​Welcome to my website!

My name is Francesco Tava. I am Associate Professor of Philosophy in the School of Social Sciences at the University of the West of England, and Co-Editor-in-Chief of Future Humanities.

My main research interests are in political philosophy, phenomenology, and applied ethics. I am particularly interested in problems surrounding the meaning and function of political solidarity in the European context.

I am the author of The Risk of Freedom (2016), which analyses the political phenomenology of Czech philosopher and dissident Jan Patočka, and the editor of Phenomenology and the Idea of Europe (2017), Thinking after Europe (2016), and European Solidarity: Interdisciplinary Perspectives (2023).

I have also published in the following journals: 

Critical Horizons
The Journal of the British Society for Phenomenology
Journal of Medical Ethics
Critical Review of International Social and Political Philosophy
Philosophy Now
Phenomenology and Mind
Studies in East European Thought
Metodo
Filosofický Časopis
Horizon

I am currently writing a proposal for a book on political solidarity and its relationship to global justice, which I intend to submit to a UK publisher in 2024.

A complete list of my publications is available here.

I am currently working on several interdisciplinary research projects focusing on the construction of European solidarity and ethical models of data access and governance (uwedragon.org). In 2020-21, I have been collaborating with colleagues from the Bristol Business School on the process evaluation of the Research & Development Programme of the Open Data Institute. In 2022, I was Co-Investigator for the UKRI DARE UK project GRAIMatter (Guidelines and Resources for AI Model Access from TrusTEd Research environments)

Since its inception in 2022, I've served as Co-Editor-in-Chief of Future Humanities (FH), an open-access academic journal published by Wiley. FH focuses on the rise and convergence of new and critical humanities by disseminating trans- and inter-disciplinary research dealing with a broad spectrum of subjects and methodologies, including philosophy, cultural and historical studies, religious studies, linguistics and semiotics, literature, arts, and creative practices. These topics intersect with fields like digital transformation and artificial intelligence, health ethics and biomedical technologies, climate change and biodiversity, and new media and communication.

At UWE, I am Programme Leader for BA (Hons) Philosophy, where I currently teach modules on decolonisation in theory and practice and film-philosophy. In 2020-23, I was also Visiting Professor at the Faculty of Philosophy of Vita-Salute San Raffaele University (Milan, Italy), where I taught modules of political philosophy and theory and postcolonial studies, at BA and MA level.

I am keen on literature and film, and am one of the founders of Thought in Action – a partnership between UWE Philosophy and Politics & International relations and the Watershed cinema in Bristol.