THOUGHT LEADERS
Crossing Cultures
Ian Buruma
Is multiculturalism a blessing or a curse? Must democracy be secular or can religion play a role? Does the “West” still exist and, if so, what does it stand for? Has China successfully fused capitalism with authoritarianism? Will Islam change the West or will the West change Islam?
“I'm not a donkey, and I don’t have a field,” scoffed Max Weber when some academic non-entity criticized him for writing outside his discipline. Yet, with the rapid growth and increasing diversification of human knowledge, the forces of intellectual specialization have all but won. Nowadays, newspaper readers and editors alike bemoan what seems to be a consequence of this narrowness: the death of the free-ranging intellectual.
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The New French Fashion in Civil Rights
Ian Buruma Series: Crossing Cultures 2010-02-08The French parliament wants to ban Muslim women from wearing the burqa – the full, face-covering garment worn by some orthodox believers – in public places. But, while no woman should be forced to cover herself up, nor, in a pluralist society, should anyone be forced not to.... read Comments: 0 Recommended: 0 Read: 903
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A Dissident in China
Ian Buruma Series: Crossing Cultures 2010-01-07
With China's economy still roaring ahead and success following success in foreign policy, the Chinese government, under the Communist Party, has every reason to feel confident. So why did a gentle former literature professor named Liu Xiaobo have to be sentenced to 11 years in prison, just because he publicly advocated freedom of expression and an end to one-party rule?... read Comments: 2 Recommended: 0 Read: 3898
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Mountains and Minarets
Ian Buruma Series: Crossing Cultures 2009-12-02To attribute the Swiss vote to ban minarets to “Islamophobia” is perhaps to miss the point. If the Swiss and other Europeans – many of whom would vote for a similar ban if given the chance – were self-assured about their own identities, their Muslim fellow-citizens would not strike such fear in their hearts.... read Comments: 1 Recommended: 0 Read: 5396
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What’s Left After 1989?
Ian Buruma Series: Crossing Cultures 2009-11-02
Twenty years ago, when the Berlin Wall was breached and the Soviet empire was collapsing, only die-hard believers in a communist utopia felt unhappy. But, after the failures of neo-liberalism and neo-conservatisim, we are still waiting for a new vision that will lead to progress, but this time without tyranny.... read Comments: 0 Recommended: 0 Read: 4677
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Roman Polanski’s American Dream
Ian Buruma Series: Crossing Cultures 2009-10-01It is hard to see any useful purpose in Switzerland's arrest of the filmmaker Roman Polanski for a 30-year-old crime committed in the US. But, while American justice may be populist and media-driven, the idea that the law should treat great artists differently – conspicuous in the outraged statements of Polanski's defenders - is fundamentally undemocratic.... read Comments: 0 Recommended: 1 Read: 4755
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The Re-Birth of Japanese Democracy
Ian Buruma Series: Crossing Cultures 2009-08-31The Japanese opposition's landslide victory shows that the desire for political choice is not confined to a few fortunate countries, mostly in the Western world. This is a vital lesson, especially at a time when China’s economic success is convincing too many leaders that citizens, especially but not only in Asia, want to be treated like children.... read Comments: 0 Recommended: 0 Read: 4692
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A Black and White Question
Ian Buruma Series: Crossing Cultures 2009-07-28
NEW YORK – In the afternoon of July 16 two men appeared to be breaking into a fine house in an expensive area of Cambridge, Massachusetts. Alerted by a telephone call, a policeman arrived smartly on the scene. He saw one black male standing inside the house and asked him to come out. The man refused. He was then told to identify himself. The man, still refusing to step out, said he was a Harvard professor, showed his ID, and warned the cop not to mess with him. He said something about black men in America being singled out, and asked the cop, who was white, for his name and identification. The cop, joined by several colleagues, arrested the professor for disorderly conduct. ... read Comments: 1 Recommended: 0 Read: 5691
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Damaged Democracy
Ian Buruma Series: Crossing Cultures 2009-07-07What are opposition candidates to do when they are asked to take part in elections that they know they cannot win, or that, even when they can win, will give them only minimal authority? There is no absolute yardstick on how to behave in these impossible circumstances, so candidates and voters alike must judge every election on its merits.... read Comments: 0 Recommended: 0 Read: 5385
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Lessons from Tiananmen
Ian Buruma Series: Crossing Cultures 2009-06-01
NEW YORK – It is a chilling thought that exactly twenty years after the “Tiananmen Massacre” few young citizens of the People’s Republic of China have much idea of what happened on that occasion. Many unarmed Chinese citizens were killed by People’s Liberation Army troops on June 4, 1989, not only in the vicinity of Tiananmen Square, but in cities all over China. Most were not students, who started the peaceful demonstrations against corruption and autocracy, but ordinary workers, the sort of people a Communist Party ought to be standing up for. ... read Comments: 1 Recommended: 0 Read: 8461
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