A life for power? Viktor Orbán’s long affair with Hungary
Do the familiar tropes of anti-tyrannical literature explain anything about what happened and is still happening in contemporary Hungary, a country that has changed so profoundly not only as compared to its post-1989 realities but from its 2010 self too?
Thailand’s Conscription: A Threat to Democracy and Freedom
Thailand is about to hold a general election in May 2023. Several progressive political parties are proposing to pass an act to abolish conscription. But the military, which has always meddled with Thai politics, has indicated it will block any efforts in this direction.
No Justin, No Martin, No Peace
Representative Pearson is part of this tradition of American political protest – a tradition that conservative conceptions of civility and peaceful protest mischaracterize and aim to delegitimize; a tradition against which Tennessee Republicans and Obama fundamentally stand, despite appearances. There’s no peace, Representative Pearson reminds us, without confrontation.
Rule of law and the structural inequalities of the European project: Europe and its dissenting peripheries
In this op-ed by Peter Agha, PhD, he argues for a different analysis of the current trouble with Europe, one which starts from the recognition of the irregularity of the rule of law policies and highlights how the clashes between the populist movements and the rule of law doctrine reflect the structural inequalities of the European project. This important aspect is often neglected because of the way we currently frame the discussions – as “the rule of law crisis”. As a result of this, our debates focus on juridical arrangements, whereas the distributional consequences of the EU and the role the legal structure plays in its maintenance remain (almost) invisible.
Heritage in War: A Key to Define the Future of Ukraine
Dóra Mérai, a lecturer of Cultural Heritage Studies at CEU, explores how heritage – often used to promote divisions – has also been reframed in Ukraine following Russia’s invasion “to develop empathy, express solidarity, and help people cope with the difficulties”.
Economic Sanctions are Insufficient to Stop the War
A year ago, Russia invaded Ukraine, catching many of us unprepared despite clear signs of impending conflict. The assumption that a European nation would conquer another in the 21st century appeared far-fetched. When the worst scenario happened, experts doubted Ukraine’s ability to hold its ground for more than a few weeks. However, the country keeps resisting. The economic domain, along with warfare and geopolitics, presents many examples of events that did not turn out the way it was expected. This op-ed by Volodymyr Kulikov highlights three selected points about economic sanctions, corporate self-sanction, and energy wars.
Living with Double-Think
In this op-ed, the author describes life in Russia’s propaganda machine, and how the internet provides venues for Russians to access media that is not controlled by the government.
Weak prospects for Russia’s democratization
Wolfgang Merkel offers a typological classification of Putin’s Russia after exploring how it compares with fascist regimes in Germany and Italy as well as Stalinism, and opines that several factors will contribute to Russia’s “poor prospects” for democratization.
Adam Michnik: The war in Ukraine is not a war between the Russian people and the Ukrainian people
This war, of which we are commemorating the anniversary today, is undoubtedly the most important war of our time, because it is a war in which the imperial-chauvinist-totalitarian project is struggling with the democratic, European, pluralist project on the one hand.
Why is the Russian bureaucracy failing in the face of war?
Vladimir Dubrovskiy, senior economist at CASE Ukraine, explores why the Russian state, which is based on the principle of “vertical power”, appears to be inept in the face of war.