Luigi Zanzi
was born in Varese on the 20th of September 1938, he completed his
studies in Varese (Classical high school) and in a College in Pavia,
graduated in Law in 1960. He works as a lawyer, mainly in civil matters.
He teaches Theory of history since 1973 at the University of Literature
and Philosophy in Genova and since 1987 at the University of Literature
and Philosophy in Pavia. His political engagement has been steady since
1964, with Altiero Spinelli, with the European Movement, whose Central
Committee he has been a member for a long time. Today he is assessor at
the Economic Program at Varese Municipality as an indipendent. He is
counsellor representing Pavia University at the Center of Scientific
Culture “Alessandro Volta”. He has been one of the founders, then
President and today Counsellor of the Institute “Ludovico Geymonat”. He
is vice-president of the International Association for the history of
the Alps, with its seat in Lucern.
The field of
research of Luigi Zanzi can be divided in different parts:
a) a
methodological and epistemological part in which he has made researches
on the historiographical working and on the different moments of history
of the historical thought, from the XVI to the XX century;
b) a part
dealing with the history of alpine civilization, particularly with
researches about alpine pastures high in the Central Alps (he has also
made, in this field, researches on the history of migrations in a
mountain environment);
c) a part
dealing with the history of nature, in which he has made works about the
history of “locally” natural evolution, addressing in particular to the
world of forests and mainly of alpine forests;
d) a part of
historical cosmology in which, in 1994, he has made researches on the
epistemological aspects of the cosmological history of the universe,
together with Ilya Prigogine.
