India: A Time of Danger and Decision  

The plight of democratic India has aroused little compassion in America. If it is accurate to say that the Administration has handled the Indian crisis admirably—not too much pressure on the Nehru government, no moralizing, a restrained effort to create …





The Case of Comrade Djilas  

The Djilas case is obviously of the first importance, another sign of that molecular disintegration at work in eastern Europe and a further proof, if any be needed, that the hope for political stability on the continent is sheer chimera.



Henry Pachter (1907-1980)  

Last year, on the night of December 10, our friend and long-time member of the Dissent editorial board Henry Pachter died of a heart attack at the age of seventy-three. His “rich and active life,” in the words of his …



French Socialism Entangled in Factions  

The fortunes of political movements change rapidly these days. Consider the French Socialist party, which could boast at the beginning of this year that it was France’s “largest party”: it had a membership of 200,000, the highest percentage of the …





In the Magazines  

In May the New Leader published a whole issue devoted to a superb study by Gus Tyler, vice-president of the ILGWU, entitled “The Other Economy: America’s Working Poor.” In his opening paragraphs Tyler presents his thesis: The United States has …



Socialists vs. Communists in France  

A cartoon in the Paris rightist daily Figaro shows a gleeful (President of the Republic) Valery Giscard d’Estaing watching a television screen on which Francois Mitterrand (Socialist party), Georges Marchais (Communist party) and Robert Fabre (Left-Radicals) attack one another. Turning …



The Russian Revolution Revisited  

Those of us who were raised on that version of the Russian Revolution symbolized in the storming of the Petrograd Winter Palace and the dramatic gesture of Antonov-Ovseenko, he of the broadbrimmed, black felt hat, as he bursts into the …



The Reawakening of India  

She had planned a sort of plebiscite, a “yes” or “no” vote on her rule, and was positive of the outcome. Whoever heard of a dictator losing a plebiscite election, since Louis Bonaparte invented the technique? Everything remained under Mrs. …



Portugal’s Dangling Revolution  

For a brief, involuntary moment, while traveling to Portugal’s Estoril beach, we joined the revolution—or was it the “counterrevolution”? It wasn’t easy to tell. Rates on the suburban railroads had been raised by 30 percent to meet the railway workers’ …



TV Comes to the Village  

Some time ago, writing about India’s population problem, I offered the suggestion—probably not original—that the introduction of television into the villages, aside from its potential educational value, might have the effect of reducing the birth rate in that the villagers …



On the Death of an Old Militant  

Messali Hadj, father of the Algerian nationalist movement and one-time charismatic leader of the Algerian people—in Algeria itself, but particularly among those Algerians who had gone to work in France during the colonialist days—died in France on June 3, 1974, …



On Terrorism  

We are in for an increasingly hard time of it. Like bad money in circulation, individual terrorism and acts of violence committed in the name of “the revolution” have a way of showing up cyclically. While the California kidnapping of …



Marching on Montgomery  

The twenty-five thousand Americans who converged upon Montgomery on March 25 surely did not represent the “best” of America in terms of wealth, status or power, but —in the words of Bayard Rustin—”all the best in America” was there. No …



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