Tag: current events

Michael H. Hunt: How to think about the end of the “American Century”

Revisiting Henry Luce’s essay on American ascendancy, Michael H. Hunt considers the current era of American decline. Continue Reading Michael H. Hunt: How to think about the end of the “American Century”

Michael H. Hunt: Out of Afghanistan: Tragedy or Farce?

Michael Hunt on how the United States’ exit from Afghanistan might seem similar to some past tricky military retreats. Continue Reading Michael H. Hunt: Out of Afghanistan: Tragedy or Farce?

Philip Rubio comments on black unemployment & the legacy of segregation

Philip F. Rubio, postal worker-turned-history scholar and author of There’s Always Work at the Post Office: African American Postal Workers and the Fight for Jobs, Justice, and Equality, has recently lent his expertise on race issues in government employment and especially the postal service in two very different but equally fascinating news outlets.  In a recent Huffington Post feature, “Black… Continue Reading Philip Rubio comments on black unemployment & the legacy of segregation

Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, 57 years ago today

Fifty-seven years have passed since the ruling in this monumental Supreme Court case that overturned Plessy v. Ferguson and found laws for “separate but equal” black schools and white schools to be unconstitutional. While this decision was a huge move in the right direction in the Civil Rights movement, it was met with resistance by many, especially sending shockwaves through… Continue Reading Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, 57 years ago today

Michael Hunt: Questions that the Libya Intervention Begs

It’s ok to feel conflicted over the Libyan intervention. You’re not alone — and you have good reason. The U.S. response to the uprising against the Gaddafi regime raises a welter of issues. Is oil driving decisions? Why the inconsistency if not hypocrisy of acting in Libya but not Gaza? Is Libya just another case of U.S. muscle flexing or… Continue Reading Michael Hunt: Questions that the Libya Intervention Begs

Vanessa May: When the Workplace Is Someone Else’s Home

Today we welcome a guest post from Vanessa May, author of Unprotected Labor: Household Workers, Politics, and Middle-Class Reform in New York, 1870-1940 (June 2011). Here she reflects on how some of the recent policies that now protect domestic workers in New York mirror the struggle for rights and reform during the era highlighted in her book.  The passing of… Continue Reading Vanessa May: When the Workplace Is Someone Else’s Home

Lisa Levenstein on Balancing Budgets and Public Employees

The recent events concerning public sector workers in Wisconsin have brought a great deal of reflecting and attention to the ways in which the government, at both the state and national levels, spends and saves money. UNC Press author Lisa Levenstein, with economics doctoral student Jason Brent, wrote an Op-ed in this past Sunday’s Greensboro News & Record on the… Continue Reading Lisa Levenstein on Balancing Budgets and Public Employees