Fall 2025

DETROIT LETTER In the Spring number of DISSENT Lewis Coser wrote: “Granted that we are not soon likely to repeat the catastrophe of the 1930’s. Yet what matters for an understanding of the mood of the nation is the fact …

I have read most if not all of the press response to Dissent as of this writing, and I think the comments which most deserve study are those expressed in the February issue of Commentary.

Do you know who the ancestors of Joe McCarthy are?

Joseph Buttinger’s book, “In the Twilight of Socialism,” is the history of the Austrian socialist underground from the victory of Austro-Fascism in February 1934 up to Hitler’s Anschluss in March 1938.

To some, a union of democracy and social planning virtually defines the socialist aspiration, and surely it would be an ideal union if the two were constantly compatible. I shall argue, however, that this is not the case.

Some excuse is needed for still another attack on the question of whether ends can justify means.

For its competition of 1782 The Academy of Lyon posed the question: “Has the discovery of America proved useful or harmful to the human race?”

Some 200 intellectuals gathered in New York last November to worry the problem: Why is Anti-Americanism so prevalent in Europe?

Neutralism is the most indigenous, the most spontaneous and the most important political mood in Europe.

For the liberal, the problem of defending the West is perhaps even more critical a question than for the socialist, since it is the liberal who eschews Utopias and therefore finds himself without an exit.

What is this historical monstrosity, this illegitimate child of the mating between a “socialist-utopian” revolution and the murky past of Russia?

To speak of a whole society as lacking in mental health implies a controversial assumption, contrary to the position of sociological relativism held by most social scientists today.

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.

Exactly when a recession becomes a depression, whether we will have the one or, in time, both, what can be done to prevent a further slide into unemployment — these, certainly, are important questions.