Essays

Feature

A Ticket for the Rome Express

A Strategy for Democracy

September 27, 2019 • by
In Budapest, and shortly before local elections, some of my friends now speak of the Istanbul Express. As readers know, in that enormous city, followers of the slightly left Republican People’s Party (CHP), of the Kurdish People’s Democratic Party (HDP) and a small nationalist grouping, “the Good Party,” united to ...
Read More
Placeholder
Feature

On Hate and Boycotts

How We Choose What We Believe

September 26, 2019 • by
It took me about six months to start interacting with people I perceived as "white." It took me a lot longer to reflect on how I could so readily use the word hate. With time I realized it was because, where I came from, hating white people -- which mostly meant ...
Read More
Placeholder
Feature

On Postcolonial Remembering and Democratic Openings in Taiwan

An Interview with Former Political Prisoner, Fred Chin

September 26, 2019 • by and
Beginning with the infamous “228” massacres in the Spring of 1947, Chiang Kai-shek’s Kuomintang (KMT) brutalized Taiwan with murder, torture, mass imprisonment, and relentless censorship -- this period has come to be known as the “White Terror.” The brave work of generations of activists led to the KMT finally lifting ...
Read More
Placeholder
Feature

Socialist Humanism

Integrating Psychology into a New Progressive Politics

September 26, 2019 • by
The Alternative: Towards a New Progressive Politics is, perhaps, one of the most inspiring and forward-thinking texts to come out of UK progressive politics for several years. Edited by a Green MP (Caroline Lucas), a Labour MP (Lisa Nandy), and a Liberal Democrat candidate (Chris Bowers), the book lays out a ...
Read More
Placeholder
Feature

Death by Omission

Power and Politics in the Amazon

September 25, 2019 • by
Celebrity Distractions Shellenberger begins by attacking public celebrities who shared photos that were either not from the Amazon or actually dated back to years earlier: “Celebrities, environmentalists, and political leaders blame Brazilian president, Jair Bolsonaro, for destroying the world’s largest rainforest, the Amazon, which they say is the “lungs of the world.” Singers and ...
Read More
Placeholder
Art & Design

The Writing on the Wall

Orozco, Benton, and Arnautoff

September 25, 2019 • by
Student and activist groups have campaigned for the removal of the murals, arguing they were detrimental to the education and well-being of students of color, who had to confront these images as they walked the halls or ascended the staircase. On the other side of the debate, art historians and ...
Read More
Placeholder
Feature

A Call For A Global Focus On Community Values

A market for values is what the world Needs to reconcile democracy and capitalism, community and the individual

September 24, 2019 • by
The weakening of democracy and community Liberal democracy is in retreat in several countries: Brazil, India, Hungary, Poland. It is also going through an identity crisis in the United States and United Kingdom. In Italy in the last year there has been a sharp increase in divisiveness on issues such as ...
Read More
Placeholder
Uncategorized

Feminism, Elections, and Beyond

On the effects of the green wave in Argentina

September 24, 2019 • by and
When people from other latitudes ask us how we managed to achieve such mobilized feminisms, we have no other choice but to trace our history. The massive mobilization for Ni Una Menos in 2015 surprised us, but to prevent that energy from dissipating, the feminists that had been struggling for ...
Read More
Placeholder
Blue Monday

The Trump “Whistleblower” Situation Is Very Dangerous for Democracy and for the Democrats

Biden’s disingenuousness is no match for Trump

September 23, 2019 • by
Do the recent revelations by investigative journalists at the New York Times, the Washington Post, and most notably the Wall Street Journal represent an “inflection point,” exposing a level of malfeasance and criminality that can no longer be ignored? Perhaps. It is too early to tell. But the record of the past seems pretty ...
Read More
Placeholder
Exiles on 12th Street

Futures

Exiles on 12th Street, Episode Five

September 23, 2019 • by
The future can sometimes seem daunting and frightening, but it can also feel like an unwritten adventure. As children, we played in a world of infinite possibilities, in which imagination—not predestination—ruled the day. In the fifth episode of Exiles on 12th Street, we explore possibilities the future may hold. From ...
Read More
Placeholder
Feature

Stormy Times in Argentina

A View from Buenos Aires

September 23, 2019 • by
The core of this article was written a week before the results of the primary elections on August 11, which massively rejected the national economic and social policies implemented by current President Mauricio Macri, as demonstrated by the 15 point spread between the victorious Alberto Fernandez and Macri. These primary ...
Read More
Placeholder
Feature

I Want to Run for Office. Thank You, AOC.

A letter to Alexandira Ocasio-Cortez

September 22, 2019 • by
Your Spanish is like mine; acquired in the streets, it sounds like it was put through a strainer, and I love it. You weren’t supposed to run for office. Mother from La Isla and dad from the South Bronx. Born in a place where zip code determines your destiny. Bearing a long, hyphenated ...
Read More
Placeholder

Newsletter

Free to subscribe. No spam.
Delivered by Substack.

Connect With Us

Instagram
Bluesky
Facebook
Twitter
Copyright © 2014–2026 The Editorial Board of Public Seminar, All Rights Reserved.