Fabris’ first areas of interest were Martin Heidegger’s thought and contemporary hermeneutics. At the age of 24 he published his first monograph, Logica ed ermeneutica (Pisa 1982), an outstanding work which offers an in-depth analysis of Heidegger’s view on the problem of hermeneutical logic. He translated into Italian many books of Martin Heidegger and Hans-Georg Gadamer. In 1988 he published another monograph on the same topic Filosofia, storia, temporalità. Heidegger e I problemi fondamentali della fenomenologia (Pisa 1988): one of the first book in Italy devoted to Heidegger’s lessons.
In the 1990s his two main areas of research were the development of modern Jewish thought – in particular then of Franz Rosenzweig, Gershom Scholem, Walter Benjamin and Emmanuel Levinas – and the discussion of the main problems of philosophy of religions in the age of religious pluralism. Important publications of this period are: Linguaggio della rivelazione: Filosofia e teologia nel pensiero di Franz Rosenzweig (Genova 1990), Esperienza e paradosso (Milano 1994), Introduzione alla filosofia della religione (Roma-Bari 1996), Tre domande su Dio (Roma-Bari 1998). In these years he also translated some writings of the preeminent modern scholar of Jewish mysticism Gershom Scholem.
In the late 1990s his attention went to studies on the genesis in ancient thought of some fundamental philosophical and religious concepts, like experience, love, person, etc. These studies led to two books: I paradossi dell’amore tra grecità, ebraismo e cristianesimo, (Brescia 2000), developed in connection of the “Eranos Group” in Ascona (Switzerland), and Paradossi del senso (Brescia, 2002), in which the concept of “paradoxical logic” was defined, discussed and applied to contemporary philosophical debate.
This project awakened his interest in communication, which became and still is one of his main areas of specialization (above all from an ethical point of view). From this moment on (2000) he will try to understand the way in which the new media have changed and will continue to change our society and quality of life, while seeking to give answers to the many ethical challenges this digital and technological revolution poses to our society without ignoring at the same time its many promising possibilities. Thanks to his formation in the philosophy of religion, he is also attentive to the difficult, but highly needed topic of intercultural and interreligious dialogue. The main works from this period are: El giro linguistico. Hermeneutica y analisis del lenguaje, (Madrid 2001); Etica della comunicazione interculturale (Lugano 2004); Etica della comunicazione (Roma 2006, 2014); A. Fabris and Mariano E. Ure (eds.), Etica de la communicacion entre dos continentes, Educa, Buenos Aires 2008; Filosofia delle religioni. Come orientarsi nell’epoca dell’indifferenza e dei fondamentalismi (Roma 2012).
More recently, Fabris has been interested in the importance of images in the philosophical and cultural debate, especially then from a phenomenological and hermeneutical point of view; in this way returning and staying true to its earlier interests. The result of this study is the co-authored volume Bild als Prozess. Neue Perspektiven einer Phänomenologie des Sehens (Würzburg 2011).
Fabris’ recent research was devoted to discuss ethical implication of some new technologies (Internet, social network, robotics etc.). See: Etica delle nuove tecnologie (Brescia 2012) and Ethics of ITCs (Springer, Cham 2018). In 2015 appears in the Handbook of Communication, vol. 5 (De Gruyter, Berlin) his Ethical Issues in Internet Communication.
From a broader philosophical point of view, he developed a “philosophy of relation”, through which many theoretical apories – well known in the history of philosophy, from Aristotle to Heidegger – are discussed and solved. See above all: TeorEtica. Filosofia della relazione (Morcelliana, Brescia 2010), RelAzione. Una filosofia performativa (Morcelliana, Brescia 2016), and Etica e ambiguità. Una filosofia della coerenza (Morcelliana, Brescia 2021).