books

Stefan Zweig's Messages From a Lost World

Scott McLemee Inside Higher Ed
In the period between the world wars, Stefan Zweig was among the world's best-known authors. His books would soon fuel Nazi bonfires. Zweig held that humanity could no longer afford the belligerent nationalism that had led them into the Great War. Yet Zweig was struck dumb by post 1933 events. That failure, the reviewer says, was of imagination, not nerve. Against the Nazis' depredations, all the consummate writer and speaker could muster was nostalgia for a lost world.

Tidbits - April 21, 2016 - Reader Comments: Neo-Nazis in Austria; Response to 21st Century Labor Movement; Bernie, Hillary; Harriet Tubman on $20 Bill; and more...

Portside
Reader Comments: Report from Austria - Neo-Nazis Rise Again; Response to 21st Century Labor Movement from Marilyn Albert; Bernie, Hillary - Krugman, Latin American polices promoted by Secy. Clinton; Israeli Conscientious Objector; Jackie Robinson - readers correct the story; This Week in History - Celebrating the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising; Announcement - Jeremy Corbyn and the State of Working Class Politics in Britain - New York - May 26

Why we must save the EU

Yanis Varoufakis The Guardian
The European Union is disintegrating – but leaving is not the answer.

Democracy or Bust in Europe

Yanis Varoufakis Project Syndicate
Why is Europe disintegrating? And what can be done about it? What we should do now is what democrats should have done in 1930 to prevent a catastrophe that is now becoming imaginable once again. We should establish a pan-European coalition of radical, social, green, and liberal democrats to put the “demos” back into democracy.

Germany Has Elections Too

Victor Grossman Portside
Events in Germany are truly alarming - with the Alternative for Germany (AfD) moving up into third place and both the Christian Democrats (CDU) and the Social Democrats (SPD) slipping. This is connected with the immigrant wave but laden with too many nasty memories - and there is rightward shifts in France, Poland, Slovakia, Denmark and Sweden.

Can the New Left Govern Europe?

Conn Hallinan Foreign Policy in Focus
After a year of earthshaking victories and devastating setbacks, Europe's new progressive parties are slowly learning how to balance governance with activism.

Thomas Piketty: A New Deal for Europe

Thomas Piketty; translated by Anthony Shugaar The New York Review of Books
Only a genuine social and democratic refounding of the eurozone, designed to encourage growth and employment, will be sufficient to counter the hateful nationalistic impulses that now threaten all Europe. We should put together a conference of eurozone nations on debt-just like those that were held in the postwar years, to the notable benefit of Germany. The objective would be to reduce public debt as a whole.

To France's Motto of "Liberty, Equality, Fraternity" Must Now Be Added "Hypocrisy"

Yvonne Ridley Middle East Monitor
There are concerns that Israel will now exert pressure on other allies, including America, Canada and Britain, to use state machinery and legislation to outlaw the growing BDS movement. It is high time, therefore, to expose the French action for what it is in an effort to deter such moves. 'Libert,, ,galit,, fraternit,' are all well and good; but now we must add "hypocrisie" and France should hang its head in shame.

Socialism: No Longer a Dirty Word; Making a Comeback Around the World

Michael Steven Smith; Van Gosse
The word socialism is in the air these days. Socialism of many varieties has been enjoying a comeback in Latin America for some time. Evo Morales, Rafael Correa, Lula da Silva, the late Hugo Chavez have been the region's dominant leaders in this century. And now there is a remarkable resurgence of European socialism. And, and, the candidate everyone is talking about is...Bernie Sanders, democratic socialist.

European Left Debates a 'Plan B' Against Austerity

Liam Flenady Green Left Weekly
Europe's left needs a Plan B at its disposal, which will allow any future left government in Europe to face down the blackmail from the European establishment — including threats of expulsion from the eurozone.
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