Memo +De Audio Free Catherine Liu Capitalism Loves Trauma Culture It was surveillance capitalism’s greatest coup: convincing us that our wounds define us, that vulnerability is strength, and that we must endlessly accommodate one another’s trauma while the powerful remain untouched. An excerpt from “Traumatized” by Catherine Liu in light of our Volksbühne event. Memo en Audio Sarah Stein Lubrano Don’t Talk About Politics “I am, of course, not arguing that we should think like Steve Bannon. I am, however, struck by how precisely Bannon has identified what makes people commit to political ideas and take action, how well his movement has weaponized this insight”—a memo in light of our Volksbühne event on October 27. Essay +De Audio Itamar Mann Real Estate and the New Jewish Question After Berlin’s state election, two debates have been perniciously conflated: one on Die Linke’s alleged antisemitism, the other on its plans to socialize housing. If the German political center continues to speak this way, it might cement an insidious concept: anti-landlord antisemitism. Review +De Enis Maci Rendering Albania’s Architectural Future Bringing together sixty architecture firms working in Albania, The Albanian Files presents a country perpetually “in transition.” But the book is less a document than an instrument of politics it claims to describe, giving form to historical amnesia, tax tricks, and the allure of the undeveloped. Essay Audio Stefan Wellgraf Extrem und autoritär Die AfD steigt weiter, und die politische und intellektuelle Klasse steht ihr hilflos gegenüber. Das könnte auch daran liegen, dass sie völkisch-nationalistischen Einstellungen – im Osten, aber auch anderswo – mit Theorien aus der alten BRD begegnet, die schon in den 1990ern die Realität verfehlten. Review en Lianna Mark Rachel Cusk’s Kopfkino In her pursuit of a “low-character fiction,” Rachel Cusk turns to the austere. Her latest work, Life of M, chips away at the load-bearing columns of fiction in a game of writerly Jenga played against herself—one she does not quite win. Memo +De Audio Georg Diez The Politics of Trash Berlin is full of trash—something political parties across the spectrum want to change, according to measures ranging from the authoritarian to the communitarian. Somewhere between ideology and pragmatism, “trash” itself has become an arena for various political views to spar. Memo en Esra Sarıoğlu The Volksbad and the Shifting Politics of Swimming Pools Berlin’s public pools have become battlegrounds over race, security, and national decline. The moral panic surrounding the Volksbad project asks what remains of the pool as a public good, and what kinds of social life can still take shape there. Review en Audio Ben Miller Different From the Others Two recent books examine the life of Magnus Hirschfeld—a sexologist and trans advocate in Weimar Germany—to better understand today’s anti-trans backlash. Yet both “misread the moment and in some cases the historical record, and remain stuck in more comforting and less useful narratives.” Essay Audio Jonas von Lenthe Gefährliche Texte Im Zusammenspiel politischer Bewegungen und publizistischer Praxis erschienen in den letzten Jahrzehnten Texte, die in ihrer Mobilisierungskraft die herrschende Ordnung gefährdeten. Was machte diese «gefährlichen Texte» aus, und welche Rolle spielen sie heute? Memo en Vladimir Konchayev* How Russia Broke Its Internet Once among the world’s most open, Russia’s internet is now a maze of proxies, spyware, mandatory apps, and sandboxed networks. Writing under a pseudonym, a Russian journalist reports on what remains of the free web under Putin’s wartime regime. Review Audio Wolfgang Hottner Vom Himmel durch den Welfare-State zur Hölle Der Wohlfahrtsstaat krepiert, die Scandinavian Star ist längst gesunken, der dänische Fortsetzungsroman läuft weiter. Asta Olivia Nordenhof schreibt über Kapitalismus als Tragödie ohne Schluss. Wie aussteigen aus einer Maschinerie, die sich selbst unendlich reproduziert? Review en Thom Sliwowski Paweł Pawlikowski’s Twentieth Century Disguised as a literary biopic, Fatherland follows Thomas Mann through a divided Germany in 1949 to accept two parallel literary prizes. But beyond dramatizing an oft-invoked moment in history, the film offers a reflection on the condition of the aging intellectual and the force of the past.