Vico, Hegel and the Making of Modern Italy

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19th century
A01=Alessandro De Arcangelis
Author_Alessandro De Arcangelis
Category=NHD
Category=QDTS
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European history
foreign
freedom
history of ideas
intellectual history
Italian history
Italian unification
local
modernity
national
Neapolitan Enlightenment
polemic
political history
political philosophy
political theory
reception
revolutionary history
Risorgimento
traditions
transnational history

Product details

  • ISBN 9781350522923
  • Weight: 580g
  • Dimensions: 162 x 242mm
  • Publication Date: 24 Jul 2025
  • Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing PLC
  • Publication City/Country: GB
  • Product Form: Hardback
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Embracing a transnational approach to 19th-century Italian intellectual history, this book examines the encounter and amalgamation of local and foreign philosophical traditions, chiefly represented by the thought of Giambattista Vico and Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, showcasing their contribution to shaping a historical mindset that guided and legitimised Italians’ experiences of political change.

Taking a revisionist stance, the author challenges the prevailing view that Italian thinkers passively adopted foreign ideas. Instead, they engaged critically with them, questioning their conceptual foundations and applicability to Italy’s political landscape. Vico, Hegel and the Making of Modern Italy reveals that Italian intellectuals sought cultural and political renewal, at both local and European levels, not through assimilation but through steadfast allegiance to a local strand of political thought inspired by Vico’s humanist historicism.

The book ultimately explores how philosophical thought empowered Italian intellectuals to navigate the uncertainties, drama, and energy of the Risorgimento, underscoring the enduring significance of philosophical knowledge in shaping Italy’s political trajectory.

Alessandro De Arcangelis is a London-based intellectual historian. His research concentrates on the history of modern Europe’s political, historical, and environmental thought in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, with particular focus on transnational encounters and cross-cultural exchanges.

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