HERSH SMOLAR, a native of Poland and a much-decorated Resistance hero, was head of the Minsk ghetto underground during World War II and a member of the high command of an entire Partisan zone comprising four brigades. After the war …
The American labor movement is being battered by tides of change. Union membership as a proportion of the total work force is down; relative wages are declining; hard-won work rules are being surrendered; and employers are sowing the seeds of …
On May 9, 1974, in Cambridge, Massachusetts, rock critic Jon Landau heard Bruce Springsteen for the first time in concert. In a now famous endorsement, he testified: “I saw my rock and roll past flash before my eyes. And…I saw …
Lewis did most of the talking. His voice was low, and he spoke with passion. He outlined the conditions in all of the major industries of the country. He emphasized that thousands upon thousands of workers were waiting with outstretched …
Christianity did not “die” in the 19th century. Millions held fast to the faith; churches survived; theological controversies flourished. Yet we can now see that in the decades after the Enlightenment Christianity suffered deep wounds that could not be healed, …
In the wake of the economic recovery in 1983-84, a kind of euphoria spread through some, but by no means all, of the upper reaches of American society. John Naisbitt, author of the widely read book Megatrends, wrote at the …
Henry Pachter was both a historical scholar who combined an unusual breadth of horizon with deep originality of thought, and a profoundly engaged, lifelong socialist. It is therefore fitting that this second collection of his essays to appear after his …
That was quite a fuss the media made this spring about the 10th anniversary of the fall of Saigon. Magazine editors and television producers cannot resist what is known as a hook. Yet in the intensity of this outpouring there …
Zola once explained how to cope with times like these. One must buy a toad every morning and devour it alive and whole. Only after such a breakfast can one face the newspapers with a tranquil stomach, read and swallow …
The March 1985 Encounter features an address to Western Europe by Irving Kristol. A warning in three parts, with the logical structure of a syllogism backed by a gun, Kristol’s article is entitled “A Transatlantic ‘Misunderstanding’: The Case of Central …
This biography of Ilya Ehrenburg is the first serious attempt to assess the career of one of the most controversial men of our century. A writer and journalist by profession, Ehrenburg was widely regarded during the Stalin years as Russia’s …
VIENNA – There is, at first, no culture shock. So much about Europe seems familiar. American civilization, after all, had followed a basically European pattern well into the 1940s. Still in the last years before the suburban dispersal, Boston, with …
The consequences of American individualism have been a principal subject for observers of this nation since Tocqueville. What connections can be traced between our individualistic ethos and social practices? How does individualism contribute to or hinder the democratic process? Is …
Like all social formations, capitalism is not merely a Chinese puzzle in which all elements are of equal importance in locking together the whole. In capitalism as in other regimes, a central organizing principle and its institutions influence all aspects …
Earlier this year the morality of American business again became a hot public issue as one scandal after another hit the headlines. “Old-line manufacturers exposed cheating the Pentagon. Venerable banks caught laundering money. A securities firm found fraudulently kiting checks. …
