The End of Hypocrisy with Martha Finnemore

The U.S. government seems outraged that people are leaking classified materials about its less attractive behavior. It certainly acts that way: three years ago, after Chelsea Manning, an army private then known as Bradley Manning, turned over hundreds of thousands of classified cables to the anti-secrecy group WikiLeaks, U.S. authorities imprisoned the soldier under conditions that the UN special rapporteur on torture deemed cruel and inhumane. The Senate’s top Republican, Mitch McConnell, appearing on Meet the Press shortly thereafter, called WikiLeaks’ founder, Julian Assange, “a high-tech terrorist.”

More recently, following the disclosures about U.S. spying programs

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Other Writing:

Interview

The Silicon Valley canon and malformed publics: Podcast with Max Read and John Ganz

Bringing this all together, the technologies through which we see the public shape how we understand it, making it more likely that we end up in the one situation rather than the other. As you have surely guessed by now, I believe Twitter/X, Facebook, and other social media services are just such technologies for shaping publics. ...
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Essay

Canada Needs to Start Preparing for Trump – and Getting Other Allies Involved – with Abraham Newman

If Donald Trump wins the presidential elections in November, even Canadians could be blocked from their bank accounts. In our recent book… Henry Farrell and Abraham Newman, “Canada Needs to Start Preparing for Trump – and Getting Other Allies Involved,” Toronto Globe and Mail, March 2, 2024. Access the full article here.
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