Risentimento, regole, giustizia: Hume e la riflessione etica contemporanea

This paper aims to answer three questions concerning the passion of resentment in Hume. The first is what exactly is his conception of resentment. The second is whether or not it is a plausible conception. The third, finally, is whether it plays a role in his theory of justice. In answering these questions, I outline a novel perspective on the emotions that are involved in the genealogy of justice in which, in addition to the positive emotions associated with sympathy for general happiness, the negative emotion of resentment also finds a place. This is certainly an advantage that concerns not only the understanding of Hume’s moral theory, but that invests the very idea of justice within that broad empiricist line that starting from Hume, and through Adam Smith, comes up to the reformed utilitarianism of J.S. Mill.