Essays Archive

'Taming the British Lion'. Puck magazine, 1888.

essays

The end of Pax Britannica

A mercantilist, multipolar geopolitical system appears to be emerging from within the liberal world order, destined to replace it. The experience of Britain's imperial past suggest..

Graeme Thompson September 10, 2025

Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni addresses the Italian Senate.

essays

Giorgia Meloni’s balancing act

The Italian Prime Minister has so far pursued a careful, pragmatic approach to government. Her greatest test will be whether she can implement her ambitious reform of Italy's const..

Bill Emmott September 5, 2025

A section of Shenzhen Port viewed from the air near Shekou, Nanshan.

essays

Is China’s mercantilism cracking up?

As the global economic order continues to fracture, President Xi Jinping is doubling down on China's mercantilist model, deepening Beijing's domestic problems while fuelling discon..

George Magnus September 3, 2025

essays

A wealth of classical music

If we want classical music to thrive, we need to pay for it. Culture this sophisticated must, by definition, be cultivated.

Richard Bratby September 1, 2025

A Ukrainian military cemetery for soldiers who have died in the Russo-Ukrainian conflict.

essays

Ukraine’s painful endgame

The era of magical thinking by Ukraine and its Western allies is over. In the absence of a formal peace treaty, Ukrainian security can only be guaranteed by arming Kyiv to the teet..

Owen Matthews August 29, 2025

A destroyed Russian tank with the image of a dove painted in the Ukrainian national colours, in Irpin, Ukraine.

essays

Russia’s reckoning is coming

Beyond the bluster of his meeting with President Trump, Vladimir Putin is in trouble. Isolated, outmanoeuvred, and stalled on the battlefield, Russia is tottering financially and m..

Peter Caddick-Adams August 27, 2025

Rudolph Müller, View of the Acropolis from the Pynx (1863).

essays

The classical key to the AI revolution

Only by reviving the classical conception of democracy, distinct from liberal democracy, can our societies reconcile the myriad opportunities and challenges unleashed by Artificial..

John Tasioulas August 21, 2025