"Il dono, tra reciprocità e agape"

Abstract: Having underlined the favourable conditions of the current situation in Italy, the article de nes the of terms used by the social sciences for the concrete dynamics of daily life. It then goes on examine a series of key concepts for the phenomenon of ‘gift’ and for its theoretical understanding: law (whose observance is seen also within the logic of gift), exchange, mutuality and agape, and gift in itself. The writer introduces the development of a multiform model of gift relating it to the intentions of the giver and to the different consequences and processes involved in each particular case. The developing argument discusses the various points of meeting and of contrast between the experiences of gift and of agape.