Vittorio Cotesta

During the 1970s he studied French culture and philosophy and was one of the first to take an interest in the work of Michel Foucault. To crown this field of interest, in 1969, he published a volume called Linguaggio potere e individuo (Language, power and the individual), an essay on Michel Foucault. Forms of legitimisation of power are also the focus of his subsequent studies, even if within a different theoretical framework. It was no longer Foucault or only Foucault that inspires him but rather the work of J. Habermas. To crown this period of his studies he published the essay Nuove legittimazioni (1984) (New Legitimations) where he examined various theories of truth and built a new normative theory of truth founded on three elements: 1) the coherence of the proposition; 2) the proposition’s correspondence with the world; 3) relations between the participants in discourse.

During the 1980s he carries out theoretical and empirical investigations of collective identities. In particular, he examines the new cities of the Agro Pontino area of Latium, the marshy lands south of Rome reclaimed under Mussolini, and the construction of identity in the city Latina (founded in 1928). The results of this broad, in-depth work are to be found in a number of essays including Modernità e tradizione (Modernity and Tradition). Integrazione sociale e identità culturale in una città nuova (1988) (Social integration and cultural identity in a new city). Astride the end of the 1980s and the beginning of the 1990s he devoted himself to a new area of studies: the social integration of immigrants and the potential ethnic strife arising from the presence on Italian soil of persons from different cultures, traditions, religions and life styles. On the one hand he focuses on forms of cooperation between immigrants and the native population, on the other, he analyses conflict between them. To carry out this kind of research he avails of a new methodology: the use of daily newspapers both as a source of information regarding the country’s social situation and as material though which to examine the ways the treat issues of immigration, the social exclusion of immigrants, strife and violence among immigrants and Italians. The conclusion reached by these studies is that the Italian media tend, systematically, to denigrate foreigners and exalt Italians. The results of these research projects were published in La cittadella assediata (1992) (The Besieged Citadel), Noi e loro (1995) (We and They), Sociologia dei conflitti etnici (1999) (The Sociology of Ethnic Conflict), Lo straniero (2002) (The Foreigner).

During the 1990s the author carried out theoretical investigations into social trust and capital and forms of solidarity. The results of these research projects inspire two types investigation: the first regarding the Italian social welfare system; the second the role played by social trust and capital in relationships within Fiat’s integrated automobile factory at Melfi (province of Potenza, Lucania region). The most important results of this work can be read in Fiducia, cooperazione e solidarietà (Trust, cooperation and solidarity). Strategie per il cambiamento sociale (1997) (Strategies for social change) and La Fabbrica integrata (2000) (The integrated factory).

These first years of the third millennium have been devoted to the study of two new topics: Europe and global society. In a certain sense these are completely new fields of study; in another they are a natural continuation of the studies carried out previously into migration, i ethnic strife and forms of social solidarity. Important stages of this work are the Sociology of the global world (2004) –Società globale e diritti umani (2008)- Global society and human rights. The results of research into Europe are contained in the volumes Le metamorfosi della sfera pubblica (2007)-Metamorphoses of the Public Sphere, Divenire europei (2008) (Becoming Europeans), Europa, Europa. Idee, immagini, percezioni (2010) (Europe. Europe. Ideas, images, perceptions). As coordinator of the Sociological Theories Section of the Italian Association of Sociologies he has devoted his energies in the last few years to a re-launching of theoretical discourse in the social sciences. Within this ambit he has organised seminars, conventions and study workshops. In 2008, in particular, in the occasione of the centenary of in occasione del Georg Simmel’s work, Sociology, he organised an international convention to investigate the importance of this seminal work to sociological studies, at the RomeTre University in Rome. The minutes and papers of the convention were collected in a two-volume work called Simmel e la cultura moderna (2010) (Simmel and modern culture). In 2010 again at Rome Tre, Rome he organised a convention on the Social Sciences and Europe. The main papers were published by the journal Quaderni di Sociologia (vol. 55, 2011).

In 2011, in Roma, again at Roma Tre, he organised a convention on Global society, Cosmopolitanism and Human Rights. The minutes and papers are about to be published by Cambridge Scholar Publisher.