By David D. Daniels III · Monday, May 7, 2018 David D. Daniels III’s “Economic Democracy, Martin Luther King, Jr., and the Black Church Tradition” appears in Telos 182 (Spring 2018), a special issue commemorating the life and thought of Martin Luther King, Jr. Read the full article at the Telos Online website, or purchase a print copy of the issue in our online store. Individual subscriptions to Telos are now available in both print and online formats.
Is the concept of a “moral arc” to the economy that bends toward justice implicit in the thought of Martin Luther King, Jr.? Can a source for this concept be found in the economic justice campaigns of the Black Church? A moral arc to the economy that bends toward justice informs King’s concept of economic democracy, which frames his campaigns for economic justice. Throughout King’s writings from 1957 to 1968, he explores the economic plight of African Americans and advocates for economic remedies to the subordination of African Americans within most sectors of the American economy and the exclusion of African Americans from other sectors. He understands that parity between capital and labor is pivotal to achieving economic justice.
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By Telos Press · Tuesday, May 1, 2018 New from Telos Press: Europe and the World: World War I as Crisis of Universalism, edited by Kai Evers and David Pan. Order your copy in our online store, and save 20% on the list price by using the coupon code BOOKS20 during the checkout process.
 With contributions by Étienne Balibar, Annette Becker, Russell Berman, Jörn Leonhard, among many others, Europe and the World: World War I as Crisis of Universalism focuses within Europe on the conflicts between nationalism and cosmopolitanism as a universalist political project and globally on the conflicts between European imperial politics and universal ideals. This collection of essays probes how these conflicts defined the war as the transition point to a new structure of global relations and postcolonial understandings of cultural identity. The volume’s first part considers the history of European universalism and how it affected the lead-up to the war. The second part analyzes how universalist goals affected the conduct of the war itself. While August 1914 marked a simultaneous turning point in Europe, Africa, and Asia, the war ended without such global synchronicity. Instead, it gave way to a wide variety of new spaces and chronologies of violence on a global level. Part three offers case studies of how representations of the war affected its remembrance and the way such war stories subverted or fit into different national narratives. The contributions in part four investigate different ways in which the experience of war and mass violence affected national cultures and notions of universalism in the United States and within Europe.
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By Rufus Burrow, Jr. · Monday, April 23, 2018 Rufus Burrow, Jr.’s “Martin Luther King, Jr., and Ethical Leadership” appears in Telos 182 (Spring 2018), a special issue commemorating the life and thought of Martin Luther King, Jr. Read the full article at the Telos Online website, or purchase a print copy of the issue in our online store. Individual subscriptions to Telos are now available in both print and online formats.
James MacGregor Burns, a pioneer in leadership theory, was certain that many people lack clarity about the meaning and place of leadership. “The confusion,” he said, “will continue as long as we fail to distinguish leadership from brute power, leadership from propaganda, leadership from manipulation, leadership from pandering, leadership from coercion.” What we have seen during and after the 2016 presidential election cycle in the United States is evidence of this ambiguity and confusion. In addition, political operatives and other presumed leaders fail to exhibit integrity, character, civility, courage, and a sense of obligation to the highest and best values. Instead, what we see persistently, particularly in the Donald J. Trump presidency, are efforts to cater to the worst in citizens, especially uneducated, unemployed, and underemployed white working-class people. For a long time I have wondered whether a study of Martin Luther King, Jr., (1929–1968) might reveal important lessons about the nature and meaning of leadership, leadership that reasonable people eagerly follow. This essay seeks to clarify how King understood leadership.
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By Marco Patriarca · Monday, April 9, 2018 Among the discouraging quandaries that the European Union has had to face in recent years, no one could have imagined that the United Kingdom and the United States, our historical, crucial allies, would turn their back on the EU, thus leaving it exposed to the global influence to Russia, Turkey, and Iran, not exactly friends of our open societies and polity. It would have been equally impossible to predict that so many supposedly enlightened, tolerant, and democratic European citizens would rally around xenophobic and anti-Semitic political parties while reviving the most obtuse and primitive ethnocentrism. All these ills, and most of all of Brexit and its aftermath, were interpreted by many as a fatal blow to the EU, in combination with other indicators that seemed to point to a general design failure of its unifying project. Nevertheless, many reliable commentators have expressed faith that the EU, at long last, would react to this long-standing issue.
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By Russell A. Berman · Thursday, April 5, 2018 Cary Nelson and Telos editor, Russell Berman, respond to Saree Makdisi and raise broader questions about the contemporary humanities. Read their essay at Fathom.
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By Harriett Jernigan · Wednesday, April 4, 2018 Harriett Jernigan’s “‘Is there something wrong with that?’: The Transculturation of Martin Luther King, Jr., Schools in Germany” appears in Telos 182 (Spring 2018), a special issue commemorating the life and thought of Martin Luther King, Jr. Read the full article at the Telos Online website, or purchase a print copy of the issue in our online store. Individual subscriptions to Telos are now available in both print and online formats.
 While it is common knowledge that a number of elementary, middle, and high schools in the United States are named after Martin Luther King, Jr., few people know that the Federal Republic of Germany is also home to a significant number of schools named in honor of him as well. The differences between American and German school systems, in particular the manner in which children are placed in special-needs schools in Germany, prompt a transculturation of the symbolic value of Martin Luther King, Jr., as the schools’ mission statements reflect. Although both American and German MLK schools are generally conspicuously diverse and underscore the importance of equality and diversity, their priorities diverge thereafter, with American MLK schools emphasizing academic preparation for upward mobility and global citizenship, and German MLK schools nonviolence and local integration, a divergence that arises partially from the priority German Leitkultur places on German-language proficiency.
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