I've not read a recently published academic book that I loved in long while, but this this this

‘China’s gaokao factories and America’s college-industrial complex are not accidents. They are the logical outcome of a global system that has mistaken education for investment and human life for capital.’ @izading.bsky.social on China’s university entrance exam. www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v4...

New essay for my readers! Sorry-this one is long :)

Beneath a Cinderella story gone wrong lies the tangled reality of class, sex, and Great Power politics. My new essay: "Anora, Russia, America" izading.substack.com/p/anora-russ...

So many great lines in this piece, but Mary Wollstonecraft's take on Edmund Burke feels fresh two centuries later: “Misery, to reach your heart, I perceive, must have its cap and bells.” 🔥

The father of modern conservatism considered himself a liberal. My new essay in The Ideas Letter explores liberalism’s existential crisis—from 1789 to now. www.theideasletter.org/essay/the-so...

Really enjoyed this conversation with two young leaders I met in Berlin, meandering through the worlds of climate change, belonging, polarization, and how to break out of echo chambers. Young people are by definition on the right side of history, and we all need to pay attention. tiny.cc/fp3c001

The brilliant @izading.bsky.social will be giving a talk at Leiden University on March 19th, discussing authoritarian teleology 🔥 www.universiteitleiden.nl/en/events/20... Looking forward to it.

This was a great episode and @izading.bsky.social dissected the pre-existing discourse in a brilliant manner.

Definitely one of my favorites of the year was a conversation with political scientist @izading.bsky.social, who offers trenchant critiques of some current ideas in Western studies of Chinese politics. art19.com/shows/sinica...

@izading.bsky.social 's deep dive into Chinese view of "declinism". TLDR: "We should be careful not to let a question turn into a prophecy. Rises and falls need not be an inter-civilizational zero-sum struggle, however seductive Thucydides’ lair may seem" www.theideasletter.org/essay/goodby...

My essay “Goodbye, Gibbon” for The Ideas Letter theideasletter.org from the Open Society Foundation. In which I offer non-answers to the question “Is America in decline from a Chinese perspective?”