Cold War Archives - Public Seminar

Canceling the West, Putin Aims to “Make Russia Great Again”

The fact that anti-Western rhetoric is increasingly popular in Russia should be a wake-up call for Europe and the U.S.

March 1, 2023 • by Anastasia Shteinert

What is happening now in the country is the reappearance and radicalization of a centuries-old resentment of the West, in the context of the war in Ukraine....

Canceling the West, Putin Aims to “Make Russia Great Again”

Europe & Central Asia

Robert Jay Lifton on Psychic Numbing and the Warning from Ukraine

The renewed threat of nuclear war—and the importance of distinguishing between fear and anxiety

October 25, 2022 • by James Carroll and Robert Jay Lifton

Nuclear complacency is multifaceted. A certain amount of nuclear fear is appropriate to our situation. When we give in to what you’re calling nuclear complacency, it’s because we have insufficient fear of what is actually dangerous....

Robert Jay Lifton on Psychic Numbing and the Warning from Ukraine

War

Personal Reflections on War and Peace

A response to James Carroll

October 24, 2022 • by Frida Berrigan

The history of nonviolent successes is underreported, understudied, and under-understood. ...

Europe & Central Asia

Part 6: A New Treaty?

Revelations of the War in Ukraine: An anti-war activist’s personal and political reckoning

October 10, 2022 • by James Carroll

In this unprecedented context, a laserlike focus on banning the bomb can be a politically viable process, surpassing the failed efforts of bygone years, and even leading to the broader mitigation of “militarism” toward which peace movements have striven without success....

Europe & Central Asia

Part 5: After Ukraine

Revelations of the War in Ukraine: An anti-war activist’s personal and political reckoning

October 3, 2022 • by James Carroll

The Ukraine war has revealed, that is, that the single stoutest pillar of the current strategic “balance” is off kilter—a dangerously leaning tower, as it were, of peace....

Europe & Central Asia

Part 1: A Just War?

Revelations of the War in Ukraine: An anti-war activist’s personal and political reckoning

September 7, 2022 • by James Carroll

In nations bracketing the North Atlantic a great sigh of relief could almost be heard: how great to be free once more to demonize Moscow....

Democracy

A Connection That Never Expired

In 1974, Jeffrey Goldfarb went to Poland to do research about democracy—and put down lasting roots

July 7, 2021 • by Elzbieta Matynia and Claire Potter

Claire Potter: Elzbieta, let's begin with when you met Jeff Goldfarb. Elzbieta Matynia: Jeff and Naomi Goldfarb came to Poland in 1973—Jeff was on an IREX fellowship, and Naomi attended some studio classes at the Academy of Arts. I had just begun my graduate studies. But we were both interested in the same ...

Capitalism

There’s a Hidden Economic Trendline That Is Shattering the Global Trade System

Why economic nationalism is suddenly a fashionable excuse for countries to decrease their reliance on the existing global supply chains

July 8, 2020 • by Marshall Auerback and Jan Ritch-Frel

Covid-19 has accelerated a process that was well underway before it, spreading beyond U.S.-China-EU trade negotiations and into the world’s 50 largest economies. As much as many defenders of the old order lament this trend, it is as significant a shift as the dawn of the World Trade Organization (WTO) ...

There’s a Hidden Economic Trendline That Is Shattering the Global Trade System

Feature

American Russophobia in the Age of Liberal Decline

Under President Donald Trump, US–Russian relations have entered a new phase

March 28, 2019 • by Andrei P Tsygankov

Accusations of Russian interference have become the primary route through which to undermine Donald Trump. In order to sustain public outrage, media and political elites provide a constant flow of leaks, rumors and conspiracy theories. Failing liberal self-confidence is to blame for the return of Cold War rhetoric, argues Andrei ...

American Russophobia in the Age of Liberal Decline

Feature

The Story of the “Good War” Must Change

Seeing WWII as an American triumph prevents understanding Russia and Europe today

August 9, 2018 • by Bruce A. Williams

In his recent trip to Europe, President Donald Trump criticized NATO, expressed a willingness to accept Russian annexation of Crimea -- calling it a Russian-speaking area -- and failed to challenge Vladimir Putin's support of separatists in eastern Ukraine where 10,000 people have died and a civilian airliner was shot ...

Feature

The Demonization of Ethel Rosenberg

An excerpt from Trans-generational Trauma and the Other

April 24, 2018 • by Adrienne Harris

The Demonization of Ethel Rosenberg, by Adrienne Harris, appears in Trans-generational Trauma and the Other, a volume of essays published in 2017 psychoanalytically meditating on the question of the transgenerational transmission of trauma, metastasizing and alienated historical ghosts, and the inter-subjectivity of Big History. Public Seminar spoke with Dr Harris – who is, among many ...

Feature

Writing about Factual Media in an Age of Extremes

Our ‘Manhattan Project’ moment

March 9, 2018 • by Chris Anderson

Several months ago, my friend and colleague Daniel Kreiss and I were discussing something extraordinary: communication research, and communication researchers, suddenly seemed to be everywhere. Prompted by the role played by digital platforms in the election of Donald Trump and the undeniable power of media and communication companies in establishing ...

Cold War

Canceling the West, Putin Aims to “Make Russia Great Again”

The fact that anti-Western rhetoric is increasingly popular in Russia should be a wake-up call for Europe and the U.S.

Robert Jay Lifton on Psychic Numbing and the Warning from Ukraine

The renewed threat of nuclear war—and the importance of distinguishing between fear and anxiety

Personal Reflections on War and Peace

A response to James Carroll

Part 6: A New Treaty?

Revelations of the War in Ukraine: An anti-war activist’s personal and political reckoning

Part 5: After Ukraine

Revelations of the War in Ukraine: An anti-war activist’s personal and political reckoning

Part 1: A Just War?

Revelations of the War in Ukraine: An anti-war activist’s personal and political reckoning

A Connection That Never Expired

In 1974, Jeffrey Goldfarb went to Poland to do research about democracy—and put down lasting roots

There’s a Hidden Economic Trendline That Is Shattering the Global Trade System

Why economic nationalism is suddenly a fashionable excuse for countries to decrease their reliance on the existing global supply chains

American Russophobia in the Age of Liberal Decline

Under President Donald Trump, US–Russian relations have entered a new phase

The Story of the “Good War” Must Change

Seeing WWII as an American triumph prevents understanding Russia and Europe today

Writing about Factual Media in an Age of Extremes

Our ‘Manhattan Project’ moment

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