Every ruling power tells itself stories to justify its rule. Nobody is the villain in their own history. Professed good intentions and humane principles are a constant. Even Heinrich Himmler, in describing the extermination of the Jews, claimed that the Nazis only “carried out this most difficult task for the love of our people” and […]
The Trump administration has yet to announce a policy on Afghanistan. For that, at least, we must be thankful. There is no basis on which to offer any recommendations: that would require shared goals and values, which do not seem to exist. Perhaps it might be possible—eventually, at least—to seek clarity on goals, lack of […]
When Elon Musk called Social Security “the biggest Ponzi scheme of all time” on Joe Rogan’s podcast on February 28, he was, wittingly or not, echoing a long line of conservative critics. Over the last fifteen years alone, a long line of Republican politicians—Mick Mulvaney, Ron Johnson, Rick Perry, Ted Cruz, and Rand Paul—have characterized […]
Boston Review recently hosted a virtual roundtable featuring contributors to a new collection of essays, Mastery and Drift: Professional-Class Liberals since the 1960s, published by University of Chicago Press. A full video of the event is below. The transcript that follows is of the second half of the event, with moderated discussion. It has been […]
The Solidarity Economy: Nonprofits and the Making of Neoliberalism after EmpireTehila SassonPrinceton University Press, $39.95 (cloth) The fight against global poverty was once all the rage. From the 1950s to the 1980s, when the Global South’s exploding populations desperately searched for jobs and food, everybody seemed to look for a solution: UN officials gathered emergency […]
On Settler Colonialism: Ideology, Violence, and JusticeAdam KirschW. W. Norton, $24.99 (cloth) I. The Pledge Christopher Nolan’s film The Prestige presents a three-act structure said to apply to all great magic tricks. First is the pledge: the magician presents something ordinary, though the audience suspects that it isn’t. Next is the turn: the magician makes […]
When Hamas-led gunmen massacred nearly 1,200 people on October 7, several fundamental conceptions, together with the Gaza fence, collapsed. Among them were the reliability of Israel’s highly regarded intelligence force, Hamas’s alleged pragmatism since it rose to power, and the deeply entrenched assumption, held by parts of the Israeli left, that resolving the Palestinian-Israeli conflict […]
When Hamas-led gunmen massacred nearly 1,200 people on October 7, several fundamental conceptions, together with the Gaza fence, collapsed. Among them were the reliability of Israel’s highly regarded intelligence force, Hamas’s alleged pragmatism since it rose to power, and the deeply entrenched assumption, held by parts of the Israeli left, that resolving the Palestinian-Israeli conflict […]
This essay is part of an Election Chronicle series in our Winter 2025 issue, Trump’s Return. Subscribe to get a copy. The year 2014 was a heady moment in the economic policy world. That spring, French economist Thomas Piketty’s Capital in the Twenty-First Century was published in English to astounding commercial and intellectual success. The […]
I live in Beirut in an area called the Corniche that runs along the edge of the American University of Beirut. The word, which comes from the French corniche, meaning “ledge,” refers to a road on a steep incline, usually along a coast or mountain face, that offers breathtaking views. Corniches are commonly associated with […]
