Notebooks Archive

Map of the secret Sykes-Picot agreement, showing the proposed division of the Middle East British and French areas.

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The perils of partition

Those who seek to carve up Syria should know that partitions never work. The divisions they create are at best arbitrary and must be enforced with violence, as the history of the M..

James Snell March 10, 2025

Tomb stones in the Srebrenica Massacre Memorial and Cemetery for the victims of the Bosnian Genocide.

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The Genocide Convention and its discontents

In 1948, the UN General Assembly ratified the Genocide Convention to punish and prevent one of humanity's worst crimes. Today, questions arise about whether this legal framework is..

Christopher Hale March 7, 2025

Reading by Berthe Morisot, oil on fabric, 1873.

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How to revive our reading culture

Technology has become a convenient scapegoat for the decline of literacy. The real problem lies in our society’s approach to reading as a shallow mode of self-expression rather tha..

Tiffany Jenkins March 6, 2025

A Russian T-64 tank painted in the colours of the Ukrainian flag with Kyiv's Motherland Monument in background.

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My journey to a defiant Ukraine

Even now, on the third anniversary of Vladimir Putin’s full-scale invasion, Ukrainians remain valiant and defiant. But with Washington withdrawing its support for their struggle, E..

Brendan Simms March 5, 2025

Donald Trump speaks during Time magazine's Person of the Year event.

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The Trump effect

The Donald Trump we know today has a lot in common with the Trump of 2000 or 1988. The consistency and brute force of the president's core convictions allow him to make the politic..

Samuel Rubinstein March 4, 2025

Franklin Delano Roosevelt and Winston Churchill aboard HMS Prince of Wales for the 1941 Atlantic Charter meeting.

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The end of the Atlanticist Era

European leaders shouldn’t be surprised that the United States is reverting to its isolationist type. Despite this tendency, the Atlanticist Era has lasted for longer than anyone e..

Robert Lyman March 3, 2025

Getriebewerk factory hall in Brandenburg in 1989-1990/

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The revolt of Germany’s working class

Germany's workers are turning to the radical right because they feel alienated by the internationalist ethos and welfare policies of their country's ruling classes, as the recent s..

Katja Hoyer February 28, 2025

The Jingo Bully: a political cartoon from 1897 satirising tariff wars between the United States and Europe.

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The transatlantic alliance is fractured, not broken

Despite the severe strains that are being placed on the transatlantic alliance by the Trump Administration, Europe and the United States are bound by economic and security ties tha..

George Magnus February 27, 2025

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The art of Éric Rohmer

The filmmaker Éric Rohmer never sought a mass audience: he wanted to reach those thoughtful, sensitive people to whom poetry, art and serious music play an integral role in life, a..

Jaspreet Singh Boparai February 26, 2025