Politics

The Myth of the Muslim Country

Calling the nations subjected to the ban Muslim is sloppy, misguided, and dangerous.

  • Elizabeth Shakman Hurd

What Totalitarianism Looks Like

Five signs of a totalitarian regime.

  • Christopher Lebron

Hamilton’s Choice

Hamilton presents us with the Choice of Hercules retold as a choice between two kinds of political life.

  • Martha C. Nussbaum
with responses from
  • William Hogeland
  • Marta Jimenez
  • Kenneth Warren

#Milosexual and the Aesthetics of Fascism

Milo Yiannopoulos was the paradoxical poster boy for the alt-right—until he wasn’t.

  • Daniel Penny

The President’s House Is Empty

Opting out, as Trump has done with the White House, is a neoliberal habit. But who bears the cost?

  • Bonnie Honig

Reagan Used MLK Day to Undermine Racial Justice

The holiday was legislated as part of a strategy to defang King of his most radical qualities while co-opting him into the ideology of colorblindness.

  • Justin Gomer
  • Christopher Petrella

Sign up for our newsletter

When W. E. B. Du Bois Was “Un-American”

At the height of the McCarthy era, he was punished for trying to keep alive a free and open debate about U.S. military, economic, and foreign policy.

  • Andrew Lanham

Five Looming Geopolitical Crises of the Trump Administration

A reckless foreign policy could bring ruin at home and abroad.

  • Jonathan Kirshner

Back of the Yards

Lessons from a community organizer on building political power.

  • Michael Gecan

Leftists and Liberals in the Political Heartland

The Clinton-Sanders conflict reveals the contentious history of the Democratic Party—and holds the key to its future.

  • Doug Rossinow

Feeling Paranoid

Phyllis Schlafly, Trump, and the Terror of Difference

  • Vivian Gornick

Lost Utopias

Alternatives to Zionism, from the Uganda Scheme to Birobidzhan, present a complex history of the search for a Jewish home.

  • Ezra Glinter

The Will of the People

The Electoral College once served an urgent political purpose. The time has now come to abolish it.

  • Kenneth A. Taylor

Garrison America and the Threat of Global War

The crisis of liberal capitalism has arrived, bringing us to the brink of total global war.

  • Alex de Waal

The New Politics of Hope

Where Trump whipped up faith in authoritarianism, Sanders revived hope in collective action. Sustaining that vision of social progress is the central task of the left today.

  • Ronald Aronson

A Special Message from BR Co-Editor Joshua Cohen

You can depend on Boston Review to provide open debate, guided by reason and supported by evidence.

After Trump

A pluralistic democracy is built on debate, disagreement, and wakeful action. This forum begins the conversation.

  • Joshua Cohen
with responses from
  • Janice Fine
  • Judith Levine
  • Robin D. G. Kelley
  • Christopher Petrella
  • William Howell
  • Nick Bromell

Voter Discrimination Starts Well Before Election Day

Voter ID laws burden minorities, but discrimination starts well before they reach the voting booth.

  • Ariel White

Hillary Clinton and the Unqualified Right to Abortion

She is the first major politician to support abortion without qualification. And she has never polled better with millennials.

  • Judith Levine

How Not to Argue for Basic Income

When proponents deploy the logic of market competition, they undermine democracy and social equality.

  • Brishen Rogers

Real Citizens

Trump shows us that populism is not the same as legitimate protest—or democracy.

  • Jan-Werner Müller

WATCH: Junot Díaz on Trump’s Shamelessness

Junot Díaz dissects Donald Trump's misogynist rhetoric and the larger societal forces that make it possible.

Putin’s More Perfect Union

The idea that Putin is driven by the philosophy of Eurasianism obscures the pragmatism of Russia’s foreign policy.

  • Jordan Michael Smith

The New World Order

The 1850s were a turning point for globalization, from telegraphs to colonization.

  • Matthew Karp
trending_flat
Get our newsletter

Vital reading on politics, ideas, and culture to your inbox

A political and literary forum, independent and nonprofit since 1975

Registered 501(c)(3) organization

Help Us Stay Paywall-Free

Donate

Become a Member

Subscribe