CATEGORY: PHILOSOPHY (12 min)

After politics

In the midst of a heated political environment and a constant barrage of media proclaiming our nation’s collapse due to the actions of one side or another, it’s hard to find refuge and peace. Is there a haven away from the hectic political existence that has befallen us in America?

In a Compact essay adapted from his foreword to the new book Alasdair MacIntyre: An Intellectual Biography (by Émile Perreau-Saussin), Pierre Manent examines the Scottish-American philosopher’s thoughts and writings to discover what he truly believed about the political state.

Manent claims MacIntyre deviated from the beliefs of the legendary Greek philosopher Aristotle more than most scholars recognize. Aristotle famously characterized man as a “political animal,” and, according to Manent, MacIntyre disdained that description, instead depicting humans as “social animals.”

MacIntyre did not like the political community at all, and he actively fought for the “subpolitical community” over the political one. Examples of that community include local businesses, villages, and churches—institutions which have suffered in today’s America.

Can we reclaim those institutions to the benefit of our country? Read Manent’s full essay to reveal more of MacIntyre’s answer.

CATEGORY: EDUCATION (4 min)

Minority reports

If you dare to speak a word against the overwhelming progressive consensus on college campuses today, you might be in for a quick trip to a kangaroo court. Hundreds of universities have launched so-called Bias Reporting Systems (BRSs), which encourage students to officially report anything someone else says that they find to be “biased” or “offensive.”

The excesses of a BRS are self-evident; who on earth defines “bias”? And some lawmakers are proposing solutions. Rep. Anthony Sabatini of Florida suggests in The American Conservative that legislation could curb the universities’ overreach by forcing them to protect First Amendment free speech rights.

Sabatini urges lawmakers to be specific in outlawing systems like the BRS by clarifying exactly what a university cannot do to chill its students’ speech. And most importantly, Sabatini argues for financial repercussions against these schools.

“The state should promise to withhold funding as long as the college or university remains in breach,” Sabatini writes.

Discover Sabatini’s full proposal here.

George Washington Statesmanship Online Course

Throughout history, people of character and conviction have studied the principles that built Western civilization and have applied them to the challenges of their day.

The free online George Washington Statesmanship Program will offer anyone, regardless of age and educational background, the opportunity to learn from those individuals and to discover what their insights can teach us about our current problems.

Throughout the course, you'll study prominent thinkers and statesmen like Aristotle, Edmund Burke, Alexander Hamilton, Thomas Jefferson, Alexis de Tocqueville, Abraham Lincoln, Winston Churchill, and of course, George Washington.

The course will also include a series of "modern-day application" sessions like “Civil Rights, Race, and Identity,” “America Is the World’s Technological City on a Hill,” and “From Wall Street to Our Street: Understanding the Financialization of the American Economy.”

It's a comprehensive course that will better prepare you to face today's issues.

Because our student editors and writers are bravely bringing conservative ideas to their campuses, we’re highlighting their efforts here.
 

CATEGORY: THE WEST (31 min)

The philosopher and the pope

What do the former leader of the Catholic church and an influential Jewish philosopher have in common? Quite a lot, according to Nathan Schlueter in our Intercollegiate Review archive.

Schlueter compares Pope Benedict XVI, the deliverer of the famous and controversial Regensburg lecture, with Leo Strauss, one of the more influential political philosophers of the 20^th century. In doing so, he finds many similarities between the two, from their shared German heritage to their belief that the West faced a major crisis. Schlueter says the two men agreed that modern reason could not solve the crisis and that “revelation” was necessary to the solution.

But Schlueter believes Benedict and Strauss diverged as well, specifically in the relationship between reason and revelation.

“Whereas Strauss argues that reason and revelation are necessarily opposed to one another, Benedict regards them as complementary and integral, though not identical,” Schlueter writes.

From this starting point, Schlueter then dives into a deep analysis of the moral, religious, and political impacts of the difference between these two luminaries, ultimately noting that despite their differences, the memory of both Benedict and Strauss must be kept alive to help preserve the West.

Follow Schlueter’s journey into these two great minds right here.

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