Weber’s conception of politics has long been interpreted in relativistic and “agonistic” terms. Such interpretations neglect Weber’s notion of “objectivity” as well as the complex links between politics as “community,” on the one hand, and as “value sphere,” on the other. Seen against this backdrop, Berufpolitik becomes a balancing act in which the pursuit of subjective values is objectively constrained not only by the ethic of responsibility, but more generally by the political imperative to safeguard the preconditions for communal order (...) and, in late modernity, of liberal freedoms. Without them, neither the objective “clarity” generated by science nor the subjective political commitments based on “clear vision” would be possible. (shrink)

The article illustrates the different meanings of the term “logic” in Weber's work and then proceeds to discuss his approach to the explanation of historical events and in particular to counterfactual analysis. Weber's epistemology is first situated within the neo-Kantian debates of his time as well as legal positivism and historical jurisprudence. The article then focuses on this author's conception of science as a value sphere, on the aims and methods of explanation in the social and historical sciences and on (...) the key concepts of possibility judgements and adequate causation. The central role played by counterfactuals and modal logic is illustrated through the example of the battle of Marathon, which Weber himself saw as the starting point of a causal chain leading to the rise of Western rationalism. The article concludes by highlighting the pioneering role of Weber's counterfactualism for the subsequent development of possible worlds theory and its use in the causal analysis of singular historical events. (shrink)

The creation of the welfare state has been one of the most significant achievements of the “long” twentieth century, now come to a close. Yet, since at least the 1980s the welfare state has been the object of heated controversy. The capacity of social policy to reconcile economic growth with social justice has been put into serious question, especially in the light of the so-called “globalization” process. More and more frequently, efficiency and equality, growth and redistribution, competitiveness and solidarity are (...) referred to as polar opposites that can only thrive at each other's expenses. The new millennium has opened under the shadow of a resurrected “big trade-off,” offering only two possible coherent value-combinations and thus virtually only one viable institutional scenario, centred around the first combination. Plausible as it may sound, this trade-off logic is certainly not inescapable. But how can we find a way out of it? The task is one of identifying new value combinations and institutional arrangements that are both mixed and virtuous, i.e. capable of producing simultaneous advances on all the affected fronts. In this paper, I will develop some considerations around this thorny challenge, with special reference to pension insurance and health care. (shrink)

This article illustrates the relationships between political parties and the healthcare sector in Italy since the 1950s. The several was though which parties have "exploited" health policics are explored, ranging from the selective extension of care entitlements to the various occupational categories to the clientelistic ties with doctors, from the placement of party personnell in the various administrative posts to illegal financing. The author argues that the partitocratie exploitation of the health care sector has greatly contributed to the failure of (...) the 1978 reform establishing a National Health Service. This failure has in its turn backlashed against the partitocratic government, accellerating its demise in the early 1990s. The article concludes with some considerations on the future of Italy's health policy and, more generally, welfare state policy. (shrink)