Books & ideas

In the Land of Logistics

Gilles Paché — 2024-05-09T06:25:59Z

By analysing a generalised process of “logistisation”, Mathieu Quet shows that the circulation of people and goods is at the heart of our societies. But has logistics also captured language and the living world?

Leaving the Car Behind

Étienne Augris — 2023-02-21T08:00:00Z

How might societies move beyond car dependency? Dishabituation from cars will require promoting new modes of transport (bikes, trains, busses) and a “mobility license” offering increased flexibility

Covid-19: Chronicle of an Outbreak Foretold

Philippe Sansonetti — 2020-03-30T07:00:00Z

What are Covid-19 and the coronavirus? What are the parameters, causes and effects of this disease? What are the short and long-term prospects? Infectious disease specialist Philippe Sansonetti explains why the fate of the epidemic is in our hands.

Automotive Society

Étienne Augris — 2019-12-19T08:00:00Z

Cars are everywhere. Motorisation owes its success to a product that satisfies individual aspirations, combined with the consumption boom and the appetite for urban transport. But do cars put us on the road to emancipation or alienation?

The Spirit of Bridges

Ivan Jablonka — 2019-08-29T07:00:00Z

What's more ordinary than a bridge? However, a bridge is a living structure that has to be designed, built and maintained. Here is our interview with a legendary bridge designer, who is also a man skilled in the art.

The color of France's “yellow vests”

Aurélien Delpirou — 2018-12-17T07:00:00Z

Jacquerie, revolt of the peripheries, or revenge of the working class? The initial analysis of the “yellow vest” (gilets jaunes) movement has unleashed sociological prejudices. Yet this movement reflects not so much a France split in two as a multiplicity of territorial interdependencies.

Brazil's “Winter of Discontent”

Edesio Fernandes — 2014-06-23T07:30:00Z

Recent social movements in Brazil, characterized by diffuse claims and a diversity of actors, should not be solely interpreted as reactions to the overwhelming cost of organizing the 2014 World Cup. This article emphasizes the elitist nature and the inefficiency of recent urban policy.

Disorder in Modernity

Evelyne Payen-Variéras — 2011-12-08T10:20:48Z

Historians of business have looked at the development of railroads in the U.S. as a time of “managerial revolution.” Richard White's latest book shows the role played by disorder and sheer contingency in this process, and runs counter to a view of economic modernity as the history of a rationalization. Business, in his view, was never just business.