Essays

essays

What the Romans did for the US

An awareness of Roman history was crucial to the founding of the American Republic. Perhaps the solution to the United States’ current external and internal crisis still lies with ..

David Cowan November 13, 2023

essays

An endless dialogue between past and present

The German art historian Aby Warburg understood that the mysterious power of iconography lies in its ability to transform the meanings of visual imagery over time. It is a power th..

Wessie du Toit November 6, 2023

essays

How history’s quest for truth became a call to action

Hayden White’s Metahistory was published fifty years ago. Many of today’s historians are its children.

Samuel Rubinstein October 31, 2023

essays

How Israel reset the energy map

The Yom Kippur war of 1973 heralded a decade of global energy crises. The situation fifty years on remains perilous, but in ways no one could have predicted, not least in Israel’s ..

Helen Thompson October 24, 2023

essays

The Entente Cordiale: bad history but good politics

A popular feature of any discussion of Anglo-French relations, talk of an entente cordiale obscures a complex, often challenging history – but it remains an effective political too..

T.G. Otte October 18, 2023

essays

Israel’s new Yom Kippur

For Israelis, the October 1973 national trauma is being revisited in October 2023.

Ahron Bregman October 11, 2023

essays

Contradictions at the heart of an expanding Europe

Western Europe is pursuing a contradictory policy, declaring a commitment to both enlarge the EU and integrate its members ever deeper, in opposition to the wishes of its electorat..

Timothy Less October 2, 2023

essays

Can the US make the world safe for democracy?

The US must adopt a grand strategy of democratic expansion. Only then can global security be established.

Kori Schake September 26, 2023

essays

De Gaulle’s world in motion

Part prophet, part statesman, Charles de Gaulle knew instinctively that political success and failure are inevitably interlinked, and that history would be the ultimate judge of bo..

Julian Jackson September 19, 2023