Essays

essays

Germany, land of experiments

Germany has long been a laboratory for political experiments, good and ill.

Daniel Johnson February 3, 2026

essays

China’s century of purges

Xi Jinping’s recent purges of senior PLA officers reveal a military stripped of independence, with obedience engineered over decades of Leninist structures.

Clark Aoqi Wu January 30, 2026

essays

The Revolution within Classics

Dan‑el Padilla Peralta, a prominent American classicist, has emerged as the face of radical critique in the academy – but his approach threatens to dismantle the field rather than ..

Jaspreet Singh Boparai January 30, 2026

essays

The fourth arm of defence

Britain’s interwar rearmament shows that military strength depends as much on industrial and economic strategy as on sheer spending.

Duncan Weldon January 28, 2026

essays

Russia’s imperial overstretch

As a vast, economically challenged and multi-ethnic polity, the Russian state is chronically overstretched. Its struggle to establish equilibrium points towards hegemonic decline.

Daniel Peris January 21, 2026

essays

Is the Islamic Republic on borrowed time?

The troubled history of the Arab Spring sheds light on the fate of Iran’s uprising. It explains why the Islamic Republic continues to survive waves of mass protest, yet may ultimat..

Shiraz Maher January 20, 2026

essays

Genoa 1922: a postwar reset that went wrong

The Conference of Genoa, 1922, promised the rebirth of a continent in ruins. Its failure offers a timely warning.

Oliver Yule-Smith January 16, 2026

essays

The invention of Singapore

In the early 19th century, Britain’s Thomas Stamford Raffles fused Enlightenment pragmatism, free trade, and secular education to create the foundations of modern Singapore.

Nic Allen January 16, 2026

essays

The two Americas

Since the Monroe Doctrine of 1823, relations between the United States and Latin America have oscillated between cooperation and conflict, reflecting deeper tensions over competing..

Damian Valdez January 14, 2026