Italo Vaccarini

V. CESAREO - I. VACCARINI, The proposal of humanist constructionism Sociological theory in the twentieth century polarized between collectivist doctrines which asserted social determinism and individualist ones which asserted the autonomous action of atomistically conceived individuals. The late 1900s also saw the advent of a kind of radical individualism which can be labelled «sociological minimalism». «Social constructionism» is the contemporary approach which seeks to reconcile the above polarizations, and it is within its theoretical domain that lies the proposal for a «humanist constructionism» put forward in this article. Humanist constructionism sets value on subjectivity and historicity. On this base it thematizes the person understood as a sociological category, and it crucially refers to the sociology of Max Weber in so far as it is qualified by the existential and historicist dimensions. The distinctive feature of humanist constructionism is its axiological profile founded upon the concept of citizenship. Within contemporary sociology, «humanist constructionism» has a particular elective affinity with the morphogenetic approach of M. Archer. Key words: humanism, constructionism, person, citizenship.

Term of reference is the thesis of M.Pera in Why we have to profess christians. Christianism contributes decisively to the building of western identity, that means modernity and liberalism. This thesis is elaborated starting from weberian assumptions on Entzauberung and rationalisation as biblical Weltanschauung: a determinant root of western identity. Christian revolution upsets the worldview from the «naturality» of ancient cosmocentrism, particularly of Greeks and Romans, to the «unnaturality» of radical theoanthropocentrism, that is to subjectcentrism, conceived as embryo of modernity. This «unnaturality» of Christianism is present in two features:the axioogical priority of inner life and the «inverse glorifications» in thr Sermon of the mountain. These features are realized in many areas and situations typical of western civilisation, particularly in the Middle Age.