Essays
(Aritra Deb via Shutterstock)
The Ties That Bind
From Inertia to Integration: Getting Serious About U.S.-India Defense Cooperation

India and the United States are declared “major defense partners.” But as Secretary Pompeo visits New Delhi this week, they are still not nearly as aligned as interests and values suggest they should be.

(Georges Michel, Art Institute of Chicago)
No True Scotsman
The Neo-Nationalist Danger

If Trump lacks a framework for his policies, an organized movement of Trump-supporting neo-nationalist intellectuals is happy to supply one.

Edvard Isto, “The Attack” (1899)
On the Front Lines
Facing Russia, Close and Personal

TAI editor-in-chief Jeffrey Gedmin speaks with the Presidents of Finland and Estonia, in Helsinki and Tallinn.

Words as Weapons
Is the Mainstream Left, Right, or Center?

American political discourse has long revolved around a non-stop labeling game that often does more to obscure political realities than to elucidate them. Is it possible to explode the game?

© Getty Images.
Who's in the Driver Seat?
Turkey’s Hour of Nationalism: The Deeper Sources of Political Realignment

Lost in the electoral struggle for Istanbul, the deeper lesson of Turkey’s local election is the rise of Turkish nationalism. It has weakened President Erdoğan, and it offers the United States new options in developing a coherent Turkey policy.

Ayushi1905 via Wikimedia Commons
Xi’s Worst Nightmare
Hong Kong’s Freedom Movement Won’t Stop Now, or There

The protests and the government’s backpedaling have exposed fissures running through the mainland, and even into Beijing’s ruling elite.

RKO Pictures
Vegetative Vampires
Howard Hawks’s The Thing and Our Echo Chamber Age

In the 1951 classic, an otherworldly being feeds on all-too-human fears—and shows how bonds can fragment in a climate of paranoia and distrust.

Graphic by Danielle Desjardins
Innovation and Disruption
Universal Basic Income: Does It Work?

Is UBI an idea whose time has come, or just a populist gimmick? With automation set to disrupt millions of jobs over the next decade, the stakes of answering that question have never been higher.

The Ivan Golunov Affair
The Summer of Russia’s Discontent?

How the sustained outcry against a reporter’s arrest led to a rare reversal from Russia’s authorities—and could widen the cracks between the Kremlin and the public.

(CC0 Public Domain via pxhere.com)
The View from Islamabad
Pakistan: Bad Moon Rising

A series of hydra-headed crises threatens to plunge Pakistan into chaos.

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