Costruire un pubblico nuovo. Gabriel Tarde fra diritto e filosofia morale

Abstract: Gabriel Tarde was one of the first researchers interested not only in the «psychology of crowds», but also in the functioning of publics and the impact that Press and Opinion have on politics, law and on the psychology of individuals. Some of his insights, guided by empirical observations and a complex philosophical vision, are extraordinarily relevant today. This article will present his “phenomenology of the public” and will attempt to compare it with the new phase of the Press opened up by Web 2.0, with populist phenomena which run through western political systems, with the moral behaviour of individualized citizens that is increasingly bipolar and fragmented. In order to understand if and how it is possible to construct a new type of public, capable of inventing and not just imitating, capable of producing «interference-combinations », as Tarde would say, and not just destructive struggles.