Just north of the Strand, behind where the Australian High Commission now stands, there used to be what the press called “a fetid, miserable lane”. One of 19th-century London’s more disreputable districts, it housed the poor, the criminal, the prostitute …
Will the elites ever behave?
Why do even the mightiest societies collapse? In his new book End Times, complexity scientist Peter Turchin blames both “elite overproduction” and a malign “wealth pump” that funnels spoils to the super rich. His theory of societal apocalypse is rooted …
What Xi can learn from Tsar Nicholas
As Europe was rocked by uprisings and revolutions during the 1830s and 1840s, one nation remained unaffected, secure in the grip of its authoritarian ruler. Russia’s Tsar Nicholas I watched while groups as disparate as English Chartists and Polish nobility …
Why it feels like 1848 again
“We are on a stormy sea, without a shore”, wrote Alexis de Tocqueville to a childhood friend in the midst of the 1848 revolutions. “The shore is so far away, so unknown,” he added, “that our lives and perhaps the …
All revolutionaries are selfish
I was recommended Germinal, Zola’s masterpiece about the mining strikes in northern France in 1866, by a friend, a writer I admire and respect. We were talking about the temptation to stay in our narrative comfort zones, to continually write …
How the Left fell for capitalism
What may turn out to be the biggest political movement of the 21st century emerged from the rainforest remnants of southern Mexico on 1 January 1994, carried down darkened, cobbled colonial streets by 500 pairs of black leather boots at …
The failure of May 1968
“What defines our public life today is boredom”. That was a Le Monde front-page headline in March 1968. Two months later, a revolution would erupt that would shake the foundations of the Fifth Republic, divide France, and alter its history …
What will Russia’s oligarchs do next?
Russia’s loyal oligarchs have always been liable to become chess pieces in political struggles. After the revolution broke out in Petrograd in February 1917, the long-despised Romanov aristocracy were ruthlessly stripped of their property and most prized possessions. The people …
Interview 1704 – The War is Actually Begun! on Declare Your Independence
James joins Ernest Hancock for his regular weekly appearance on the Declare Your Independence radio show. This week James and Ernie discuss the growth of anarchism, the Canadian trucker convoy, the DOJO chip and Musk’s FSD takeover, the mass formation…
Be part of the solution, not part of the problem
In early March, in reaction to some people calling the governments to impose strict lockdowns, and “protective measures”, we said – “Be part of the solution, not part of the problem“. The problem was that they understood this as an …
