A collaboration with The New School & the European Democracy Institute
 
Category: <span>Dispatches</span>

Will Trump Betray Taiwan?

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Time to Get Serious About Defending Democracy in the Indo-Pacific On July 31, 2025, news erupted that Taiwan’s President “William” Lai Ching-te had been denied entry to the United States by a Trump administration eager to curry favor with China. As his predecessors had done with regularity, President Lai planned to stop-over in America enroute to visiting allies in Latin America, but the Trump White House slammed the door …

Poland’s Presidential Election, and the Dangerous, Uncertain Future

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So how to make sense of last Sunday’s (June 1) Polish presidential elections, in which the candidate of the far-right, Karol Nawrocki of the Law and Justice Party (PiS), defeated the liberal mayor of Warsaw, Rafal Trzaskowski, from Civic Platform? I had a sense this would be the result, after first-round voting gave the combined far-right parties a near majority total.

The Constitution of Freedom: A Reply to Micah Beckwith’s Misreading of the 3/5 Compromise

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Lt. Governor Micah Beckwith recently took to X to post a short video denouncing the “DEI radical revisionist history” taught by “professors at woke schools.” His target: the idea that the 3/5 Compromise “was some terrible thing in our past.” This compromise—one of the compromises through which the U.S. Constitution was established in 1787—incorporated this language into Article I, Section 2 of the Constitution: “Representatives and direct Taxes shall be apportioned …

Authoritarianism is Built on Collaboration: How Supporters Enabled and Normalized the Fascist Consolidation of Power

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Photo: “Cover of “La Domenica del Corriere” of February 24, 1929, signing of the Lateran Treaty.” Author: Achille Beltrame (1871–1945).Source. Via WikiCommons. “Copertina della Domenica del Corriere Anno XXXI n. 8 del 29.2.1929 illustrata da Achille Beltrame. La didascalia recita: Uno storico avvenimento. Nel Palazzo Lateranense, il Duce e il Cardinale Gasparri firmano l’accordo tra lo Stato italiano e la Santa Sede. Disegno di A. Beltrame Italiano: Anno XXXI …

Letter to a Ukrainian Friend

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Photo: “President Trump clashes with Ukrainian President Zelenskyy Meeting in the Oval Office on Feb. 28, 2025.” Source: The White House. From Wikimedia Commons. February 28, 2025 My friend, Only hours ago I watched Donald Trump and J.D. Vance, the President and Vice President of my country, publicly berate and attempt to humiliate Volodymyr Zelenskyy, the President of your country. It was perhaps the most shameful public event …