Amid the complex cross-currents of the Latin American political scene, where to situate Lula’s Brazil? Dynamics of neo-populism and statification, social credits and government graft as elements of a novel reconstitution of power under a Workers Party president.
The hollowing of democracies, as ruling elites retreat and voters abstain from mass electoral politics. Peter Mair on the paradoxes of its ‘third wave’ triumph and emergence of a governing class bereft of legitimacy, as parties become appendages of the state.
Charged in 1951 with defending rights of asylum, the UN High Commissioner for Refugees has been recast for an age of humanitarian warfare. From Operation Provide Comfort to Bosnia and the Rwandan massacres—a compliant advocate of repatriation at any cost.
Life-cycle of Cahiers du cinéma. The trajectory of the pre-eminent film journal, from cine-clubs of Liberated Paris to masterpieces of the New Wave, barricades to the pensée unique, tracked against broader changes in French intellectual culture.
Contradictions of his country’s breakneck urbanization in the cinema of Francisco Lombardi. Film’s rival media—tele-reportage, newspapers, radio, videotaped corruption—brought into play to create new cinematic forms.
Hong Kong labour activist Au Loong-Yu discusses the impact of Chinese sovereignty on the former British colony, and Pacific Rim protests against the WTO. What prospects for an alter-globalization in the East?
Tom Mertes on Sean Wilentz, Andrew Jackson. A retouched portrait of the Democrat founding father—minus Indian massacres, slave exploitation and financial bubble.
JoAnn Wypijewski on Louis Uchitelle, Disposable Americans. Case studies from the underbelly of the US economy: the growth of lay-offs, debt and insecurity from Reagan to the dot.com crash.
Achin Vanaik on Zbigniew Brzezinski, The Choice. Clinton’s grey eminence ponders the hegemon’s next moves. What changes are required for imperial strategy to remain the same?
