Elements of Carlos Vaz Ferreira’s Philosophy as Strategies to Counteract the Impact of Polarization

The work of Uruguayan philosopher Carlos Vaz Ferreira (1872-1958) shows a deep ethical commitment to institutions and forms of sociopolitical organization that favor peaceful coexistence in societies that, like his own, at the beginning of the 20th century, faced various conflicts that led people to hold opposing positions on how to solve conflicts. In the context of widespread concern about the risks that polarization entails for contemporary democracies, Vaz Ferreira’s study of the nature of this type of problem, the analysis of the epistemic and psycho-logical conditions that make it possible and, above all, his proposal on the kind of solution that can be applied to normative problems, are of particular interest to address this phenomenon philosophically. Vaz Ferreira conceptualizes polarization, especially in its social and political dimension, as a problem of ideals, that is, a normative issue that, unlike explanatory problems, can be solved by choosing among different options, none of them perfect or necessarily excluding, which the philosopher calls a solution of choice . In this sense, false oppositions, exclusivism, and extremism are, in most cases, obstacles to finding solutions to the problems of ideals and, therefore, often lie at the root of polarizing tendencies. Vaz Ferreira offers an original contribution as his thought articulates epistemic, psycho-logical , ethical, and political elements in studying the causes and effects of polarizing tendencies, thus allowing us to address this phenomenon comprehensively as a single, coherent, and systematic unit of analysis.