Dlittle30

LATEST ARTICLES ( 893 )

• Nuclear Accidents

  

  diagrams: Chernobyl reactor before and afterNuclear fission is one of the world-changing discoveries of the mid-twentieth century. Read more

  Posted on 24 February 2018 SOCIETY

• Folk Psychology and Alexa

  Paul Churchland made a large splash in the philosophy of mind and cognitive science several decades ago when he cast doubt on the categories of "folk psychology... Read more

  Posted on 11 February 2018 SOCIETY

• Cold War History from an IR Perspective

  

  Odd Arne Westad's The Cold War: A World History is a fascinating counterpoint to Tony Judt's Postwar: A History of Europe Since 1945. Read more

  Posted on 09 February 2018 SOCIETY

• Declining Industries

  

  Why is it so difficult for leaders in various industries and sectors to seriously address the existential threats that sometimes arise? Read more

  Posted on 30 January 2018 SOCIETY

• Gaining Compliance

  

  Organizations always involve numerous staff members whose behavior has the potential for creating significant risk for individuals and the organization but who... Read more

  Posted on 25 January 2018 SOCIETY

• Actors in Historical Epochs

  

  I've argued often for the idea that social science and historical explanations need to be "actor-centered" -- we need to ground our hypotheses about social and... Read more

  Posted on 20 January 2018 SOCIETY

• The Second American Revolution

  

  The first American Revolution broke the bonds of control exercised by a colonial power over the actions and aspirations of a relatively small number of people i... Read more

  Posted on 15 January 2018 SOCIETY

• Populism's Base

  

  Steve Bannon may have lost his perch in the White House and Breitbart; but the themes of white supremacy, intolerance, bigotry, and anti-government extremism... Read more

  Posted on 15 January 2018 SOCIETY

• Trust and Organizational Effectiveness

  

  It is fairly well agreed that organizations require a degree of trust among the participants in order for the organization to function at all. But what does thi... Read more

  Posted on 08 January 2018 SOCIETY

• Is History Probabilistic?

  

  Many of our intuitions about causality are driven by a background assumption of determinism: one cause, one effect, always. But it is evident in many realms --... Read more

  Posted on 30 December 2017 SOCIETY

• The Culture of an Organization

  

  It is often held that the behavior of a particular organization is affected by its culture. Two banks may have very similar organizational structures but show... Read more

  Posted on 22 December 2017 SOCIETY

• Is Public Opinion Part of a Complex System?

  

  The worrisome likelihood that Russians and other malevolent actors are tinkering with public opinion in Western Europe and the United States through social medi... Read more

  Posted on 20 December 2017 SOCIETY

• Varieties of Organizational Dysfunction

  

  Several earlier posts have made the point that important technology failures often include organizational faults in their causal background. Read more

  Posted on 13 December 2017 SOCIETY

• Organizational Dysfunction

  

  What is a dysfunction when it comes to the normal workings of an organization? In order to identify dysfunctions we need to have a prior conception of the... Read more

  Posted on 09 December 2017 SOCIETY

• New Perspectives on Chinese Authoritarianism

  

  The question of China's political future is an important one and a difficult one. Will China evolve towards a political system that embodies real legal... Read more

  Posted on 04 December 2017 SOCIETY

• Collapse of Eastern European Communisms

  

  An earlier post commented on Tony Judt's magnificent book Postwar: A History of Europe Since 1945. There I focused on the story he tells of the brutality of... Read more

  Posted on 29 November 2017 SOCIETY

• Corruption and Institutional Design

  

  Robert Klitgaard is an insightful expert on the institutional causes of corruption in various social arrangements. His 1988 book, Controlling Corruption, laid... Read more

  Posted on 28 November 2017 SOCIETY

• China Today

  

  There are a lot of opinions about China today in the United States -- authoritarian, farsighted, effective at economic progress, overly committed to Party... Read more

  Posted on 22 November 2017 SOCIETY

• Europe After World War II

  

  Europe faces major challenges today, from the rise of the extreme right to Brexit to the ongoing threat of ISIS terror. But these challenges pale against those... Read more

  Posted on 11 November 2017 SOCIETY

• A Localist Approach to Chinese Politics

  

  How do the domestic politics of China work, from 1949 to the present?This question covers many issues: Why does the Chinese state act as it does? Why does it... Read more

  Posted on 09 November 2017 SOCIETY