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Jung & Naiv
Jung & Naiv

#794 - Philosophin Lea Ypi

November 25, 2025 • 2h 39m

Summary

⏱️ 9 min read

Overview

A wide-ranging philosophical and political discussion with Lea Yuppi, a professor of politics and philosophy at LSE, covering her Albanian background, the fall of communism, critiques of capitalism and oligarchy, democratic deficits in the EU, the crisis of the left, migration politics, and the need for democratic alternatives to both state socialism and market capitalism.

Albanian Origins and the Collapse of Pyramid Schemes

Lea Yuppi describes growing up in communist Albania and leaving in 1997 during a financial collapse caused by pyramid schemes. These legal financial institutions collapsed, causing most Albanians to lose their savings and triggering civil unrest. Against this backdrop of institutional breakdown, she chose to study philosophy rather than pursue a traditional profession, seeking a way to ask fundamental questions about a world where law, markets, and medicine had all failed.

  • Yuppi left Albania in 1997 when there was a war/civil unrest triggered by the collapse of pyramid schemes
  • Most Albanians had invested their savings in these legal pyramid schemes with the expectation of future happiness
  • The collapse led to a breakdown of the state, with Kalashnikovs outside her window during her final year of high school
  • She chose philosophy because traditional professions (law, economics, medicine) no longer made sense when those systems had broken down
" All I had at the time were questions. And so I thought, what could I study that makes me ask questions in a good way? And somehow philosophy, I think, emerged as the subject that I picked. "

Journey Through Philosophy: From Kant to Marx

Yuppi explains her philosophical journey, beginning with Kant during her studies in Italy. She was drawn to Kant's philosophy because it provided critical tools without descending into complete skepticism—offering a way to critique authority and dogmatism while maintaining faith in practical reason and human progress. This balanced approach was especially meaningful after experiencing both communist dogmatism and its sudden replacement with market fundamentalism in Albania.

  • Most Albanians learned Italian by watching Berlusconi television channels showing soap operas and entertainment programs
  • In Italy, philosophy education was challenging because she lacked the background Italian students had from studying philosophy in high school
  • She survived early struggles by focusing on logic and formal systems where her Soviet-style math training gave her an advantage
  • Kant became her primary philosophical influence because his work navigates between skepticism and dogmatism
" There's two dangers. One is skepticism and one is dogmatism. And I think the Kantian philosophy gave me some kind of grounding and a sense in which you could be critical of dogmatism and of authority and authoritarianism, but that being critical of everything doesn't mean that you then end up a skeptic. "

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