The invasion of Ukraine by Russian forces at the end of last month has spawned an industry of think pieces. Comparisons to historic events, times, people, and peoples have been a useful, if not fraught means of attempting to explain something which to most people under 40 seems unexplainable. The End of History, the oft scoffed at thesis of Francis Fukuyama, has well and truly been put to bed. T

The outbreak of ground war between two industrialized states on European soil marks the return of history. Russia’s bucking of international trends and perceived order allows for a real life example of practice in the theories of international relations built and developed since the end of the second world war. The conflict over prevailing thought between realists and liberals has waged on with mostly hypotheticals and tangential ‘proofs’ offered by each side.

How does the interplay of nationalism and pride undercut the ability to think critically about history. Can one be patriotic while still accepting abhorrent acts by those in the nation who came before us? In December, The International Review of Law, an academic journal, published a paper online by the Harvard economist J. Mark Ramseyer in which he called the victims of Japanese rape and torture “prostitutes.” T

The view of history often falls into the trope of unstoppable progress forward. President Obama often referenced being on the “right side of history” even quoting Martin Luther King Jr. in saying that the “arc of history” bends towards justice. While from a cursory glance, this view feels right, we live today in a more stable, just, and safe world than we did just a century earlier. It also lacks the perspective in how fragile progress and justice can actually be

Last week, the House passed President Biden’s top policy agenda by pushing along the Build Back Better bill. Build Back Better is the so-called social infrastructure bill that has been shaped to use budget reconciliation in the Senate and thus take a simple majority to pass. BBB has been in the making since before Biden was elected and is part of a two pronged approach to ambitious policy making for the Democratic controlled Capitol Hill.