Links to Recent Articles of Interest
By Walden Bello, Foreign Policy in Focus, posted June 30
An overview of the Chinese party's hundred-year history, focused especially on its rise to its current status as the world's leading economic power. The author is an internationally known Filipono sociologist and activist who teaches currently at the University of the Philippines.
By Rashid Khalidi, Foreign Affairs, posted June 30
Points to new features in the recent Israeli-Palestinian conflicts, including changing dynamics among the Palestinians. “… the stirring of a new generation of Palestinians offers some grounds for hope. A revivified Palestinian national movement can dispense with the assumptions and failures of previous generations and, through its actions and messaging, make clear the untenability of the status quo.”
The author teaches history and Modern Arab Studies at Columbia University.
The author teaches history and Modern Arab Studies at Columbia University.
By Lawrence Wittner, CommonDreams.org, posted June 29
A brief highlighting of recent political setbacks to right-wing nationalist parties in a number of countries around the world. The author is a professor of history emeritus at SUNY Albany.
By Gillian Brockell, Washington Post history blog, posted June 19
“Millions of Americans gained freedom from 1861 to 1865 in a slow-moving wave that includes the Emancipation Proclamation, Juneteenth and the passage of the 13th Amendment. There are millions of stories to tell.” This article spotlights three such stories from Virginia, Arkansas, and Kentucky. The author is a staff writer for the Washington Post's history blog, “Retropolis.”
Highlights some details in a bipartisan Senate report issued June 8 on the events of last January. The author is a historian who formerly taught at Tulsa University and other schools and is currently editor of Covert Action magazine. He has had books published on US foreign policy, the modernization of police repression, and the “drug war.”
By William J. Astore, TomDispatch.com, posted June 17
Finds parallels in the present-day US to the two big lies that infected Germany after World War I: that the German military was never defeated on the battlefield and that internal enemies in Germany had administered a “stab in the back.” The author is a retired Air Force lieutenant colonel who has taught at the Air Force Academy and the Naval Postgraduate School.
By Stephen Wertheim, New York Times, posted June 14
“It’s time for Americans to recover their critical faculties when they hear “NATO,” a military alliance that cements European division, bombs the Middle East, burdens the United States and risks great-power war — of which Americans should want no part.”
Mr. Wertheim, a historian of U.S. foreign policy, is the director of grand strategy at the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft.
By Nic Yeager, Texas Observer, posted June 10
A review essay on the new book Forget the Alamo by three Texas authors (Penguin, 2021) taking apart the standard account still required to be taught in Texas public schools) of the 1836 battle.
Interview with Ari Berman, Jacobin, posted June 5
On parallels between current Republican electoral manipulation efforts at the state level with the institution of all-white elections in the South after Reconstruction. Ari Berman is a senior reporter for Mother Jones and author of Give Us the Ballot: The Modern Struggle for Voting Rights in America (Macmillan, 2015).
By John Bellamy Foster, Brett Clark, and Hannah Holleman, Monthly Review, posted June 1
” With the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, the importance of historical-materialist epidemiology has become increasingly evident.” This article is a lengthy but readable, account of writers going back several centuries who have applied social analysis to the incidence of diseases and the circumstances that have produced them. The authors are sociologists at, respectively, the University of Oregon, University of Utah, and Amherst College.
Thanks to Rusti Eisenberg, Jerise Fogel, and an anonymous reader for flagging some of the above articles. Suggestions can be sent to jimobrien48@gmail.com.