’uomo sull’uomo. Appunti per un’ontologia del «politico»

In the seventies Gianfranco Miglio conceived the project of a synthesis between "natural sciences" and "human sciences." For the Italian political scientist, disciplines such as ethology, sociobiology and biopolitics could give a solution to the old project of (classical) political realism of founding the study of "regularity" in politics on a more systematic and complete knowledge of the "human nature." This article examines Gianfranco Miglio’s interest in these disciplines, with the aim of emphasizing the aporetic tension - between the two polarities of “nature” and “culture” - that marks each theoretical project that tries to find in the “natural science” the basis for the confirmation of the classical image of anthropological pessimism. In particular, the article argues that the tension between nature and history can paradoxically lead to forget what specifically characterizes the 'Political'.