Kant and Humbug
It is perhaps no surprise that the country which brought us Kant and the categorical imperative has also given rise to the word “Gutmensch” as a…
Politics
In Defence of the Open Society against its Enemies
Some have declared that 2016 was the year democracy died. This is nonsense of course and represents nothing more than those persons peeved sense of…
Virtuous Thinking?
Are we as human beings all different from one another, or are we not rather all basically the same? And do you feel you are…
Chance and Necessity in Populist Revolution
May you live in interesting times (Confucian curse) Men are qualified for civil liberty in exact proportion to their disposition to put moral chains upon…
The Politics of Division
Is the new populist style of politics emerging on both sides of the Atlantic a cause or a symptom of the increasing sense of division…
What is the point of the Left? A dispassionate assessment of its virtues and vices
After the fall of communism in the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe in the 1990s there was a brief window in which it was predicted…
Three Cheers for the EU ‘Single Market’ (but Not Four)
Now that the dust kicked up in the hubbub preceding and succeeding the Brexit referendum result is beginning to settle, the real options facing the…
Postscript to the Referendum: the Continuing Case for Reform of the EU
Amid the celebrations, dejection, hopes, foreboding, possibilities, instability, treachery, transformation and general uncertainty that has followed the outcome of the EU referendum, one thing has…
The Moral Basis of the European Project?
Colin Turfus asks if the European Union is or can ever be faithful to its own founding principles. The Two Pillars For over half a…
Confirmation bias and the EU
Do Europhiles tend to hedge their bets with a ‘better the Devil you know’ approach to the coming referendum? Having inclined over the years towards…