Paul Starr

Paul Starr is co-editor of the The American Prospect. His most recent book is Remedy and Reaction: The Peculiar American Struggle over Health Care Reform. Click here to read more about Starr.

Recent Articles

Liberty Since 9-11

Paul StarrJan 07, 2002

Wartime generates violations of civil liberties.
Wartime justifies restrictions of civil liberties. So we have heard since
September 11 from people variously trying to explain or to defend
departures from standing protections of individual rights. A historical
perspective suggests, however, that we have reason for vigilance but not
for resignation about liberty's fate--and at this point no grounds for
believing doom is at hand.

Computing Our Way to Educational Reform

The new technology may not only make progressive educational ideas more appealing; it may also help them work.

Paul StarrDec 19, 2001

Illustration by J. T. Morrow

The New Media and Learning

With this issue we inaugurate a series
of articles on the new media and
learning, drawn from a conference
sponsored by The
American Prospect
on June 4th at the
MIT Media
Laboratory.

What Killed the Boom?

Paul StarrDec 19, 2001

The worry is obvious: just as an expanding high-tech
sector contributed to strong growth in the 1990s, so might a deepening slump in
technology drag down the entire economy. High among the sources of concern is the
recent meltdown in the telecom industry. Even after the dot-com collapse, a
broadband upgrade of the Internet seemed sure to be the next big thing, and
investors continued plowing capital into the companies supplying and building the
new infrastructure for high-speed digital communications. But now telecom too has
seen staggering losses, bankruptcies, and layoffs.

The Electronic Commons

Paul StarrDec 19, 2001

While the rise of electronic commerce excites visions of a new economy, the Internet continues to produce explosive growth in free, public communication. The sheer scale and variety of the electronic public domain are staggering, but the promise is not simply an information cornucopia. Despite all its problems, the Internet has the potential to remedy some historic defects of public communication. It has already begun to do so, and with additional capital and new forms of organization, it can do much more.

Several distinct developments contribute to the transformation of the public domain:

The War about the War

Paul StarrDec 19, 2001

"If something is defined as real, it is real," goes a common dictum of the
social sciences. The passive voice, however, conceals an uncertainty: Defined by
whom? What if, for example, two antagonists define their conflict in opposing ways?

As American forces strike in Afghanistan, Osama bin Laden and the
Taliban say this is a religious war--a view that reportedly has resonance through
much, though not all, of the Islamic world. If not merely our adversaries but
millions of others define the war as religious, is that the reality?

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Paul Starr

Recent Articles

Liberty Since 9-11

Computing Our Way to Educational Reform

The new technology may not only make progressive educational ideas more appealing; it may also help them work.

What Killed the Boom?

The Electronic Commons

The War about the War

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