Politics Archives - Page 6 of 143

Genocide

The Self-Orientalization of Israeli Politics

Why “the only democracy in the Middle East” is cozying up to authoritarian regimes

February 19, 2025 • by Assaf David and Arie Dubnov

Israel has often been described as the only democracy in the Middle East. This perception—flawed and problematic as it is—has been central not only for Israel’s defenders abroad but also for many Jewish Israelis’ self-perception. The power consolidation of an extreme coalition of right-wing political parties in recent years, coupled ...

Democracy

An Open Letter to Kamala Harris

When silence is not an option

February 13, 2025 • by Melvin L. Rogers

On the final night of the Democratic National Convention in August 2024, Vice President Harris delivered what was meant to be a defining speech of her career. Accepting her party’s nomination, she did more than make the case for her presidency—she sounded the alarm. “With this election, our nation has a precious, fleeting ...

Democracy

Trust in Political Leaders Plummets Worldwide

When it comes to political legitimacy, the more significant the expectations, the higher the disappointments

February 11, 2025 • by Camila Rodríguez Nardi

In early November 2024, PULSAR, the academic observatory of the University of Buenos Aires, and the Konrad Adenauer Foundation (KAS), published a Spanish-language report that analyzed the social approval of national governments in 16 countries across Western Europe, North America, and Latin America. The document compiled approval ratings of presidents ...

Trust in Political Leaders Plummets Worldwide

Podcast

The Great American Crack-Up

Episode 67: Julian Zelizer asks us to reimagine political division as a good thing in a conversation about his new book, In Defense of Partisanship

February 10, 2025 • by Claire Potter

Back in 2016, like about a million other fans, I was listening obsessively to Lin-Manuel Miranda’s Broadway show, Hamilton: An American Musical. Unlike a lot of stage-door Johnnies, I am a historian of the United States. So, when my friend and colleague Renée Romano called to suggest we edit a collection ...

Democracy

From Erdoğan’s Turkey to Trump’s America

What we can learn from a parallel history

February 7, 2025 • by Phyllis Jeffrey

In 2002, voters in Turkey—reeling from an economic crisis that halved the value of the Turkish lira and produced a 7.5 percent drop in GDP—elected a new party by a plurality: 34.3 percent of the vote. Though hardly a resounding mandate, the margin enabled the party, an Islamist offshoot led by ...

From Erdoğan’s Turkey to Trump’s America

Democracy

The Dictatorship of the Tech Bros—or, What Is to Be Done?

A conversation about DOGE and Trump and Musk’s attempt to smash the state

February 7, 2025 • by Forrest Deacon and James Miller

Editor’s note: In December 2024, Forrest Deacon, a Humanities lecturer at Villanova University who is also completing a dissertation in politics at the New School for Social Research, approached Public Seminar, offering to write a piece about the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE). At the time, this seemed like a ...

The Dictatorship of the Tech Bros—or, What Is to Be Done?

Democracy

Trump Returns

Anyone who knows what will happen in 2028 probably doesn’t know much

February 6, 2025 • by David Plotke

The following remarks were first presented on November 13, 2024, in a public lecture at the New School for Social Research. Donald Trump’s substantial victory was a big deal, but not yet a full-scale political shift. Trump made a successful move in the trench warfare that now defines American politics, ...

History

Israel’s American History

On Israel’s ambivalent relationship with the United States and OZ Frankel’s latest book, Coca-Cola, Black Panthers, and Phantom Jets: Israel in the American Orbit, 1967–1973

January 29, 2025 • by Oz Frankel and Claire Potter

Historian Oz Frankel's new book, Coca-Cola, Black Panthers, and Phantom Jets: Israel in the American Orbit, 1967–1973 (Stanford University Press, 2024), examines the multifaceted and contradictory presence of the United States in Israel during a short but significant period of history. In a conversation with Claire Potter, Frankel shares the ...

Body & Mind

Downward Mobility as a Relative Loss in Economic Security

How economic anxiety explains voting patterns

December 19, 2024 • by Teresa Ghilarducci and Ludovica Tursini

In 2016 formerly unionized parts of the country, the "Arsenal of Democracy," now called the Rust Belt (to the dismay of people who live there), switched from voting for the Democratic Party candidate Obama (both in 2008 and 2012) to the Republican Trump. Teresa Ghilarducci and Siavash Radpour (2016) show long-term stagnation ...

Downward Mobility as a Relative Loss in Economic Security

Capitalism

Social Capitalism: An Alternative to Neoliberalism

On the economic consequences of the US neoliberal period

December 18, 2024 • by Mark Setterfield

As defined by Hagen Krämer and coauthors (2023), social capitalism constitutes a "renewed social democracy" designed to achieve growth that is both inclusive (in the sense of being consistent with an equitable wage share of income) and sustainable (in the sense that it does not foster financial imbalances). These constitute narrow definitions of inclusivity and ...

Capitalism

Reconstructing Capital

The politics of translating Marx

December 6, 2024 • by Gant Roberson and William Clare Roberts

Gant Roberson interviews William Clare Roberts about the evolving relevance of Marxist theory with the latest translation of Capital. ...

Podcast

To The Constitution, With Love

Episode 63: A conversation with historian Mary Ellen Curtain about her book She Changed the Nation: Barbara Jordan’s Life and Legacy in Black Politics

November 20, 2024 • by Claire Potter

In the summer of 1974, I was glued to the television for most of the day. For the first time in my life, my parents didn’t insist that I shut it off, go outside—do something useful. That was Watergate Summer, the weeks that a national drama played out all day on ...