Michael Laxer
Student Demands for Divestment Are Not New
There is a long history of students organizing for divestment from states and institutions complicit in criminal acts, apartheid, and...
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Michael Laxer
Apr 2810 min read
Banks and Investors Are Fueling a Global Biodiversity Crisis
Commercial financial flows to the forest-risk commodity sectors are driving the majority of tropical deforestation. By Laurel Sutherlin...
Michael Laxer
Apr 266 min read
India’s Billionaire Wealth Is on Display as Nation Votes
India’s Ambani family has enjoyed flaunting its obscene wealth, a perfect reminder in the midst of an election, of the economic...
Michael Laxer
Apr 205 min read
US Prison Calls Are Increasingly Free, but Prisoners Still Aren’t
New reforms have made it easier and cheaper to make calls to and from incarcerated people. But corporate profiteering will continue until...
Michael Laxer
Apr 168 min read
Property and Debt in Ancient Rome
The Roman concept of property is essentially creditor-oriented. As Rome’s power grew, practices quickly became predatory. House of the...
Michael Laxer
Apr 1210 min read
A Class Analysis of the Trump-Biden Rerun
Amaury Laporte, CC BY 2.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0>, via Wikimedia Commons By Richard D. Wolff By “class system” we...
Michael Laxer
Apr 127 min read
Why Culture Is Not the Only Tool for Defining Homo sapiens in Relation to Other Hominins
We need a broad comparative lens to produce useful explanations and narratives of our origins across time. An ancient skull excavated...
Michael Laxer
Apr 915 min read
The Myth That India’s Freedom Was Won Nonviolently Is Holding Back Progress
Some struggles can be kept nonviolent, but decolonization never has been—certainly not in India. Public domain image of Gandhi leaving a...
Michael Laxer
Apr 66 min read
How Elite Infighting Made the Magna Carta
Although the Magna Carta typically is depicted as the birth of England’s fight to create democracy, the 13th-century struggle was to...
Michael Laxer
Mar 305 min read
Corporate Profiteering Destroyed the Baltimore Bridge
The price of corporate compromising on safety is usually paid with taxpayer dollars and immigrant worker lives. Image via screenshot By...
Michael Laxer
Mar 235 min read
Here’s Why You Can’t Afford an Electric Car
The U.S. is aggressively keeping cheap Chinese-made EVs off the market. We are all paying the price for this protectionism. BYD Seagull...
Michael Laxer
Mar 227 min read
Why Artificial Intelligence Must Be Stopped Now
The promise of AI is eclipsed by its perils, which include our own annihilation. By Richard Heinberg Those advocating for artificial...
Michael Laxer
Mar 205 min read
Lessons From Legalization: The Problem Isn’t Cannabis, It’s Capitalism
There has been a sea change in attitudes and laws on marijuana, which ought to have helped ease racial inequities. But without concerted...
Michael Laxer
Mar 1611 min read
We Need a Plan for the Transition to Renewable Energy
Radical societal transformation is inevitable; a plan could make a difference between catastrophe and progress. Dillon Wind Power...
Michael Laxer
Mar 118 min read
Debt Forgiveness in the Bronze Age
Whether in the realms of trade or agriculture, the operative principle was that debtors should not lose their economic liberty by being...
Michael Laxer
Mar 97 min read
The Great Archaeological Discovery of Our Time
An interview with renowned archaeologist Gary M. Feinman on the emergence of a global data set from our past that humanity can use to...
Michael Laxer
Mar 65 min read
Empire Decline and Costly Delusions
President of Russia Vladimir Putin and General Secretary of the Chinese Communist Party Xi Jinping, March 2023 -- Kremlin.ru, CC BY 4.0...
Michael Laxer
Mar 66 min read
Discarding Old Theories on the Path to Finding the First Humans Outside Africa
Spectacular archeological finds reveal the true past of the first Europeans. Atapuerca, Gran Dolina excavation -- Malopez 21, CC BY-SA...
Michael Laxer
Mar 24 min read
The Adaptive Value of Teenagers: How Peer Learning Contributes to Primate Success
By Brenna R. Hassett Anthropological science is our species’ attempt to address our most fundamental questions about who we are and how...
Michael Laxer
Feb 2812 min read
The Inspiring Movement to Build for Climate Resiliency
Architects and everyday people are teaching each other to build spaces for community and climate resilience using local, natural...
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