In Praise of Wokeness

Don't blame woke ideas, which have merit, for the self-defeating style of politics that is pervasive online.

Finding Freedom in the Gender Phantasmagoria

The parts where Butler does what they do best—academic analysis of gender and culture—are excellent, but they sit uneasily alongside an awkward and insistent self-defense.

Against the Slave Power: the Fugitive Liberalism of Frederick Douglass

Douglass elaborated a political theory from his experiences as a slave, where institutions were directed against people like him. He had to become attuned to the differential character of law as it applied to slaves and other outlaws.

Mass Deportation: If You Do It

What you'll do.

He Will Try

Only one candidate is guaranteed to try to undermine our democracy and our way of life.

C. B. Macpherson on Retrieving Liberal Radicalism

The 20th century political theorist has much to offer for the contemporary left liberal.

A Resilient Spirit Yearning for Justice: The Arab World Today

Powerlessness in the Arab World, thirteen years after the Arab Spring.

An American Reconstruction

The revolution will take place within the modes and orders of American law even as it distorts and transforms that law.

For Non-Binary Arkansans, No ID, No Entry Into Public Life

The governor of Arkansas has intentionally demeaned minority communities in a state where their position is already precarious.

Elections Are Purely Practical

Don’t be vain about your vote.

The Case Against Despair

In politics sometimes you’re in government, sometimes you’re in the opposition, and sometimes you’re a dissident.

Yes to a Living City: Applying Jacobs' Principles to New York's Rezoning

The urbanism of Jane Jacobs, then and now.