Concrete Universality : Philosophy for an Age of Fragmentation

Universalism is collapsing in real time. As Western hegemony wanes, the promise of universal values is unmasked as a parochial inheritance; and as AI systems multiply, universal truths transform into computed artifacts emerging from a particular code and training. In Concrete Universality, Lorenzo Marsili argues that the choice is not between a bankrupt universalism and an 'anything goes' relativism.He proposes a third path: universality as a practice of worldmaking.Drawing on Chinese philosophy, European thought and the contemporary metaphysics embedded in artificial intelligence and quantum mechanics, Marsili develops the concept of ontopoiesis: the idea that reality is not simply found but continuously produced through relations, cuts, and forms of mediation. This approach gives rise to a new political method.Universals are not timeless abstractions; they are fragile mortal achievements – concrete agreements and institutions that make the same thing visible to everyone, for a time, in a context.Marsili calls this 'concrete universality' – the formation of shared, binding practices that emerge from situated encounters yet gain planetary resonance, from nuclear regulation to digital ethics, from climate policy to cultural restitution.Here, universality is not a static ideal but an unfinished voyage whose horizons move as humanity moves. This book is an erudite and impassioned manifesto for a planetary philosophy – a way of weaving together a fragmenting planet, one universal at a time.