Background
Della Volpe, Galvano was born on September 24, 1895 in Imola.
Della Volpe, Galvano was born on September 24, 1895 in Imola.
Since 1939, Professor of the History of Philosophy, University of Messina.
Della Volpe’s early work sought to reconcile the philosophies of Gentile and Croce, and his early writings on Hegel and Hume reveal an opposition to idealism later to influence his Marxism. Although a controversial member of the Italian Communist Party he made substantial contributions to theory. Della Volpe traced Marx’s inheritance from Aristotle, Galileo and Hume, categorically rejecting any attempt to link Marx to Hegelian idealism. Empirical science needs to organize facts and Della Volpe rejects a priori theories in favour of historically determinate ones. What Marx meant by historical materialism is that theories that explain reality arc part of that reality. Della Volpc is, however, critical of materialism considered as objective a priori truth. It is historically determined, emerges from capitalist society and is valid only for the historical period from which it emerges. Marx’s great contribution was to see that material phenomena that appear isolated are connected in a grand social totality shaped by the economic base. His was a scientific theory whose theoretical interpretations are hypotheses to be inductively confirmed by empirical sociologists, a confirmation that will fuel the class struggle. Sociology is thus both a materialist and a revolutionary empirical science.