The Latest

Politics

Is There a War on Thanksgiving?

Some on the right insist that efforts to curtail Thanksgiving are in reality sinister attempts to rewrite the country’s history.

Arts in Society

Poet of the Impossible: Paul Celan at 100

Among the most innovative poets of European modernism, he forged a new path for poetry after the terrors of the twentieth century.

Politics Science

How to Fix the Climate

Diplomacy isn’t enough. To decarbonize the economy, we must integrate bottom-up, local experimentation with top-down, global cooperation.

Arts in Society

J. D. Vance’s Political Mythology

Why Hillbilly Elegy strikes such a national nerve.

Politics

Against Returning to Normal

Joe Biden positioned himself as the “return to normalcy” candidate. But normalcy is not something we can afford—we must actively resist it.

Gender & Sexuality Race

Why We Shouldn’t Compare Transracial to Transgender Identity

Unlike gender inequality, racial inequality primarily accumulates across generations. Transracial identification undermines collective reckoning with that injustice.

Politics

Biden Must Put Democracy First

Unless we bolster its foundations, our enfeebled democracy won’t be able to solve any of the daunting problems Biden has singled out as priorities.

Politics Race

I Don’t Have to Forgive Joe Biden

We should condemn the president-elect’s record on race, but that does not foreclose hope for his administration.

Class & Inequality

How Latin America Reimagined Classical Economics

The region has a long legacy of critical engagement with classical political economy, helping to change the way we think about markets and morals.

Arts in Society

Announcing the 2020 Boston Review Annual Poetry Contest Winner and Finalists

Congratulations to Cheswayo Mphanza!

Arts in Society

Announcing the 2020 Aura Estrada Short Story Contest Winner and Finalists

Congratulations to Yeoh Jo-Ann!

Science

Our Vaccine Infrastructure Needs a Radical Overhaul

We must reimagine how to make life-saving vaccines available to everyone.

Arts in Society

Three poems by Christopher Kempf

Politics Science

How to Fix the Climate

Biden should rejoin the Paris Agreement, but diplomacy isn’t enough. To decarbonize the economy, we must integrate bottom-up, local experimentation with top-down, global cooperation.

Gender & Sexuality Law

Mourning in Tehran

On Ashura, Shi’a Muslims grieve the Prophet’s grandson. But with Iran crippled by COVID-19 and U.S. sanctions, it was also an occasion this year to mourn the country’s deaths from disease and despair.

Law Politics

Bolsonaro’s War Against Reason

The Brazilian president’s offensive against universities threatens democracy and recalls the dark years of the country’s dictatorship.

Politics

What Are Parties For?

Basic norms exist for political parties; Republicans don’t meet them.

Politics Race

Births of a Nation, Redux

If we’d paid attention, we wouldn’t have expected a Biden landslide.

Law Politics

Democracy Hangs in the Balance

Part two of a conversation on voter turnout, vote counting, and what we can expect now. 

Politics Science

From the Editor: Thinking in a Pandemic

COVID-19 is not just a public health crisis. It is also a crisis of public reason.

Politics

In Defense of Politics

The only antidote to despair over national politics will be to generate and expand new solutions at local, state, and regional levels.

Class & Inequality Politics

COVID-19 Provides All the More Reason to Tax the Rich

Tax policies like New Jersey’s new Millionaires Tax are essential—not only for an equitable recovery, but also for reining in pre-pandemic inequality.

Arts in Society

Suite for Trayvon

(and for the ones we raise)

Politics

When Democracy Ails, Magic Thrives

West German witchcraft trials after World War II reveal how political rupture can fuel magical thinking.

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