An illustration of a cowboy with a serious expression

American Individualism and American Power

The American habitus was forged partly by the conquest of Native land and partly by the experiences of superiority and entitlement among white enslavers.
The Louvre Museum in Paris

Pyramids of the Present

We associate pyramids with ancient civilizations, but contemporary humans appear to have an affinity for the peaked structures as well.
Atlas Mountains

Modern Nomads in the Atlas Mountains

For pastoralists who live and work in the mountains of Morocco, the lifestyle is difficult but worthwhile. It’s also threatened by economic and climate change.
Operation Morning Light team members, dressed in specially designed arctic clothing, begin the painstaking process of searching the area with hand-held radiation detectors.

The Trouble with Reentry

Reentry of space junk in the 1970s forced First Nations communities into a reckoning with Cold War geopolitics and a burgeoning envirotechnical disaster.
Calvin presiding over a colloquium in Geneva, 1549.

When Singing Was a Crime

Calvinist reformers in sixteenth-century Geneva frequently punished people for immoral behavior—like singing.
Gaslighting illustration concept with two hands with tangled string over someone's head

Audacity and Gaslights: Empowering or Zombifying Citizens?

Political scientists Eric Beerbohm and Ryan W. Davis consider how citizens can protect against gaslighting while staying open to audacious ideas of change.
A dog riding the Moscow metro

Dogs of the Moscow Metro

The public attitude toward the adventurous dogs who have mastered the Moscow metro system has roots in an egalitarian Soviet culture.
View of Baltimore, Maryland, ca. 1873

Justice in Baltimore

In an atypical case, a white policeman was convicted of killing a Black man at a private house party.
Temüjin being proclaimed as Genghis Khan in 1206, as illustrated in a 15th-century Jami' al-tawarikh manuscript.

How to Govern Like a Mongol

The leaders of the Mongol empire never abandoned their nomadic lifestyles, but they created organizational structures capable of ruling a huge part of the world.
Abstract illustration of faceless man in dark suit.

What We Talk About When We Talk About Authoritarianism

Is the global state system in crisis, with authoritarianism, nationalism, populism, and illiberalism running amok?