The system hasn’t failed; it has succeeded too well. Patrick Deneen said this about liberalism. Now Daniel Markovits is saying it about meritocracy. Markovits, a professor of law at Yale, argues that a system that once promoted social mobility has created a self-perpetuating class of elites. His . . . . Continue Reading »
Like many persons possessing limited insight into the future, I had supposed that, with the collapse of the Soviet Empire, utopianism would die out in the Western world. I was mistaken. Identity politics in the West is veering in the direction of totalitarianism. A book I read . . . . Continue Reading »
This is our 300th number, marking thirty years of publication. In early 1989, Richard John Neuhaus had no inkling that he was about to found First Things. A Lutheran pastor noted for his incisive religious and political commentaries, he was busy running the Center on Religion and Society. The Center . . . . Continue Reading »
The LGBT rights agenda has become a powerful, aggressive force in American society. Continue Reading »
The monarch, stripped of all ancient direct power, is now remarkably like the king on a chessboard—almost incapable of offensive action, but preventing others from occupying a crucial square. Continue Reading »
Pseudo-liberalism seeks to turn upside-down the value system of the civilization that once was Christendom. Continue Reading »
As we watch the mostly white officials of the Democratic party pander to black Americans with talk of reparations on which they will never deliver, it is worth pondering their motive. The support of black Americans for the Democratic party is precarious. Black America, the secret soul of our . . . . Continue Reading »
In this issue, Oren Cass explodes the false dichotomy between cultural questions and economic ones(“The Problem with the Culture Problem”). Nowhere is the falsity more evident than in the question that will define the coming decade: Should we emphasize consumption or work? Our answer will have . . . . Continue Reading »
On February 2, 2018, seven members of a group called Bristol Antifascists assembled outside a lecture hall at the University of the West of England in Bristol. They donned balaclavas or dark glasses, according to taste, and entered through the double doors at the back of the hall. “No platform for . . . . Continue Reading »
Shorthand is convenient, but sometimes it confuses. In the game of telephone, by which ideas evolve through repetition and iteration across generations, words can take on new meanings that diverge from the arguments they once advanced, and come to stand for ideas that lack support altogether. This . . . . Continue Reading »
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