Essays

Tony Blair is dismantling the British state as it has existed since the 18th century. Is his new Britain a fair trade for the old?

The debate between national sovereignty and human rights began in earnest after World War I and continues to this day.

One good celebration (of the Wilson Quarterly´s 25th anniversary) deserves another.

It takes audacity to launch any new magazine, but it took a special sort of spirit to launch a magazine like the Wilson Quarterly in 1976. Beneath the glow of that year’s bicentennial celebrations, the nation bore a sickly pallor, and it was not merely coincidental that for the serious general-interest magazine it was a time of unusual peril.

A new industry has sprung up in the West to promote democracy abroad. Sometimes it does more harm than good.

A philosopher who once graced the cover of Time is now largely forgotten. His ideas--utterly materialist yet deeply spiritual--are ripe for reconsideration.

Today's scientific breakthroughs raise an old question: Is the pursuit of knowledge always a good thing? A long tradition in Western thought holds that it is not.

Can "Gilligan's Island" be high art?

When it comes to popular culture, we have only ourselves--and our poor taste--to blame.

The past century witnessed a complete reversal in the way humans relate to the landscape; the new century will need to cope with the result.

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