Suchergebnisse

Abstract
The attack on the US Capitol on 6 January 2021 was the first such attack on the US Congress since the British-American War of 1812. It was also the event leading to the highest number of injured first responders from any single event in the US since 9/11. What led to it? To respond this question, this article places this event within the broader crisis of Western democracies and the rise of populism that has been its hallmark. It explains the attack on the Capitol as a result of the "Big Lie", that is, the assertion that the November 3, 2020, presidential elction was stolen from Donald Trump. The remarkable resonance this unfounded claim has found among the US population, in turn, can be traced back to the huge division by race, class and geography currently affecting the United States, a division that makes for a highly polarized polity.

Summary
'A diplomat these days is nothing but a head waiter who is occasionally allowed to sit', the actor Peter Ustinov once quipped. The paradox is that at the height of the current phase of globalisation, diplomacy and diplomats were sidelined rather than recognised for their key roles as 'hinges' of this process. Will the COVID-19 pandemic, with its cutting back on travel and (most likely) the budgets of ministries of foreign affairs, and the blistering attacks of populists on diplomats lead to their further marginalisation? Looking at the newly emerging role of Chinese ambassadors, this essay argues that may not necessarily be the case.

Pablo Neruda has been described by some as the most widely read poet ever. His output was prodigious and diverse. He was also very much a man and a poet of his time, that of the first three-fourths of the 'short' twentieth century, a time very different from our own. That raises the question: Is it possible to split the poet from his politics? A standard recommendation of literary critics is to stick to Neruda's 'non-political' work and forget the rest. Yet, Neruda himself insisted that not only his poetry but also his personal life and his politics formed an indivisible whole. At a time when the rise of Asia and South America is changing the global landscape, it is especially important to come to terms with the central perspective that inspired Neruda's oeuvre: his identification with the common man and with the South; his anti-colonial spirit (honed during his Asian sojourn) and his extraordinary grasp of what José Martí referred as 'nuestra América'. This article explores how Neruda provides us with a vocabulary and a grammar that allows us to look at the emerging new world of the twenty-first century with fresh eyes.