FOR THE first time, German politicians have entered into a debate on their involvement in Afghanistan informed "by the knowledge that the country is engaged in a war," writes Cameron Abadi. While this has led to a more open discussion over their involvement in Afghanistan, no political figure has confronted the larger question at the heart of military policy: "what [Germany] might stand for." Photo: German Chancellor Angela Merkel (Wikimedia Commons).

SEIU PRESIDENT Andy Stern announced his retirement last month. Melvyn Dubofsky takes stock of Stern's successes and failures over the last fifteen years. His career, writes Dubofsky, exemplifies "a perpetual dilemma in labor history: the evolution of labor leaders from rebels to union administrators." Photo: Andy Stern (Joi Ito/Wikimedia Commons).

THIS APRIL saw the publication of Dissent editorial board member Paul Berman's The Flight of the Intellectuals, a "searing examination into the intellectual atmosphere of the moment" examining "how some of the West's best thinkers and journalists have fumbled badly in their effort to grapple with Islamist ideas and violence." Andrew F. March and Paul Berman debate the book, and Tariq Ramadan, here. Photo: Tariq Ramadan (Joshua Sherurcij/Wikimedia Commons).

WITH A UN climate change meeting coming in November, Senate leaders have proposed a bill to help limit U.S. CO2 emissions. While "many in the United States think the Senate proposal to cut CO2 emissions requires far too large a sacrifice," writes Darrel Moellendorf, the bill itself is inadequate, "[failing] a reasonable requirement of universalizability...There is little in this bill to inspire." Photo: UN official Yvo de Boer (Ng Swan Ti/Wikimedia Commons).

The American obsession with youth has spawned a plethora of books on America's young, but to Nicolaus Mills, too "many of the books and essays we have about the young...refuse to let the young speak [about] themselves." Dissent asked nine young Americans to write, in their own words, about their experiences and the meaning of their social engagements. These contributors help "provide an important record of how our new century began as well as an indication of where it is headed." Photo: Corporation for National and Community Service.

LAST MONTH, Arizona Governor Jan Brewer signed into law a set of new measures intended to help secure the state's border with Mexico. But, writes Katherine Benton-Cohen, the law fails to tackle the problems its purports to solve. "Checking the identification of every day laborer in Phoenix won't bring back Robert Krentz. [It] will only perpetuate hatred and stalemate." Photo: Nogales on Arizona/Mexico Border (Gordon Hyde /U.S. Army/Wikimedia)

WITH HIS Cooper Union address, Obama has at last made a start at the much-needed reform of our financial markets. "Obama," writes Jeffrey Madrick, has "awakened to what economic self-interest really means, [and] he has at last made a start in financial re-regulation...The bill that will pass will make a difference. It just won't be nearly enough." Obama in March (Pete Souza / White House)

NUCLEAR WEAPONS have not only played a significant role in shaping American military and foreign policy, they have also helped legitimize an emerging security state at home. Writes Ward Wilson in his review of Gary Wills's Bomb Power, "Wills points to one of modern democracy's fundamental cruxes: [How] should a state balance the needs of security with the demand of transparency?" Photo: Nuclear Test Romeo ( U.S. Department of Energy)

THE COLLAPSE of communism was freighted with ironies. "The sharpest of these," writes Michael Kimmage in his review of three new histories of communism, "is that communism [turned out to be] the historical midwife of capitalism. But in a similar contortion of theoretical logic, communism-which, for Marx, was rigorously internationalist-also [came to] serve as an agent of nationalism." Photo: A toppled statue of Stalin in Budapest, 1956 (Wikimedia Commons)

CESAR CHAVEZ gave the United Farm Workers a religious sense of mission. But, writes Jeffrey Rubin, his leadership also led to the movement's decline. "Had Chavez been willing and able to delegate authority and relinquish control, then others could have run the union, and Chavez himself might have focused on building a broader poor people's movement."(Photo Credit: UFW leader Cesar Chavez / Joel Levine / Wikimedia Commons)

IN THE January Citizens United v. FEC decision, the Supreme Court ruled that most restrictions on corporate election spending are unconstitutional. By allowing markets to influence the political process, argues Daniel J.H. Greenwood, "we lose democracy. Moreover, we will lose our markets."

IN A land of many disputes, perhaps no piece of territory is as intensely contested as what Jews call the Temple Mount and Muslims the Noble Sanctuary. But, writes Michael Walzer, "It turns out that even extreme political disagreements can yield, at least for a few moments, to the demands of historical scholarship."

OVER THE past decade, the Internet has proven to be an invaluable tool for Chinese dissidents. But, write Kate Merkel-Hess and Jeffrey Wasserstrom, while there are those "who deftly confound word filters and poke holes in the firewall, there are also patriotic hackers, Han ethno-nationalists, and government moles using the Internet in equally adept ways to deploy their own views."

THE DEATH of Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam leader Velupillai Prabhakaran on May 19 signaled the end of over twenty-six years of war and violence. But, writes Sumedha Senanayake, "The military victory [has] left the Sri Lankan government with a massive humanitarian emergency: nearly 300,000 internally displaced persons."

WHEN TENSIONS emerge between Islamic law and human rights, civil society advocates often attack Shari'a or ignore it. But, writes Austin Dacey, "the experience of [a] young man from Cairo testifies to the promise of [a] third strategy."

FORTY-THREE YEARS after "reunification," Jerusalem is still deeply divided along religious, political, and socioeconomic lines. Writes Jo-Ann Mort, "The cultural divide is tremendous....East Jerusalemites read different newspapers; watch different television stations; and if they need public transportation, use different bus lines than the residents of the western, mostly Jewish part of the city."

OBAMA'S IMPROBABLE rise to the White House was marked by a radical sense of possibility and hope. But a year into his presidency and many--both on the right and the left--are disappointed. Todd Gitlin, Nelson Lichtenstein, Lillian Rubin, and Michael Walzer examine the ups and downs of his first year and contemplate what may come next.

AS SOCIAL critics, writers, editors, and scholars, intellectuals have a responsibility to be both a part of and apart from the society in which they live. E. J. Dionne, Jr., Alice Kessler-Harris, Jackson Lears, Martha Nussbaum, Katha Pollitt, Michael Tomasky, Katrina vanden Heuvel, and Leon Wieseltier contemplate the role intellectuals ought to play in American political and cultural life.

LIBERALS TALK of the New Deal as if it had been a panacea. But, writes Linda Gordon,while it "decreased unemployment and increased production and general well-being," its "discriminatory practices [also] helped create the growing inequality on which today's economic crisis rests." (Photo credit: A rivet heater at a PWA construction site FDR Library)

WHEN MICHAEL Ignatieff spoke at the Liberal Party convention in 2005, he was Canada's most buzzed-about politician since Pierre Trudeau. But five years later, reports Jordan Michael Smith, the Liberals are lagging behind the Conservative Party by double digits, and there is little hope that that they will soon return to power. (Photo credit: Michael Ignatieff Creative Commons / Brian Rice)