A Kurdish Experiment in Decentralized Governance
The Kurds of Northern Syria are trying something different, for better or worse.
Book Reviews
Sticking It to the Man
A new anthology explores how the counterculture of the '60s and '70s mixed with the mainstream.
'Jane Jacobs Goals Through Robert Moses Tactics'
Community planners don't have all the answers.
She Came To Slay
The deeply human Harriet Tubman who emerges in Dunbar's book was exhausted, frustrated—and heroic.
When Border Defense Becomes Border Offense
Militarized borders and military intervention are two sides of the same coin.
The Myth of the 'Opium War'
The vast majority of opium users in China were not the desperate addicts portrayed by proponents of prohibition.
The Third Lesson of Economics
Henry Hazlitt's insights were far more sophisticated than one modern critic thinks.
The Creek Nation and the Culture of Consent
Under threat from the United States, Creek people replaced consent with coercion. Then they lost everything.
Occult Features of Anarchism
An anthropologist examines secret societies, revolutionary movements, and esoteric ideas.
Maybe the Media Mishandled the New Brett Kavanaugh Book Because It's Mostly a Dud
The Education of Brett Kavanaugh: An Investigation doesn't shed much light on the Supreme Court justice or the allegations against him.
Edward Snowden's Autobiography Makes a Plea for the Fourth Amendment, the Right to Privacy, and Encryption
America's most famous whistleblower calls for restricting the power of government.
Bitcoin at 10
A new book aims to chronicle the digital currency's ideological origins.
The Horror of War and the Thrill of Horror
A new book explores the First World War's role in creating the horror genre.
How Biased Are We, Really?
A new book offers a tour of the modern study of race and racism.
Lives Ruined for Petty Crimes
A new book explores how America's criminal justice system heaps debts on those who can't possibly pay.
There's Nothing New About the 'New Conspiracism'
A pair of political scientists think they've identified a new kind of conspiracy thinking. They haven't.
What Inmates, the Amish, and Imperial Chinese Law Teach Us About Relying on the State
David Friedman’s Legal Systems Very Different from Ours explores the costs and benefits of various legal systems across time.
Spies in the Media
Journalists have long been used by governments, wittingly or not, to collect intel and spread disinformation.
The Government Can't—and Won't—Give Meaning to Your Life
A conservative technocrat tries to engineer a better world.
Why Do So Many Modern Jobs Seem Pointless?
An investigation into why people are working more without accomplishing more
No, Sex Wasn't Better for Women Under Socialism
It's hard to get in the mood when you're sharing a bedroom with your mother-in-law.
The Wild Rise of Lyndon LaRouche
What a conspiracy theorist, a Vietnam War deserter, and a Trump adviser have in common
When George Orwell Got in a Fight With the Anarchist Author of The Joy of Sex
The future 1984 scribe debated pacifism with Dr. Alex Comfort in 1942.
Vietnam and the Rise of White Power
A new book ties racist reactionary politics to the war, but overreaches when it comes to militias.
Russians and Reactionaries
The on-again, off-again flirtation between Mother Russia and the deplorables of Europe
'My Plan Is to Let People Do Whatever They Please'
The daily newspaper columns of H.L. Mencken
GW Students Organize to Fight Oppression By Oppressing Reading Choices
Obvious propaganda should be labeled propaganda, obviously.
Book recommendations from me and my colleagues
Time travel and originalism (not in the same book!)
Statist Just-So Stories
The author of Seeing Like a State casts a skeptical eye on the conventional wisdom about the cradle of civilization.
Sex and Communism
The times and trajectory of Max Eastman, progressive turned "libertarian conservative"
The Insatiable Utopia
The Soviet elite who built a "dictatorship of the proletariat" and paid with their lives