Walter Benjamin’s Graveyard
On the run from the Gestapo, Walter Benjamin committed suicide on the French-Spanish border in 1940. The place where he spent his last days now overlooks the most brutally policed border of the EU.
Blog
Building Civilization at Shenzhen Speed
Once the poorer neighbor of Hong Kong, Shenzhen has been transformed into a showcase for the speed, power, and dynamism of Chinese development — and a study in extreme inequality.
Biafra’s Back
More than 50 years after the end of the civil war, there’s a new generation of Biafran separatists in Nigeria.
Issue 59: Letters + The Internet Speaks
No border can contain our subscribers’ enthusiasm.
Cowboys and Italians
In the 1960s, Italian filmmakers took the cowboy out of America. They gave the western a wild, blood-soaked makeover that revived the genre for global audiences and imbued it with new political relevance.
How Can We Organize Immigrant Workers?
Bosses will always try to divide native-born and immigrant workers. Our response has to be unconditional solidarity.
Borders Books
Some recommendations from the Republic of Letters.
The Red Scare Blueprint
A 1917 effort to deport political radicals from Seattle became the model for all 20th-century deportation crusades.
Should We Invade Israel?
For decades, advocates of humanitarian intervention argued that the international community should take military action against states engaged in extreme human rights abuses. Israel is one such state.
Partisans on Ponies
One German’s idiosyncratic obsession with the American frontier led to an unlikely West German–Yugoslav cinematic partnership that fed the European appetite for cowboys and Indians.
Jacobin Turns 15 Today
Here’s why we still publish.
How Israel’s War Economy Defied Economic Predictions
Many observers thought that years of prolonged war would cripple Israel’s economy. But the opposite has happened. By giving billions of shekels in compensation to reservists, Israel has managed to keep its citizens spending while Gaza burns.