Il buono, il giusto, il cattivo. Alcune considerazioni sull’etica e la politica di Clifford Geertz

This paper critically reconstructs Clifford Geertz’s reflections on the ethical and political significance of cultural diversity, focusing on the question of its most desirable use. Through an analysis of Anti Anti-Relativism and The Uses of Diversity, it argues that Geertz rejects both anti-relativism and ethnocentrism as inadequate responses to pluralism. While the former neutralizes the transformative potential of anthropological inquiry, the latter reduces cultural difference to separation rather than mutual transformation. The paper then examines Richard Rorty’s response, highlighting the complicated interplay between universalist justice and moral imagination, and ultimately defends the enduring political relevance of Geertz’s position