The recent disqualification of the Parot doctrine by the Strasbourg Court of Human Rights has provoked a general reaction of indignation, which is worth reflecting on, when distance permits. As Durkheim saw, the clamor with which the people resent criminal actions tends over time to take shape in a new penal code, expressive of their moral sensibility. In this sense, a unanimous social reaction is an important indication to the legislator that something needs revision, even urgent revision.

However, it also seems clear that the ordinary operation of the law should not be at the mercy of popular reactions. For better or for worse, the principle of legal certainty, and ultimately written request the very possibility of civil society, requires that the cold reasons of law, better or worse interpreted, have the last word.

Who will not be in solidarity with the victims who have suffered terrorist violence? Historically, we owe it to them to have recovered civic courage and moral clarity in the face of the ideological cover-ups of crime. However, our historical debt with the courage of the victims does not authorize us to capitalize on their pain to break the basic Structures of the rule of law, to which we owe a space for coexistence, perhaps imperfect, but generally safe.

I consider it significant that a thinker like Hume, an illustrious representative of ethical emotivism, held a rather rationalist social theory. And this simply because he considered it possible to generate social service on the basis of each individual pursuing his "true" interest, his long-term interest deadline, which would sooner or later pass through cooperation. If, in spite of knowing what our interest is, we sometimes do not follow it, says Hume, it is because our conduct is distorted by "violent passions", which do not listen to reason and which block any strategic consideration, locking us into the satisfaction of the present passion. Clearly, Hume's is an enlightened social theory, whose theoretical potential would be questioned if it were interpreted as a descriptive theory of what actually happens, and not, rather, as a theory rules and regulations about what should happen, in order to create a civil society: to control violent passions.

Unlike other moments in the past, and with the exception of the bleeding case of Islamic terrorism, nowadays, the abrupt breakdowns of civil coexistence no longer refer to religious motivations; rather they respond to ideologies and particular interests, with which people who voluntarily exclude themselves from the rule of law end up benefiting from the rights that it recognizes them. This class of abuse of institutions originally introduced to preserve justice is what explains the citizen indignation, pronouncing the abyss between the feelings of the people and the institutions supposedly at their service.

Now, precisely in the midst of this dramatic fracture between formal rationality and feelings of justice, there should be a space for reflection on the foundations of our rule of law and the ways to overcome the inequality resulting from providing the same legal protection to the criminal and his victim. In the meantime, however, it is worth remembering that, despite its obvious limitations, the coldness of the law, which we now deplore, is that which on other occasions can protect us from arbitrary abuses.

On the other hand, civil society is also built and deteriorates by non-legal means. Thus, for example, either by appealing to the historical report , or on the occasion of nationalism, there is much talk in recent times of the polarization of the public discussion , and of the fractures it introduces into civil society. Comparatively less is said about those responsible for this polarization, who by capitalizing on the less kind feelings of our nature give the impression of expecting some benefit from the confrontation. But, in fact, every word uttered in the public space is presented in the light of commonplaces and slogans that -like the stimuli of Pavlov's experiment- trigger the conditioned reflex of a predictable social response, always under the sign of conflict, provoking stereotyped reactions in both sides, a continuous misunderstanding. 

In this sense, we would do well to initiate a collective reflection on the emotional traps with which, frequently on a daily basis, public opinion makers hijack civil society's ability to enlighten itself with rigor and serenity on the issues that concern us. Now then: I do not believe that a social change in the direction of a greater understanding between the parties can be led by the political class : it is a task that clearly exceeds them. Instead, we should ask ourselves what each one of us could do from our own place to create social cohesion and face, as we should, the collective challenges to which, beyond our legitimate differences, an increasingly globalized world summons us.