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.
From 1562 to 1598, as the Wars of Religion deprived France of its reference points, strategies for mastering, disguising, and eliminating religious signs became necessary for survival. External markers of identity provide crucial insight into what civil wars do to a society.
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.
How can we move beyond abstract architecture, where buildings are constructed without their audiences? Peter Ferretto’s method is based on observation, engagement, and the osmosis between teaching, practice, research, and social impact.
International Criminal Court judges process hundreds of pieces of evidence before rendering their verdict. Artwork-tools cut through the maze of data, providing an essential artistic and visual support for the administration of justice.
On April 25, 1974, a coup d’état led by young officers overthrew a nearly fifty-year old dictatorship in Portugal, inaugurating a revolutionary era. The historian Victor Pereira describes the origins and repercussions of this event—as well as its twists and turns, achievements, and doubts.
About: Romain Descendre & Jean-Claude Zancarini, L’Œuvre-vie d’Antonio Gramsci, La Découverte
About: Bruno Dumézil, L’Empire mérovingien, Ve-VIIIe siècle, Passés composés
About: Jean Boutier, Sandro Landi et Jean-claude Waquet (dir.), Le temps des Italies. XIIe-XIXe siècle, Passés/Composés
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.
Michel Crozier’s work was shaped by the conviction that organizational phenomena create society. He helped pioneer the tools for analyzing groups established to carry out a common project according to a specific system of action and rules of the game.
The EU aims for net climate neutrality by 2050, utilizing the Emission Trading Scheme (ETS) as its main tool. But the climate crisis demands more than market mechanisms. It requires comprehensive planning and legal frameworks that prioritize public over private interests.
Summer is here; Books&Ideas is off on holiday. We will be back with new publications starting August 30. In the meantime, here is a selection of essays, interviews and reviews published over the past year.
Over the past few months, Books and Ideas has been running a series of interviews with leading contemporary scholars, who took the time to discuss their particular topics of research with us. For the Christmas season, we have put together a selection of seven discussions with intellectuals across the humanities and sciences: sociology, history, comparative literature, neuro-biology, anthropology and political science.
Books & Ideas is slowing down for the summer and will be offering weekly selections of reviews and essays published over the last year. This week’s selection focuses on digital tools, their relationship to political power and capitalism.
André Gorz’s multiform thought is entirely centred on liberation: from work, which prevents individuals from thriving; from consumption, which grows ever higher; and from the social system, which reduces individuals to mere pawns in a “megamachine”.
Though poorly known in France, the work of the anthropologist Mary Douglas is nonetheless essential for understanding the elementary forms of social organization and daily life. By shedding light on her academic career and personal life, this portrait rehabilitates the thought of a major intellectual.
A great historian of the English working class, a major intellectual figure in debates surrounding Marxism in the years 1960-1970, and an anti-nuclear activist who initiated an environmentalist critique of capitalism—such were the many faces of Edward Palmer Thompson, whose work deeply permeates the different social sciences to this day.
En Allemagne, le conflit israélo-palestinien divise notamment les sympathisants et militants de la gauche radicale. Parmi eux, le courant « anti-allemand » se distingue par son soutien inconditionnel à l’État d’Israël et une critique de l’anti-impérialisme majoritaire à gauche.
À la croisée de la fête et de la contestation, le carnaval militant s’est imposé comme une forme mêlant tradition festive et intentions subversives. Outil de mobilisation et de transgression, le carnaval brouille la frontière entre révolte et mise en scène.
L’amour de la nouveauté n’est pas né dans la société moderne de consommation. Depuis longtemps, il est un moteur du capitalisme, constituant un imaginaire commercial puissant. Ses impacts environnementaux sont, aujourd’hui, désastreux.
À propos de : Philip Pettit, The State, Princeton University Press
À propos de : Adeline Barbin, La démocratie des techniques, préface d’Andrew Feenberg, Hermann
À propos de : Isabelle Coutant, Yvon Atonga, Petit frère. Comprendre les destinées familiales, Seuil
