Is It Possible to Think About Capitalism with María Zambrano? A Review of the Philosopher’s Early Writings

Abstract Thinking about capitalism with María Zambrano may at first seem like a strange gesture. It is true that she does not devote much space to it throughout her work. However, there are a couple of writings to which I would like to pay special attention: on the one hand, her first published book in 1930, Horizonte del liberalismo , whose conclusions are particularly relevant; on the other, an earlier, unpublished manuscript titled Lo económico y lo humano , dated 1926 and preserved at the Fundación María Zambrano. This manuscript contains the initial intuitions that would later be developed in the published book. Thus, in the first section, these early texts are contextualized within her life; in the second, the unpublished manuscript is described in detail and analyzed in dialogue with the published work; and in the third, final reflections are presented, synthesizing the findings and pointing toward new avenues of research.