Do they work, can they work? If the opposition parties had agreed on a candidate, Orban in Hungary, Modi in India, Duterte in the Philippines, and Morawiecki in Poland wouldn’t have won the last national election in their countries. In fact, the incapacity of the opposition to establish election alliances helps authoritarian governments all around the world. One of the factors behind this incapacity is the fact that …
Kateryna Mishchenko is a Ukrainian writer, curator and publisher. She is co-founder and editor of the Ukrainian publishing house Medusa, and has also served as the editor of Prostory, a magazine on art, literature and social critique. A participant in our recent Democracy Seminar webinar on the Russian war on Ukraine, Kateryna spoke powerfully about her initial shock and horror at the Russian attack, which she experienced from her …
Putin and the limits of Realism The Russian invasion of Ukraine, and the unified international response to it, have raised once again the specter of nuclear war. After the US, the EU, Canada, Japan and Australia responded to the invasion with robust economic sanctions, Putin ordered Russia’s nuclear forces to move to a higher state of alert—to take up “a special regime of combat duty” that has no …
As I observed in a recent commentary, Russian teachers are at the center of whatever debate is still possible in Russia about Putin’s bloody war on Ukraine. The regime is doing its best to use public schools as vehicles of its propaganda, because it is only through propaganda and disinformation that its war can be sustained in the face of the Russian military’s incompetence and the extraordinary Ukrainian …
Reflections on Putin’s war in Ukraine and its implications As the war in Ukraine unfolds, I am both horrified and hopeful. Day by day, the suffering of the Ukrainian people is ever worse. Yet, as well, the limited effectiveness of the brutal military actions of invading forces are likewise revealed day by day. Here, six notes on the horror, five notes on hope, and six reflections between hope and horror, followed …
The rising autocrats. The melting ice caps. The widening gyre of economic inequality. The tide of refugees at the Polish-Ukrainian border – or at Ciudad Juarez. The endless pandemic. Those of us attempting to bear up under this parade of crises may look back with nostalgia at a time when only a single specter haunted a single continent. In our own times, it seems, that lone specter has …
Fickle are the keyboards of most people writing in the 21st century and those struck by strategic analysts are fickler still. Three weeks ago the vast majority of experts in military matters were forecasting a quick Russian victory in Ukraine, even against significant Ukrainian resistance. Russian armor was supposed to reach and take Kyiv in days, supported by paratroopers securing strategic airfields. The planes bearing the red star …
It’s my seventh day in Hamburg. I’m sitting on the bedroom floor, leaning against the closed door, and talking on FaceTime with a close friend. People down the corridor are about to go to sleep. Then he says, “Write. Notes. On Twitter. On Instagram.” And I ask, “why?” He responds, “Maybe, a person will read them and feel better for a second.” I have never thought that I …
From the moment that Russian troops first attacked his country on February 24, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelinskyy has bravely rallied his country, and much of the world, in opposition to Putin’s aggression. Since that time Ukrainians have fought bravely against the inefficient but brutal Russian military onslaught. They have been an example to everyone in the world who cares about freedom. Two weeks ago I wrote that Zelinskyy …
At first glance, it may seem like a strange and even a preposterous undertaking. My country is under attack. Thousands of people have already died. Many more may die in the upcoming days, even hours. Ukrainian cities are being shelled, schools and hospitals are being destroyed by bombs and artillery fire, women and children are hiding in bomb shelters and basements. The whole world is watching a gigantic …
