Tra potere della strada e potere carismatico. Considerazioni weberiane

Expressions such as ‘charismatic leadership’, or ‘plebiscitary leader democracy’ – which often emerge in common language – appear today quite confused. This paper takes up these categories from Max Weber to highlight their problematic depth, which hold both the risks of populist developments and the resources to avoid them. What emerges from the relationship between democratization and rationalization, between bureaucratic impersonality and personal responsibility, is the spiritual meaning of the term Beruf, in which both the logic of ‘profession’ and the pathos of ‘charismatic vocation’ of politics coexist.