The powerful image of thousands of migrants marching together on the motorway between Budapest and Vienna, in the first week of September, is one of those images capable of symbolizing a turning point. It made visible the utter failure of the European policies on immigration and political asylum, while symbolizing ...
I have a morbid fascination with Carl Schmitt. Morbid, because he manages to condense, in his political theory and philosophy of law, pretty much everything I find repulsive about the radical right. His pessimism about “human nature” is raw and simplistic and, unlike Hobbes, whom he superficially resembles, ...
I am writing this with great relief as the “crisis” of sexual assaults on college campuses in New York State has finally been addressed through affirmative consent, or “yes means yes” legislation from Governor Cuomo. Having worked for years as the director of a college-based women’s center, having ...
An army revolt against vanishing communist forces brought back Constitutional order, halting the march toward totalitarianism, and was celebrated in Brazilian streets like a football victory. “Brazil,” The New York Times believed in 1964, “is a desperately sick country. The present struggle is simply to see who ...
I recently filled out a “Health Assessment” form for my employer and insurance company.
I was queried not only about my diet, exercise, and existing medical conditions. I was also asked about how happy I was at work, if I approved of my boss’s performance, whether I worried about money, and ...
I stand before you with more questions and contradictions than answers. I have chosen to speak of growing up “under different skies” because that was my destiny. What I don’t know is whether such a biographical accident sheds a very different light on growing up or whether it ...
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Public Seminar is a journal of ideas and debate published by the Public Seminar Publishing Initiative at The New School. Our free, nonprofit publication is made possible by the support of The New School and the generosity of our readers.
