Across the globe, democracy appears to be in a curious state. One of the main indicators of the health or pathology of democracy is the turnout in elections. Some might claim that the high turnout for the Biden-Trump face-off last year was a sign of health for US democracy. But the aftermath...
At an earlier stage of my life, I had the great pleasure of spending two years teaching at York University in Toronto, Canada. Unlike the University of Toronto, whose campus looks like Harvard or Yale, York resembles British public universities such as Sussex: modern, functional, but without what...
France appears to be living through a strange transitional period that could be described as the waning of the Fifth Republic. It contains no sense of what a sixth republic might look like or why it might even be necessary. But today’s republic, with its unique electoral system, has achieved a...
The recent European elections have triggered dramatic changes in French politics but, with a murky political landscape, no one can predict where they might lead. The year 2019 has turned out to be rich in pretexts for political predictions. While India managed to hold an election that produced...
The results of the European elections reflect far more than the simple play of party politics and the media’s obsession with hyperreal contests. The European parliamentary elections have weighed in with tallies gleaned from 28 nations. Perhaps the most awaited results came from the United...
What that Protestant Reformation can teach us about the durability of far-right movements — and the order they seek to replace. Less than a month ago, the candidate leading in the polls in the Brazilian presidential election was a jailed ex-politician who technically couldn’t even run for...
A global climate deal in Paris raises hopes even as the far-right gains influence in France and the US by preying on prejudice and targeting minorities. La grande nation is no longer that grand. In the previous century, it refused to see the writing on the wall and withdraw from its colonies...
