A Political and Literary Forum
Two new books take aim at the moral failures of meritocracy. But we can advocate for a more just society without giving up on merit.
Agnes Callard
The Krugs and Dolezals dominate the headlines, but they are distractions from the fraud that imperils us all: believing oneself to be white.
Luvell Anderson
Much maligned as a mere tactician of power, Machiavelli was in fact a philosopher of the people. His critique of oligarchic domination remains essential today.
Camila Vergara
A new book suggests that modern readers can still follow the path of reason that Spinoza traced to true well-being, but they might not want to.
Carlos Fraenkel
Many reject privatization for its distributional consequences. The deeper problem is that it threatens the very foundation of political legitimacy.
Chiara Cordelli
Unlike gender inequality, racial inequality primarily accumulates across generations. Transracial identification undermines collective reckoning with that injustice.
Robin Dembroff, Dee Payton
Simone de Beauvoir’s relationship with her readers was a mutually demanding collaboration.
Vivian Gornick
The Frankfurt School on the appeal of authoritarianism—and how to counteract it.
Charles H. Clavey
Pestilence and plague have often prompted waves of apocalyptic thinking, calling into question the steady march of progress in human history.
John Merrick
Anger’s history—along with the very fact that it has one—can shed light on the hypertrophied emotional climate of today.
David Konstan
While existentialist thinking has much wisdom to offer about anxiety, contingency, and death, we must also think concretely about politics and institutions.
Carmen Lea Dege
Two conflicting visions of equality have recently emerged on the American political left. Only one aims at institutional change.
Aziz Z. Huq
Three things we need to get right.
F. M. Kamm
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William Callison, Quinn Slobodian
Jacob Whiton
Charisse Burden-Stelly
Alberto Toscano
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