Historians traffic in characters and plots. They appreciate the extent to which timing, location and personality matter. Anthropologists, on the other hand, eschew the importance of contingency, inadvertence and timing, treating humans like predictable atoms, not willful Adams.

Today there is a sizeable gap between elite and non-elite opinion on immigration reform. Time to cut through the fog of fear and moralizing dividing them.

This is not your grandfather’s Great Depression. It’s ours. And it will scar and mold and re-shape us in its own unique way.

The age-old scourge of piracy has come back to haunt us off the waters of Somalia. Our troubles in dealing decisively with the problem are largely of our own making.

French immigration dilemmas can no longer be denied.

Are Ayn Rand and her adept Alan Greenspan to blame for our economic woes? Answering that question requires something more than parody and less than unqualified praise.

To Western development experts, Africa remains a puzzle box of failure. But it’s really no puzzle: Africa is rich; only its politics are poor.

During the Cold War, a loosely confederated intelligence community was enough to counter the lumbering, bureaucratic Warsaw Pact. But in the age of globalization, U.S. Intelligence needs to operate as a single, networked enterprise.

What does the rise of mixed martial arts (MMA) say about American culture? And is it barbaric human cockfighting or a noble sport?

James Galbraith’s prediction of the collapse of the nation’s financial system has earned him a well-deserved reputation for prescience. His understanding of recent history, however, is another matter.