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book reviews

  • SOURCE: War on the Rocks
    3/11/2022

    Is the West Laissez-Faire About Sanctions?

    If economic sanctions become a replacement for military force in international conflict, they also risk becoming a normal part of nationalist economic policy that escalates international rivalry as a feature of the global economy. 

  • SOURCE: The Nation
    3/9/2022

    Review: The Pragmatism of Police Abolition

    Activist and police abolitionist Derecka Purnell's book draws on personal and academic history to push readers to question what they think an ideal society looks like, and whether police forces are an instrument for achieving it. 

  • SOURCE: Boston Review
    3/1/2022

    Review: The Afterlife of Black Hawk

    by David Roediger

    A suppressed history of conquest and expulsion pervades the state of Illinois; A new book seeks to recover it.   

  • SOURCE: Washington Post
    12/30/2021

    Tracing the Origins of Today's Archconservatives (Review)

    by Randall J. Stephens

    "John Huntington convincingly concludes that Trump 'tapped into the government mistrust, racial resentment, and conspiratorial beliefs that had festered within conservatism for decades'."

  • SOURCE: New York Times
    12/30/2021

    Is the Narrative Impulse Dangerous (Review)?

    by Timothy Snyder

    Jonathan Gottschall's book proposes that human intellect is a captive of the structure of stories. Reviewer Timothy Snyder is skeptical of his case. 

  • SOURCE: The Nation
    11/13/2021

    Direct Action: The Practical Politics of Protest

    by Erin Pineda

    "Protesters may be a loud minority of citizens, a set of especially motivated and impassioned individuals who are in many ways not representative of the general public. But the silent majority of voters are not as disconnected from—or dismissive of—protest as many assume."

  • SOURCE: New York Review of Books
    11/15/2021

    Should Germany Prosecute the Few Surviving Nazis?

    by David Motadel

    "Most of the perpetrators of the Holocaust have passed away, but German courts still have an opportunity to prosecute those who remain alive. It is the final chapter in the country’s long and not very successful history of ensuring justice for their victims."

  • SOURCE: Boston Review
    11/4/2021

    Radical Movements and Political Power: Terence Renaud on New Lefts

    by Justin H. Vassallo

    Terence Renaud's history places the international New Left movements that emerged in the 1960s, and today's left activism, in the context of radical traditions that have sought to avoid hierarchy and rigidity. Questions remain about how ideals and ethics can combine with organizing to change institutions.

  • SOURCE: The Nation
    11/1/2021

    Land of Capital: Jonathan Levy's "Ages of American Capital" Reviewed

    by Steven Hahn

    "Ages of Capitalism" is one of the first synthetic accounts of the relationship of capitalism and American politics and society, and provides an important vocabulary for a developing field of inquiry. It also, oddly, resonates with the older consensus history that assumed capitalism as a core part of American life.

  • SOURCE: New York Review of Books
    10/19/2021

    "This Obstinate Little Man": Tom Segev on Ben-Gurion as the King Lear of Zionism

    "Ben-Gurion was not a saint and should not be made into one posthumously. An unvarnished account of his vices is essential, but so is an appreciation of his merits." A reviewer says Tom Segev's new biography sheds little light on his influence over the Zionist movement and the Israeli state.

  • SOURCE: The Baffler
    9/22/2021

    Rebel is Right: Reassessing the Cultural Revolution

    by Chaohua Wang

    A new book by the Chinese scholar Yang Jisheng examines the Chinese Cultural Revolution's lasting impact on the Communist Party, concluding that the generation of party leaders who experienced it were indifferent to utopianism but deeply attracted to the exercise of absolute power. 

  • SOURCE: The Nation
    9/8/2021

    What Is Owed: The Limits of Darity and Mullen's Case For Reparations

    by William P. Jones

    A historian argues that a recent and influential book calling for reparations could strengthen its case by considering the arguments made by historians about the connections of American slavery to other manifestations of racism. What's needed is to link reparations to a global overturning of racial inequality.

  • SOURCE: New York Times
    8/16/2021

    Where America Went Wrong in Afghanistan (Review Essay)

    by Fredrik Logevall

    "It will be up to historians of the future, writing with broad access to official documents and with the kind of detachment that only time brings, to fully explain the remarkable early-morning scene at Bagram and all that led up to it. But there’s much we can already learn — abundant material is available."

  • SOURCE: The New Republic
    8/2/2021

    The Liberals Who Weakened Trust in Government

    by Kim Phillips-Fein

    Historian Kim Phillips-Fein writes that Paul Sabin's new book "Public Citizens" adds to understanding of the rise of conservatism and the power of attacks on "big government" by focusing on the role of liberal public interest groups in exposing the capture of the liberal regulatory state by big business interests.