This essay begins with the study of ancient rhetoric to develop some
philosophical reflections on which to base a historical reconstruction
that will lead us, through the various definitions of rhetoric and all
its practical, ethical, social and political implications, to the world
of today, where we will find the cue to question the more or less
rhetorical languages developed within the democracies and the so-called
populisms that characterize the West - or rather, what remains of it.