Commentary archive

Commentary Jews in the culture wars Lynne segal What will it take to unite the intellectual Left? After decades of internal academic strife on the Left, the moral dilemmas currently faced by Jewish academics have thrown up some unexpected alliances. The 1980s and 1990s were embattled decades in the universities, especially in North America. These […]

Philosophers have only interpreted the world in various ways; the point is to change it.ʼ How many times during the heyday of socialist activism in the 1970s was Marxʼs eleventh thesis on Feuerbach rolled out to put overly reflective comrades back in their place? In fact, of course, even then one would have been hard-pressed […]

Commentary Shiny, happy people ‘Body Worlds’ and the commodification of health Megan stern Gunther von Hagenʼs touring ʻBody Worldsʼ exhibition of dissected, ʻplastinatedʼ human corpses has generated a great deal of public interest, much of it critical and even hostile. The use of animal body parts in art installations and exhibitions and documentaries exploring human […]

Commentary Anti-Americanism and realignment in the two Koreas Hyun ok park For all their differences, the expressions of anti-Americanism that erupted this winter in South Korea and North Korea convey a common desire. They were distinctly post-Cold War events, not just because Koreans are pursuing national sovereignty independently of the USA, but more importantly because […]

Commentary War and democracy Kate soper Whether they welcomed the prospect of the ʻnewʼ world order it would supposedly inaugurate, or were appalled by its imperial ambitions and the disasters it would unleash, few can have doubted the historic import of the decision to go to war with Iraq. Those who have committed the globe […]

Consumers or citizens? Re-regulating communications Julian petley At a seminar on the recent Communications Bill in Britain, the UK Culture Secretary, Tessa Jowell, began her speech by asking, ʻWhat is the point of government?ʼ A reasonable question. The answer, however, was less so – at least to those who gasped in audible surprise on hearing […]

Commentary The pink Viagra story We have the drug, but what’s the disease? Leonore tiefer Ever since Viagra put a spring in the step of millions of impotent men after coming onto the market in March, attention has been focused on the more mysterious key to sexual gratification among women. Sunday Times, 19 July 1998 […]

Commentary Heads of cabbage and mouths full of water On corporate slaughter Mark neocleous In 1998 Simon Jones, a student at the University of Sussex, signed up with Personnel Selection to earn some extra cash. Sent to work for Euromin at Shoreham dockyard, he was given the job of unloading bags of stones by attaching […]

Two hundred years ago this month (January 2004), the French colony of SaintDomingue on the island of Hispaniola became the independent nation of Haiti. Few transformations in world history have been more momentous, few required more sacrifice or promised more hope. And few have been more thoroughly forgotten by those who would have us believe […]

Commentary Debating Ground Zero Architects, planners, ideas Anthony vidler The story of architectureʼs role following the destruction of the World Trade Center (WTC) in September 2001 is on the one hand long and extremely complex, and on the other brief and simple. The long version involves numerous groups including architects, engineers, planners, developers, public officials […]

Anti-Oedipus – thirty years on Éric alliez I, for my own part, made a sort of move into politics around May 1968…Gilles Deleuze, NegotiationsThis title was suggested to me some months ago by my best enemy – or my best fiend, to paraphrase Werner Herzog – who also happens to be a very good friend: […]

Fixing meaning Intertextuality, inference and the horizon of the publishable Rachel malik What is reading? Recent attempts to characterize it have conceded, and in many cases celebrated, its elusiveness as an experience. In Michel De Certeauʼs words, reading, unlike writing, takes no measures against the erosion of time (one forgets oneself and also forgets), it […]

Remembering Adorno John abromeit In his sociology of religion, but also in his analyses of bureaucracy in modern societies, Max Weber analysed the process by which ideas that aim for qualitative change, for a transvaluation of values, are worn down in the historical process, codified and routinized by interpreters, gradually brought back into line with […]

Commentary The hijab and the Republic Headscarves in France David macey At the end of the long summer holiday the children of France will return to schools governed by a new dress code. There is no tradition of school uniforms in the state sector and they will still be free to wear more or less […]

Boycotts are age-old undertakings. Unlike sanctions, which are enforced by governments and sometimes destroy the lives of millions of ordinary people (as in the case of the twelve-year sanctions against Iraq), boycotts are most often grassroots means of protest against the policies of governments. They can be undertaken by ordinary people to defend fellow human […]

Commentary Geographies of violence and democracy Politics in Spain Alejandro colás On the morning of 11 March 2004, after ten bombs were detonated on four commuter trains in southern Madrid, the communist-led United Left coalition released a press statement, part of which translates as follows: Today is a day of democratic unity. With this fascist-like […]

Commentary After Iraq Vulnerable imperial stasis Neil smith I dread our being too much dreaded. Edmund Burke At the end of the twentieth century the American ascendancy appeared almost inexorable. Despite personal scandal and impeachment hearings, a seemingly unassailable Bill Clinton led a global neoliberalism that was methodically sweeping all other contenders aside. At home […]

Commentary Fast train coming The political pedagogy of Fahrenheit 9/11 Mandy merck This August, when Fahrenheit 9/11 had long since surpassed all records to become the most commercially successful documentary ever made, the New Yorker ran an article anxiously attempting to establish it within a generic tradition stretching from Grierson and Flaherty to Fredric Wiseman […]

Making another world possible? The European Social Forum Les levidow The European Social Forum (ESF) has been inspired by the global slogan ʻAnother world is possibleʼ, expressing the need to create alternatives from out of the resistance to neoliberalism. Since its inception in 2002, the ESF has provided an opportunity to debate methods and strategies […]

Commentary It’s not the culture, stupid Interpreting the US election Ken hirschkop Elections first and foremost decide governments, but they are also conjunctures when political forces are organized and realigned. The very act of mobilizing activists or energizing groups within the franchise can have long-term effects, and in the course of a campaign ideologies that […]

Patriotism as paranoia Steve Kurtz and the Critical Art Ensemble Barry schwabsky Folklore warns that the devil can only enter your house if you invite him in. What itʼs not so clear about is that more often than not the devil poses as just the person you need when youʼre in trouble. Steve Kurtz, an […]