María Zambrano and the critique of democratic reason

Abstract

This paper proposes a reflection on the present of Persona y democracia and its possible contribution to a critique of democratic reason. Three essential issues are considered: firstly, an elucidation of the concept of person or soul, as the heart of the political subject. Secondly, the tension and, indeed, contradiction between temporality as the intimate and plural dimension of the person, and history as its reductive and insufficient materialisation. Finally, an analysis of absolutism as the underlying structure of totalitarian ways of life.