Books & Ideas is the English-language mirror website of La Vie des Idées, a free online journal which has gained a large readership and established itself in France as a major place for intellectual debate since 2007.
Drawing on a socio-historical study of the construction of astronomical observatories on the island of Hawai‘i, Pascal Marichalar shows that scientific policies can no longer be considered separately from their ecological and social impacts.
In their recent research about Israeli politics, Noam Gidron and his coauthors explore the country’s affective polarization, the support for the judicial overhaul, Likud’s populism, and the relations between them.
Popular sovereignty and the rule of law are inseparable: the idea that there could be “illiberal democracies” is groundless and plays into the hands of populists.
The American civil rights movement was more complex than is generally realized. Olivier Mahéo reconstructs its story by considering the marginalized voices and internal conflicts that are often overlooked.
À propos de : Vincent Tiberj, La droitisation française. Mythe et réalités (France’s rightward turn: myths and realities), Puf
About: Emmanuelle Durand, L’envers des fripes. Les vêtements dans les plis de la mondialisation, Premier Parallèle
About: Frédéric Keck, Préparer l’imprévisible. Lévy-Bruhl et les sciences de la vigilance, Puf
A rumour is circulating in some African countries: the French state is organising penis thefts to offset declining fertility. The rumour, spread by Russian propaganda, has become fake news.
The American sociologist Harrison White made a vital contribution to the development of social network analysis. Besides his work in this field, his theoretical synthesis and his understanding of social formations have influenced a variety of fields such as the sociology of art and economic sociology.
Ukraine’s water networks have been mobilized since the start of the war in 2014. Infrastructure workers are some of the last to leave settlements attacked by the Russian army. Water systems and people are resisting but are reaching the limits of their capacity to adapt to violence and disruptions.
The last year has been extremely tough for Europe as a political idea. The debt crisis, the rise of the radical right, repeated and widespread attacks against immigrants, foreigners, but also the very concept of supranational solidarity have seemed to bring one of the richest regions of the globe to the brink of collapse. Is the situation as hard as it has been made to look? And where should Europe’s efforts first turn to?
Is there still room for hope at the White House?
In the U.S., in France as well with Hugues Lagrange’s book on “the denial of cultures”, culture has again become the focus of poverty studies. Our dossier on “culture of poverty” reviews this new trend and examines a notion that has paradoxically been given a new lease of life by the economic downturn, half a century after Oscar Lewis controversially introduced it.
Among the recipients of the 2009 Nobel Memorial Prize in Economics was Elinor Ostrom, for her analysis of economic governance, especially in relation to the commons. While this choice took many in the profession by surprise, her life-long quest for an understanding of successful common property resource management holds important lessons for our future.
What distinguishes a blank canvas from an empty frame? A simple object from a readymade? What is this mysterious gap that art digs as it separates from life? Such are the questions posed by Arthur Danto, a major figure of contemporary art theory.
Umberto Eco is best known to the general public for his novels and critical works in which he developed his theory of reception. Who realizes, however, that this aspect of his work is only one part of a general semiology organized around a philosophy of signs?
À Los Angeles, la résistance des habitants et des pouvoirs publics à la politique anti-migrants manifeste l’ampleur du militantisme populaire. On voit s’engager là une lutte majeure pour la souveraineté territoriale.
À combien doit-on estimer le prix d’une vie pour interdire les chaudières au fioul ? Pourquoi la tarification du carbone reste-t-elle compliquée ? Le changement climatique va coûter cher, Fanny Henriet revient sur les propositions des économistes pour l’atténuer.
Ghassan Hage montre comment la physique du social élaborée par Bourdieu permet de penser les formes de domination contemporaines à travers ce qu’il appelle une « écologie existentielle ».
Carolin Amlinger et Oliver Nachtwey, Zerstörungslust. Elemente des demokratischen Faschismus, Suhrkamp
À propos de : Daniel Cohen, Une brève histoire de l’économie, Albin Michel
À propos de : Arlette Farge, Ils ont écrit leurs visages. Signalements de galériens et de délinquant⸱e⸱s au XVIIIe siècle, Mētis Press
