The illiberal backlash cannot be sanitized through conventional political morality: liberal democracy must redefine itself in order to win back credibility. Literature and literary debate are not necessarily where that process will start. But if they succumb to dogmatism, it is hard to see where else free thought will flourish.
Social media’s commercial colonization of the internet is clearly detrimental to the public interest. However, calls for an ‘information commons’ go too far: rather, those who own the new information channels must comply with rules set by democratic process.
After ’89, the ideology of ‘free’ markets prevailed not just in eastern Europe, but also in the West. The consequences were particularly evident in the wake of the 2008 financial crisis and the 2010 euro crisis. What effect did the economic restructuring have on the European project and what are the key issues facing Europe today?
In a politicized age, literary debate seems to be seeking consensus. But many still argue that the task of writers is to voice what would otherwise be seen as unacceptable. Today, the question is as much about how literature is talked about as what it talks about.
Danilo Kiš famously observed that the western bracketing of Balkan literature as narrowly ‘political’ rested on a set of mutually reinforcing stereotypes. Today, following Kiš, Balkan novelists are challenging received wisdom and integrating the political and the poetic in surprising new ways, writes Katarina Luketić.
New knowledge about the neurological effects of music coincides with revived musicological interest in the body. Does this mark a return to the Enlightenment view of music as a matter of the nervous system? A survey of modern musical aesthetics through the lens of medical history.
Speculation may not be the best approach in a trial, but it can be useful for making sense of seemingly nonsensical events happened the way they did. Our authors try their luck in explaining new authoritarianism, the loneliness of online socializing, and women’s advancement in politics.
Media acceleration puts enormous emphasis on speed, creating a pressure on politics that the elaborate procedures of cross-party cooperation cannot withstand. Modelled after Roman democracy, modern liberal democracies may as well have an expiration date, George Blecher argues.
The classic liberal distinction between war and peace has expired. Markets have learnt the lesson that gut reactions matter, but political institutions of liberal democracy are still lagging behind. What we need is a politics of empathy, William Davies argues.
Rightwing literature reappeared in Poland after 1989, having been absent from cultural life during communism. Since 2010, political polarization has caused its significance and visibility to increase. But what defines rightwing literature in Poland? A typology of its motifs and genres, from anti-communism to anti-modernism, historical revisionism to sci-fi.
The Orbán regime’s ‘war on gender’ and scapegoating of scholarly dissent rely on long-lasting popular animosity toward independent intellectuals. Unfortunate patters of academic withdrawal, dating back to state socialist times, make it even harder to resist populist pressure.
Louis-Ferdinand Céline based a literary reputation on transgression. He was a prototypical troll, contemptuous of the truth, indefatigable in saying the unsayable, and couching his hatred in irony. And like trolls, he poses a dilemma: engage or ignore?
Can we rethink bots and algorithms so that they become tools that work for us, instead of an invisible, oppressive system that tries to deceive us? How can we redesign the ‘social’ in a way that doesn’t allow trolls to permanently disrupt our thinking and behaviour?
Finnish politics today is dominated by women, many under the age of 35. This is a result of long-standing efforts to include more women in leadership. But the failure of the previous rightwing government has also helped pave their way, as have the internal fractures in the social democratic and centre parties. Now they must clear up the mess they have inherited.
This decade brought us revolutions, crises and strong backlashes too. But although it’s easy for authoritarians to prey on societies in turmoil, the popular demand for equality and a liveable future do not dissolve, even under tyranny.
Boris Vezjak looks into Peter Handke’s controversial Nobel Prize using the analogy of a pizza: whether one should only care if it tastes good and not about the morals of the chef. Isolationists only refer to tastiness, while holists’ criticisms don’t necessarily invalidate the award.