Links to Recent Articles of Interest
By James Robins, The New Republic, posted February 16
On the psychological difficulties of historians who delve into past atrocities. The author is a journalist and historian who has written on the Armenian genocide.
By Lawrence S. Wittner, Asia-Pacific Journal, posted February 15
Traces in detail the rise and decline of international efforts to curtail the threat of nuclear warfare. “Although the public has not been effectively mobilized for decades against nuclear catastrophe, the potential for popular mobilization is clearly substantial.” The author is a professor emeritus of history at SUNY Albany.
By Gavriel Rosenfeld, History News Network, posted February 14
“To the extent that we can better understand the origins of MAGA-ism on its own terms — beyond the paradigm of fascism — we will be better able to counter the threat it poses to American democracy.” The author teaches history at Fairfield University and is co-editor with Janet Ward of the forthcoming Fascism in America: Past and Present (Cambridge U. Press).
By Karl Jacoby, Public Books, posted February 9
A review essay on Benjamin D. Hopkins's Ruling the Savage Periphery: Frontier Governance and the Making of the Modern State (Harvard U. Press, 2020), drawing on British and American history. Karl Jacoby teaches history at Columbia University.
Interview with Kelly J. Baker, Washington Post, posted February 7
The interview compares the extremism that propelled the Ku Klux Klan in the 1920s and today's white supremacist movement. Kelly J. Baker has a PhD in religious history and is the author of Gospel According to the Klan: The KKK's Appeal to Protestand America, 1915-1930 (U. Press of Kansas, 2017).
By Jeffrey L. Herf, History News Network, posted January 31
Compares the Republican establishment's relationship with Trump to the German conservative elite's embrace of Hitler. “The party of big business, hedge funds, country clubs and Wall Street also needed numbers, and so it welcomed Trump as he gave it a mass of angry, resentful white voters….” The author teaches modern European history at the University of Maryland.
By Joanne B. Freeman, New York Times, posted January 29
“Between 1830 and 1860, there were at least 70 violent incidents on the House and Senate floors, most of them prompted by Southerners.” The author teaches history and American Studies at Yale University and has written The Field of Blood: Violence in Congress and the Road to Civil War (Farrar, Straus and Girous, 2018).
By Laura Smith, New York Times, posted January 26
A lengthy, detailed, and chilling account of white supremacists' use of high technology, starting in the early 1980s, and sharing the catchphrase “leaderless resistance.”
By Alfred McCoy, TomDispatch.com, posted January 26
“Despite an aura of overwhelming strength, empires, even ones as powerful as America’s, often prove surprisingly fragile and their decline regularly comes far sooner than anyone could have imagined.” The author teaches history at the University of Wisconsin. Among his books is In the Shadows of the American Century: The Rise and Decline of U.S. Global Power (Dispatch Books, 2017).
By Joshua Tait, Bulwark, posted January 22
Argues that, beyond its cartoonish aspect, the now-withdrawn “1776 Report” reflected the continuing influence on the Right exercised by students of the German-American scholar Leo Strauss. The author is a historian of American conservatism with a PhD in US history from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
Thanks to Rusti Eisenberg and an anonymous reader for suggesting some of the above articles. Suggestions can be sent to jimobrien48