In June LARB published a number of articles that explore the merits of what may be the most fragile of political systems — democracy — and tackle the dangers facing it around the world. Below you will find in-depth reviews of works of political science and on-the-ground reports of dissident movements and clandestine insurgencies, considerations of tyranny in classics of world literature and urgent calls for vigilance by political leaders. As always, we hope the material we publish will both challenge and inspire you, and perhaps stir you to action. — LARB
The Monthly Digest: July 2018
A Talk About Democracy
German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier's speech, delivered at the Getty Center, about the legacy of Thomas Mann and the state of democracy today.
Prisoners of a Vision: Dissidents in Sisi’s Egypt
The ongoing struggle against a US-backed dictatorship.
Pyongyang Torch Song
An American writes of his time in North Korea.
“A Lovely Grave for Learning”: Exhuming the Dead of Guatemala’s Genocide
A journey into the mass graves of Guatemala.
Fashion It Thus: Stephen Greenblatt’s “Tyrant”
What Shakespeare’s tyrants tell us about our own political crisis.
Black Panther and the Black Panthers
On the history of black superheroes and black revolutionaries.
Max Eastman: From Left to Right
Georgiy Chernyavskiy reviews “Max Eastman: A Life,” a biography by Christoph Irmscher.
The Vigilante Style in California Politics: At a Symposium in the Central Valley, Devin Nunes and Militia Hero Ammon Bundy Tap into a Deep Well of Agrarian Rage
Devin Nunes goes to a farm convention and reaps a crop of right-wing fury.
Hate Speech: An Imaginary Debate
Stephen Rohde offers an imaginary debate between Nadine Strossen and Richard Delgado.
The Autumn of Our Patriarch
Lois Zamora looks at contemporary American politics through the lens of "The Autumn of the Patriarch," a “dictator novel” by Gabriel García Márquez.
Reasonableness Without Reasons: Yascha Mounk’s “The People vs. Democracy”
Is populism a reaction against oligarchy, or is it part of the oligarchic plan?
Totalitarian Politics Are Local
A flawed but spirited attempt to develop a grand theory of the 21st-century autocratic revival.
From Nixon to Trump: Metastases of Cultural Power
Carl Freedman examines the cultural power dynamics that link Nixon and Trump.
Awaiting the Prophet: On Jonah Goldberg’s “Suicide of the West”
David Wolpe critiques “Suicide of the West,” a jeremiad by Jonah Goldberg.
An Imagined Insurgency: A Conversation with Bernard E. Harcourt
A law professor argues that counterinsurgency is no longer a temporary emergency measure but a permanent state of being.
Deep Dad: The End of The Americans
For Dear Television, Phil Maciak considers the dad rock series finale of FX's The Americans.
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