On April 7, Franco Ferrarotti turns 95. Exactly 60 years ago, the doyen of Italian sociology gave the opening address of the first chair of the discipline just established in Rome. Ferrarotti, author of countless books read all over the world, is still professor emeritus of Sociology at the University "La Sapienza" and director of the journal La Critica sociologica. But his career as a scholar and as a man involved in social work is long and full of changes. In 1951, with Nicola Abbagnano, he created the Sociology Notebooks, which he directed until 1967. he He was one of the founders, in Geneva, of the Council of European Municipalities, responsible for the Facteurs sociaux division of the OECD in Paris. For a long time alongside Adriano Olivetti, he was elected independent deputy in the Italian Parliament from 1958 to 1963. Appointed Directeur d'études at the Maison des Sciences de l'Homme in Paris in 1978, he was awarded the Lifetime Achievement Award by the National Academy dei Lincei in 2001 and the title of Cavaliere di Gran Croce al merito della Repubblica from President Ciampi in 2005. He has taught in Chicago, Boston, New York, Toronto, Moscow, Warsaw, Cologne, Tokyo and Jerusalem.
Generations of students remember Ferrarotti's enthralling lectures at the university. Provocative interventions by him on various political and social issues of the country from the sixties to today. Ferrarotti's research and study activity is contained in an enormous amount of writings that he still continues to publish. Recently the Marietti publisher of Turin has published the Opera omnia of Franco Ferrarotti consisting of six volumes for 5 thousand pages. The father of sociology in Italy has given numerous interviews to FIRSTonline.
Ferrarotti: "Covid like war but let's hope for a burst of vitality"
Ferrarotti: "Poor electoral campaign but Europe and reforms are the real watershed"
Ferrarotti: "The Italian paradox and Renzi's novelty"
