Ri-progettare il mondo nell'epoca delle crisi

At the time of de-globalisation, the idea of a shared international project leaves more and more place to the interests of elites and nations. Established balances collapse, political authoritarianism strengthens, the path of rearmament and economic struggle take the place of dialogue and cooperation. Frontiers close, become impermeable, to the benefit of a nationalist perspective that promotes mechanisms to repatriate migrants. The dream of a supranational alliance for the resolution of global problems disappears. Where has the common project of society gone? Where to begin to re-design a collective trajectory?

The construction of a new equilibrium, in which power is distributed and not relegated to the interests of individual economic and state powers, seems, as of today, the only way to build a system based on what Stefano Rodotà has called “constitutionalism of needs”, i.e. a system in favour of a society in which “the right to have rights” becomes a common reality.

In this perspective, refocusing the principles of local constitutions or inter-state bodies - such as the UN Charter - could be a start. But how do the international powers with imperialist and economic lusts deal with these assumptions? How does Europe cry rearmament? How does the Italy of the migrant fight and the externalisation of frontiers, in which those who escape their homeland find themselves further and further excluded?

With the recent situation in the United States of America and the European Union's massive investment plan in rearmament, the Western world seems intent on safeguarding the exclusive interests of individual nations. The democratic tradition is in crisis, the constitutional principles underpinning nations are crumbling, established rights are being debated and sometimes superseded by orders given by governments. However, the challenge to the rule of law posed by the political authoritarianism of our times meets with a fundamental resistance: the Peoples' Constitutions. Can these be the right instruments to imagine a collective vision capable of reinserting international reality into a common project, faithful to the principles of solidarity and participation?