Terrorist Attacks Of September Research Articles

Российско-американские отношения конца XX – первой четверти XXI века: тенденции и перспективы

The article studies the relations between Russia and the USA in the late 20th – first decades of the 21st centuries as a central problem of modern international relations. The analysis is performed in the historicalpolitical retrospect, from the 1990s to the present day. When it comes to the 1990s, viewed as a time of friendship and partnership, the reasons for the rapprochement between the two countries are described, as well as the events of the late 1990s – eastward NATO expansion and the NATO bombing of Belgrade – which were the turning point for the decline in Russia–US relations. Talking about the 2000s – 2010s, the author indicates the contradictions in the development of the bilateral relations, namely, a trend towards both improvement (establishment of the NATO–Russia Council following the attacks of September 11, 2001 and the “reset” policy in the late 2000s) and deterioration (as a result of the US-led invasion of Iraq in 2003, Russo-Georgian conflict in August 2008, Syrian civil war, Ukrainian political crisis and the accession of Crimea to Russia in 2014). According to the author, Russian-American relations over the past decade (2014–2024) could be described as hostile, which eliminates the possibility for their normalization through direct contacts between the two parties. The downward trend in Russia– US relations, which emerged in the late 1990s and continued to grow during the 2000s – 2020s, can be explained by the two countries’ irreconcilable positions on the system of international relations. The United States seek to create a unipolar – Americentric – world, while Russia insists on multipolarity. According to the author, the only way to improve relations between Russia and the USA is to stabilize the system of international relations. This problem is discussed in the final part of the article.

The Case for Closing the U.S. Prison at Guantanamo Bay

The Case for Closing the U.S. Prison at Guantanamo Bay

Нагорный Карабах — 2023: проблемы международно-правовой квалификации

The Second Karabakh War of 2020, which ended with the defeat of the Nagorno-Karabakh Republic (NKR) and Armenia supporting it, reversed the balance of power but did not resolve the conflict. The absolute superiority of Azerbaijan — both military and political, the insufficient clarity of the Statement of 9 November, the remaining contradictions between the parties — all this created the preconditions for the Third War, which began on 19 September 2023 and lasted only one day. The eventual defeat of the NKR and the transfer of the entire region under Azerbaijani jurisdiction, however, does not appear to be the final point: Azerbaijan demands the eight occupied villages and insists on the extraterritoriality of the Zangezur corridor. This article continues an article published in 2021 and dedicated to the legal aspects of the 2020 conflict. The author describes developments after 2020; analyses the use of force and assesses new interpretations of Article 2(4) of the UN Charter; gives qualification to the blockade of the Lachin corridor and the Armenian exodus from Nagorno-Karabakh in autumn 2020; examines some aspects of the right to self-determination that became relevant in 2023; defines the remaining territorial disputes; and assesses the effectiveness of the settlement formats. In legal terms, the 2023 conflict significantly improved the position of Armenia and the Armenians of Nagorny Karabakh; in the final analysis, it can be argued that the blockade and the 19 September attack created the preconditions for a remedial secession, the realisation of which, however, is unrealistic. Some of the new qualifications are based on scientific hypotheses that reflect progressive trends in the development of law rather than being an established element of it. Politically, on the contrary, the conflict has seriously worsened Armenia’s situation. There are several scenarios for the development of events. The first assumes the satisfaction of all Azerbaijan’s claims and Armenia’s transition to a subordinate position; the second — modification of the status quo through compromise regimes built on the basis of mutual respect and equality; the third — restoration of the status quo as it existed or should have existed at the time of the collapse of the USSR. This scenario seems realistic and fair; its realisation, however, is impossible without the participation of external actors: Russia, Iran, Turkey, the West, the US and China. Unfortunately, the position of these actors is not consolidated, while the Caucasus is still perceived as a peripheral region unworthy of the attention paid to some other regions.

Terror and the Ethics of Resistance

ABSTRACT: After the terror attacks of September 11, 2001, it took the United States almost two years to forfeit the sympathy of the world. After the terror attacks of October 7 of last year, Israel, a more nimble superpower, accomplished the same feat in just a few days. Because the atrocities committed by Hamas have been eclipsed by the horrors that Israel has brought down on the people of Gaza, a consideration of the way the U.S. left responded to Hamas’s attacks might seem to be of nothing more than historical interest. But some of the questions raised by our responses should still be of concern to those who want to build a better left.

Terror and the Ethics of Resistance

ABSTRACT: After the terror attacks of September 11, 2001, it took the United States almost two years to forfeit the sympathy of the world. After the terror attacks of October 7 of last year, Israel, a more nimble superpower, accomplished the same feat in just a few days. Because the atrocities committed by Hamas have been eclipsed by the horrors that Israel has brought down on the people of Gaza, a consideration of the way the U.S. left responded to Hamas's attacks might seem to be of nothing more than historical interest. But some of the questions raised by our responses should still be of concern to those who want to build a better left.

ARAB MUSLIM CHARACTERS IN KHADRA’S NOVEL THE SIRENS OF BAGHDAD

In this study, the researcher presented the American’s views of Islam and Muslims in Khadra’s Novel The Sirens of Baghdad. The image of Arab Muslim character is portrayed differently by the post-colonial novelists post September attacks 2001 on the World Trade Centre towers situated in New York City, USA. Since the accident, many American writers who represent the Western values have endeavored to stigmatize the picture of Arab Muslims through their writings using variant depictions to confirm their ‘Others’ as they consider the Arab Muslims their foes in the world. Consequently, the American writers perpetuate their previous negative picture to continue their domination upon the Arab Muslims, using post-colonial concepts in their portrayal. In contrast, the Arab writers try their best to depict the image of the Arab Muslim characters fairly as they have realistically witnessed and experienced the actual life events. Due to this, Orientalism, stereotyping, otherness and racism are the key concepts examined in this study related the Sirens of Baghdad. As many other Western and Arab writers have dealt with the same concepts previously, the current study examined and identified the concepts differently through this study concerning Arab Muslim characters from contrasting perspectives. Accordingly, the researcher adapted Said’s Orientalism theory as a main method of analysis. The research findings revealed that the American novelists purposely reflected dark aspects of the Arab Muslim characters so as to show to the world that Islam is a religion that propagates oppression and violence. On the other hand, the Arab novelists successfully and realistically proved that it is the Westerners who most of the time oppress the Arab Muslims and murder a fairly good number of them on the basis of false and unfounded allegations. As a conclusion, the study proposes a framework of the portrayal of the Arab Muslim characters conceptualized by the post-colonial perspective. It is recommended that future research examines the reliability and authentication of the respective American novels that have distorted the Arab Muslim identity by using high level of fictitious representations that is very distant from reality and truth, so that the negative representations of the Arab Muslim characters can righteously be repudiated. Moreover, future research can explore cross-cultural studies related to the novel concerned and the like of them so as to highlight the psychological, cultural and societal representations of the two nations—the Arab and
 the Western.

Traumatic Seclusion in M. Night Shyamalan’s Garrison Trilogy: Signs (2002), The Village (2004) and The Lady in the Water (2006)

Shyamalan’s Signs, The Village and The Lady in the Water turn around the need to find refuge away from violence, in an updated version of Northrop Frye’s garrison motif. Absolute safety is, however, threatened by spectral, even fictitious monstrous creatures that can be defined as projections of specific traumatic situations, provoked partly by the terrorist attacks of September 2001 but mostly by Shyamalan’s own response to social violence.

US Foreign Policy Towards Afghanistan. Brief from 2001 to 2022

In 2021, U.S. and international forces departed after nearly two decades of operations in Afghanistan; the internationally backed Afghan government and its military forces collapsed; and the Taliban, that formerly ruled the country from 1996 to 2001, retook power. The aftershocks of these events continue to reverberate within Afghanistan, throughout its region, and in the United States as publics and policymakers alike grapple with the reality of the Taliban’s renewed rule. When the United States, in response to the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, led a military campaign against Al Qaeda and the Afghan Taliban government that harbored and supported it. In the subsequent 20 years, the United States suffered over 22,000 military casualties (including about 2,400 fatalities) in Afghanistan, mostly at the hands of the robust and growing Taliban insurgency, and Congress appropriated approximately $144 billion for reconstruction and security forces there. At the same time, an elected Afghan government replaced the Taliban and, with significant U.S. and international support, made limited improvements in most measures of human development. This article examines the policy and strategies of the U.S in Afghanistan

Art, human rights, and threats from above

Art can present to people the dangers coming from above, like excessive surveillance, military attacks and climate change, which all threaten people's physical and mental well-being. Governments, however, also use art to legitimise new military and surveillance technologies. They often create seductive images which show the efficiency of these technologies, and they develop fiction related to pre-emptive measures which might try to predict and prevent crimes from occurring. In the last 20 years, especially after the 11 September terrorist attack, we have witnessed an essential change in the perception of human rights and reinterpretations of laws to allow pre-emptive strikes in the battle against terrorism. The concept of pre-crime, increased surveillance, and the belief that one can predict and prevent crimes have also altered the perceptions of subjectivity. While some critics regard human rights as obsolete or inefficient, political scientists like Claude Lefort have perceived them as always open to reinterpretation and expansion. People can invent new human rights. The increased threats from above require that we expand the existing rights corpus.

Lessons in Crisis Leadership from 9/11: Delineating the constituents of Crisis Leadership and their utilization in the context of Covid-19

Abstract The year 2020 was challenging and demanding for humankind. The outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic compelled thousands of organizations to shift their operations online and millions of employees to work from home. Many have compared this crisis to the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, in the United States, another inconceivable incident that changed the way we think and act today. This study analyzes three leaders in the context of the 9/11 terrorist attacks, who proved to be role models of leadership during crisis situations and, thereby, have contributed to the evolution of crisis leadership. By doing so, it attempts to define the constituents of effective crisis leadership and fill the relevant gap in the existing literature on crisis leadership. The current study’s limitations, implications for practitioners, and suggestions for further research needed to shed light on cases of effective leadership during the COVID-19 pandemic are also discussed.

Securitization of International Migration in the Context of Economic and Societal Security: An Example of the Hungarian Fidesz and Jobbik Parties

The phenomenon of international migration has become one of the most complex issues within the expanding and deepening security field since the conclusion of the Cold War. By the end of the 1990s, far-right parties had securitized international migration, which had previously been encouraged by many European countries to meet their workforce needs, posing a threat to the security of both the international system and developed and developing countries. Particularly after the terrorist attack of September 11, 2001, immigration and anti-immigrant sentiments and actions were concentrated in the Western world in general, and Europe in particular, reaching a pinnacle during the Arab Spring. Far-right parties have risen in response to migration and anti-immigration discourses, securitizing international migration by claiming that immigrants disrupt European society’s homogeneity and increase integration problems, unemployment, and crime rates. This study examines the securitization of international migration on a socioeconomic and political level within the framework of far-right parties in Europe using the example of Hungary’s ruling Fidesz and opposition Jobbik parties. The conclusions reached show that international migration will be securitized in both Eastern and Western European countries where the far-right is on the rise.

Post-traumatic stress disorder and risk of first-time and repeated opioid-related hospitalizations among World Trade Center Health Registry enrollees

In 2021, and average of 220 deaths from opioid-related overdoses occurred daily in the US. Recent evidence suggests there is an association between post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and increased opioid misuse, while little is known about opioid-related hospitalizations. This study used data from the World Trade Center Health Registry (WTCHR), a longitudinal cohort consisting of individuals directly exposed to the September 11th terrorist attacks with a high prevalence of resulting PTSD (3.8–29.6%). We linked WTCHR data to New York State hospitalization data to examine the question: do opioid-related hospitalizations (first time and repeated) differ by PTSD status. In a study sample of 37,968 adults, 145 experienced at least one episode of opioid-related hospitalization and 64 had repeated episodes during the study period. We found that in the 13-years post-9/11, individuals with PTSD had a significantly higher risk of a first-time opioid-related hospitalization (Hazard Ratio: 3.6, 95% CI: 2.7, 5.0) and repeated opioid-related hospitalizations (Hazard Ratio: 3.9, 95% CI: 2.7, 5.8) than those who did not have PTSD. Improved treatment of and increased screenings for PTSD may reduce the likelihood of opioid misuse in this population and consequently overdoses, hospitalizations, and healthcare costs.

‘Never forget’: examining changes in materiality and preservation practices at the National September 11 Memorial & Museum, New York

The National September 11 Memorial & Museum commemorates specific traumatic moments in history—the February 26, 1993 bombing of the World Trade Center in New York and the catastrophic attacks of September 11, 2001. The recovered realia, exhibiting damage from the attacks, consists of many objects never intended to be preserved. Now 20 years later, the plastics, newspapers and corroded metals which served as placeholders connecting us with both the past and the innocent lives lost are beginning to age. In addition, the people who care for these artefacts may no longer have personal associations with the trauma; that is, the lived experience of the events which motivated the original caretakers. This paper discusses the current research conducted by museum staff related to how the conservation community navigates our own experiences, memories and evolving biases in interpreting trauma collections and how a human-centred approach of involving family members and survivors defines conservation priorities for objects meant to stay frozen in time.

Domestic Terrorism in the United States of America after the Attacks September 11, 2001 A statistical study of the role of the extreme right))


 
 
 
 The United States of America faces many internal threats and challenges, and terrorism is one of the most significant challenges and threats. The years following the attacks of (September 11, 2001) witnessed a substantial decrease in the rate of external (foreign) terrorism in the United States, at a time when domestic terrorism witnessed an apparent rise at unprecedented rates in the last two decades. There are four main categories of ideologies in the United States of America: the far right, the far left, religious extremism, and ethnic extremism. The far right is the first and most significant challenge and threat to the United States, as the operations and attacks of this wing have increased rapidly in terms of quality and quantity. Within this wing, there are many movements, and white extremists and anti-government extremists are considered the most critical movements. It is a statistical study that tries to shed light on domestic terrorism in the United States of America after the 11 September 2001 attacks by collecting data from American formal and informal institutions. The study utilizes the quantitative approach as a tool for analyzing these data.
 
 
 

Субъектный нарратив в романе Дж. Франзена «Свобода» (2010) в свете парадигмы постпостмодернизма

The aim of the research is to find an answer to the following question: how the narrative-artistic structure of J. Franzen’s novel “Freedom” (2010) reflects the problematisation of the concept of freedom in US post-postmodern literature. The paper analyses the changes in the life of American society after the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001 in the light of the reduction of civil liberties and the strengthening of the role of state control in various spheres; determines the influence of sociopolitical and economic changes on the formation of the paradigm of post-postmodernism and identifies the mechanisms and motives for constructing the characters’ subjectivity in the post-postmodern novel “Freedom” (2010) by J. Franzen. The research is original in that it is the first to analyse the narrative-artistic structure of the novel “Freedom” as a work of US post-postmodern literature through the lens of problematisation of the concept of freedom after the 2001 terrorist attacks. As a result, it has been proved that the narrative-artistic structure of the novel, in which the explicit narrator takes into account the explicit reader, restores the characters’ subjectivity and gives them post-postmodern freedom, allowing the characters to find their place in modern realities on their own.

Analyzing the New War Concept with the Context of 11 September Attacks and Terrorism

11 Eylül 2001’de teröristlerin New York’taki Dünya Ticaret Merkezi’ne ve Washington DC’deki Pentagon’a saldırısı, yeni bir dönemin başlangıcı olduğu yönündeki yorumları kuvvetlendirmiştir. 21. yüzyılda savaş ve terörizm, uluslararası meselelerinde artan bir güç uygulamakta ve uluslararası güvenliğin istikrarsızlaşmasının kaynakları olarak kabul edilmektedir. Bu bağlamda “Yeni Savaş” kavramı uluslararası ilişkiler gündeminde bulunmakta ve terörizm de bu süreç içerisinde yeni bir yöne doğru evrilmektedir. Bu çalışma, yeni savaş kavramı ve terörizmin küresel bazda oynadığı kalıcı rolü açıklamak için uluslararası ilişkiler tarihindeki gelişim süreci, dönüşümü ve önemli anları yeniden ele almayı amaçlamaktadır. Bu kapsamda örnek olay yöntemi kullanılarak 11 Eylül saldırıları ve sonraki süreç akademik çalışmalar incelenmesiyle ele alınarak uluslararası ilişkilerde yeni savaş kavramının dönüşümü açısından terörizmin yansımasının boyutu ele alınmaktadır. Yapılan tespitler ve ulaşılan sonuç yeni savaş kavramı içinde terörizm olgusunun sürekliliği ile ilgilidir. Farklı sınır çatışmaları ve uluslararası anlaşmazlıklar da göstermektedir ki terörizm farklı sorunları besleyecek ana faktörler arasındadır. Keza bu çalışma kapsamında, 11 Eylül’de görüldüğü gibi terörizm, savaşın daha yıkıcı ve tehdit edici bir potansiyele sahip olduğunu ve savaşın geleneksel yöntemlerden ziyade yeni düzene göre şekillendiğini göstermektedir.

America’s Occupation of Iraq and its Implications

The US-led invasion of Iraq took place on 20 March 2003. The question that arises is what made the US to invade, occupy, destroy and then to reconstruct Iraq state and to what extend the occupation is legitimate? A debate continued throughout the period of the US occupation over Iraq as to the legitimacy of the US invasion. It first started with the WMD and its threat to the world peace. The war that started in 2003 with the motive of removing Saddam with the false claim of Iraq’s possession of WMD has led to death of thousands of people on both the sides. Despite having no evidence, the Bush administration also tried to convince people that Saddam had a hand in 11 September attack and thus started the invasion of Iraq as a part of ‘war on terrorism’. When US failed to find any link between Saddam and al-Qaeda and the 11 September attack, the public support towards the war gradually declined.

The Shaking of America: September 11th Becomes History

J. Samuel Walker’s new book focuses on why the United States failed to prevent the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, as well as the experiences of that day and the U.S. policy response. This study efficiently summarizes this history and makes some important arguments, but its lack of historical contextualization and failure to differentiate itself within the extensive scholarship on this topic limit its usefulness. Walker’s most interesting arguments examine pre-2001 counterterrorism policy and intelligence, including the shortcomings that made September 11th possible. For instance, he offers a compelling defense of U.S. President Bill Clinton’s administration’s counterterrorism policies. He shows that Clinton devoted more resources than any previous president to counterterrorism, doubling federal spending between 1995 and 2000. He launched missile strikes on targets in Afghanistan and Sudan, took effective financial action against terrorist groups, and put massive diplomatic pressure on Afghanistan to give up Osama Bin Laden and on Pakistan to pressure Afghanistan to cut ties to al-Qaeda. However, Clinton’s counterterrorism efforts bumped against constraints such as vague intelligence about al-Qaeda, the limits of U.S. ability to influence Pakistani foreign policy, and the lack of political support for bolder military action.

Die hellen Jahre über dem Atlantik. Leben zwischen Deutschland und Amerika by Frank Trommler

Reviewed by: Die hellen Jahre über dem Atlantik. Leben zwischen Deutschland und Amerika by Frank Trommler Stephen Brockmann Die hellen Jahre über dem Atlantik. Leben zwischen Deutschland und Amerika. By Frank Trommler. Vienna: Böhlau, 2022. Pp. 384. Hardcover €28.00. ISBN 978-3412525422. Frank Trommler’s beautifully illustrated tome is both an autobiography and a personal history of German studies in the United States over the course of the last six decades. As someone who served as president of the GSA at the moment of German reunification, who organized the humanities program of the American Institute for Contemporary German Studies in Washington, D.C., from the early 1990s into the twenty-first century, and who played a central role in planning the academic commemoration of the three-hundredth anniversary of German immigration to North America in 1983, Trommler is uniquely placed to offer insights into the ways that the field has changed. These changes are both positive and negative. When Trommler arrived in the United States from West Germany in the 1960s, “German studies” did not exist, and the most influential practitioners of Germanistik, defined primarily as the study of canonical German-language literature, formed an “old boys network” that came together every year in December for the MLA convention. That “old boys network” was, to a large extent, dominated by white, male, German-speaking immigrants from Central Europe, many of whom had fled from the predations of the Nazi dictatorship. During his first decades in the United States, Trommler witnessed the final flowering of that approach to Germanistik. At the same time, over the course of the 1970s and 1980s, he fought for and helped to ensure the breakthrough of a more comprehensive, historically and politically oriented approach to the German-speaking world, one that brought historians together with literary scholars. Their most important institutional foundation was the GSA, a product of the 1970s that was originally called the Western Association for German Studies (WAGS) before its name changed to the current one in 1983. The transformation in the field also brought with it increasing diversification, as more and more women began to take on leading roles, feminist scholarship grew and flourished, and the definition of “German” was broadened to include more than just traditional ethnic Germans but also multiculturalism, hybridity, migration, etc. The field also became increasingly “Americanized,” i.e., less dominated by Germanistik [End Page 340] as practiced in Germany and Austria and more focused on its position within the US academy and in dialog with American colleagues in other disciplines such as English and history. Paradoxically, this “Americanization” of German studies was also championed by the German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD), which had a keen interest in preserving the relevance of Germany and German culture for an American audience. All of those developments were always threatened by the fundamental fact that Germany is a long way away from the United States, and that the humanities generally, as well as foreign languages and cultures, including German, are relatively marginal. Even within the MLA, the English language and British, American, and Canadian literature dominate. During the Cold War, German and other foreign language fields profited from a Cold War bonus, and even after German reunification, the field of German profited temporarily from renewed interest among American college students. However, in the long run, the end of the Cold War led to declining interest in European languages and cultures, including German. The terrorist attack of September 11, 2001, only exacerbated this problem, and Trommler notes the way that US and European attitudes differed radically in the wake of that event: “The Americans are from Mars, the Europeans from Venus” (335–336, a reference to a book by Robert Kagan published shortly after 9/11). As a result of all these developments, as well as others, American interest in central Europe generally, and in German-speaking culture specifically, radically declined after 9/11, and it has continued to decline. Therefore, although the field of German studies has become more diversified and open, it has also become less central to US intellectual life, even within an academic setting. The field has been diversified but also, at the very same time...

The Paradox of Democracy: Free Speech, Open Media, and Perilous Persuasion by Zac Gershberg and Sean Illing

Reviewed by: The Paradox of Democracy: Free Speech, Open Media, and Perilous Persuasion by Zac Gershberg and Sean Illing Ray Brescia (bio) The Paradox of Democracy: Free Speech, Open Media, and Perilous Persuasion By Zac Gershberg and Sean Illing. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2022. Pp. 320. In The Paradox of Democracy, authors Zac Gershberg and Sean Illing do yeoman's work in reviewing the history of Western democracies, from the Greek city-states of the time of Socrates to the United States of today, to make the claim that it is democracy's very openness that can lead to its ultimate demise. Demagogues can exploit the ability to communicate freely to garner support from the masses for very illiberal, antidemocratic ends. The authors point out that today's instantaneous, disintermediated media environment only makes the impact of media on culture even more profound. When the "paradox" of democracy—that it contains the seeds of its own destruction—meets the power of new media, the authors argue that a nation can find itself on the road to fascism. The solutions to this problem, the authors posit, are increased media literacy and a return to local journalism. When reading The Paradox of Democracy, it is not clear that the sources of the threats to democracy—and the defenses or solutions to those threats—are as simple as the authors suggest, however. What is more, the examples given by the authors do not always provide clear support for their arguments. One chapter-spanning discussion begins with Alexis de Tocqueville, goes through the Spanish-American War, doubles back to the Franco-Prussian War, fast-forwards to the Dreyfus Affair in France, follows up with the tension between Germany under the Kaiser and Russia under the Czar in the lead-up to World War I, and then discusses the rise of Mussolini in Italy and Hitler in Germany. Do these examples support their analysis regarding the relationship between mass media and democracy when each of these nations had very different political systems, approaches to free speech, and wildly divergent outcomes? What, then, can we learn from these examples? How do they relate to the paradox of democracy? Similarly, the book rarely explores the fact that exogenous forces operating on and the relative strength of institutions within a society can both change a nation just as much, if not more, than mass media operating within it. Yes, the authors mention the American response to the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, make passing reference to the economic impacts of the Great Depression on politics generally, and discuss the failure of the January 6, 2021, insurrection in the United States, but little effort is made to identify the conditions and forces at work that result in the success or failure of illiberal demagogues in different institutional, economic, and political environments. Sometimes institutions hold, sometimes they do not. Sometimes antidemocratic forces leverage mass media to demolish democracy, sometimes they fail in their attempts to do so. We are given few tools to understand the difference between success and failure in such efforts. [End Page 601] The authors, choosing to see these phenomena through the prism of media analysis almost exclusively, might bring to mind the parable of the blind philosophers standing around an elephant, trying to identify what it is that stands before them. One, holding the trunk, concludes that it is a snake; another, touching its flank, thinks it is a wall; and so on. Here, our authors, media theorists themselves, analyze the impact of media tools on communication, culture, and politics and see what they have chosen to see given the lens through which they view these phenomena, which is well and good, standing on its own. But they also draw broader conclusions about the impact of those tools without recognizing that other factors are equally as important, if not more important, than the tools of communication in determining a society's future. The authors' efforts to help us understand the role that media can play in the potential fate of democracy and democracies are useful and remind us of the dangers present in this fraught political moment. But the limited nature and reach of...