Turning public
As scholars, historians must discover the truth about the past, writes Volodymyr Sklokin. But following the Ukrainian intellectual community's transformation after 1991, Ukrainian historians have also...
View ArticleA rough guide to the commons
There are a raft of major challenges that complicate the creation of the commons today. The researcher and writer Charlie Tims considers some of the most pressing of these challenges -- in combination...
View ArticleRobert Silvers: Just an editor?
The late Robert Silvers, co-founder and editor of the ‘New York Review of Books’, was aptly characterized as ‘the author who doesn’t write’. A tribute to a one of the most important actors in the...
View ArticleDilemmas eines Herausgebers
Wie kaum ein anderer Zeitschriftenmacher verstand es Robert Silvers, der legendäre Mitgründer des New York Review of Books, Autoren zum Schreiben zu bringen. Er selbst aber schrieb nie. Mit einer...
View ArticleThe political geographies of Muslim visibility
The Muslim presence in European cities is often concealed through formal restrictions on mosques and other signs of religiosity. Yet Muslims are also exposed as threats to the public order. Claiming...
View ArticleBreaking out of the echo chamber
Is the goal of a European public sphere best served by the creation of a supranational public service broadcaster, as has recently been proposed? Roman Léandre Schmidt and Carl Henrik Fredriksson are...
View Article‘Don’t let the facts spoil a good story’
The ethos of journalistic independence that flourished in the USSR during glasnost degenerated, in the following decades, into political partisanship and commercial opportunism. In today’s Russia,...
View ArticleTrust me, I’m lying
The history of news is the history of the confusion between the real and the fake – with that master of disguise, the devil himself, never far away. Today, too, demonic involvement is readily invoked,...
View ArticleFacebook and the revolt of the democratic elites
Social media providers are currently faced with a dilemma: to take on an editorial role or respond to the demands of their investors. The revolt against fake news is part of a defence mechanism on the...
View ArticleWhat makes a great magazine editor?
There can be no doubting the historical influence of literary-intellectual magazines, but we still know little about how they were led and managed. Looking at some of the outstanding magazine editors...
View ArticlePlatforms are not neutral
Critique of social media tends to focus on the content of online discourse, particularly the impacts of fake news and hate speech. But how do social media platforms themselves determine interaction,...
View ArticleFrom ‘expropriate Springer’ to #deletefacebook?
In 1968, West German students protested against the monopoly of the Springer Press. Does the campaign have an equivalent today? Given the power and ubiquity of social media, Claus Leggewie doubts it....
View Article‘Rechte Hefte’: Rightwing magazines in Germany after 1945
The use of magazines by the German far-right to integrate its ideology into acceptable political discourse goes back to the transformation of former National Socialist networks into the so-called New...
View ArticleAmerican Russophobia in the age of liberal decline
Accusations of Russian interference have become the primary route through which to undermine Donald Trump. In order to sustain liberal outrage, media and political elites consort to provide a constant...
View ArticleThe internet against democracy
Digitalization reveals the distance between the democratic ideal and its practical reality. Only a society that is open, sceptical and flexible can adapt successfully to this transformation, writes...
View ArticlePost-truth panic: the news that never was
Media professionals often engage in a collective hysteria. They complain about their loss of authority, signalling a deep unwillingness to take responsibility for our trade’s failures and, often,...
View ArticleCivic engagement in the twenty-first century
Disinformation and audience fragmentation pose major questions for the future of the public sphere. Media literacy is increasingly being seen as one response. But what precisely is to be taught?...
View ArticleAnother media regime is possible
In response to political pressure, digital platforms are abandoning their laissez-faire approach to content and allying with legacy media to provide ‘reliable’ news and information. But this is the...
View ArticleDigital socialism
The great social democratic achievements of the twentieth century were in institutional innovation. By engaging with the risks posed to democracy by Big Tech, social democracy can both revive this...
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