A Philosophy of Political Myth

Chiara Bottici is a researcher in political philosophy at the University of Florence. The author of Uomini e Stati, Percorsi di un'analogia, she has contributed to the Journal of Political Philosophy, the European Journal of Social Theory and the Quaderni Forum.

• Introduction; Part I. A Genealogy of Myth: 1. Mythos and logos; 2. The biblos and the dialectic of the sacred logos; 3. Scientific rationality and the dialectic of the enlightenment; Part II. The Need for Myth: 4. Myth and meaning; 5. Approaching myth; 6. Naming the unknown, grounding significance; Part III. Political Myth: 7. Myth and the critique of political reason; 8. Classical theories of political myth; 9. Political myth, ideology, and utopia; Part IV. Myth and Political Identity: 10. Myth, historical narratives and the social imaginary; 11. Myth and identity; 12. Political myths today: the extraordinary and the banal.

Review of the hardback: '… Bottici has endeavoured to provide a framework within which the study of myth can be usefully developed, and in this she has performed a very useful work of Lockean philosophical underlabouring.' Review of Politics