History can’t fully explain the present or predict the future, but it can help us understand the patterns of contemporary politics and the likely paths ahead.

To help understand them, here’s a guide to the five ballot initiatives that will tell us the most about American politics — and why they’re important.

How Smithsonian Curators Visit Political Conventions to Explain the Present to the Future When scholars from the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History attend one of these gatherings ...

While that expression of populist resentment might, despite two elitist semi-colons, explain the New Hampshire primary, we think we could do better to explain all of American politics.

For the first time in history, an American sits on the Throne of St. Peter. Pope Leo XIV – born in Dolton, Illinois, and ...

But American capitalism has been built on the pursuit of profit at all costs. In recent decades, investors have flocked to index funds, which track the market, offering diversification and low fees.

Yet in online discussion of American politics, censors provide leeway. When mocking or lamenting the Trumpian world, Chinese netizens often refer to the Cultural Revolution.

How a Pandemic Malaise Is Shaping American Politics Four years later, the shadow of the pandemic continues to play a profound role in voters’ pessimism and distrust amid a presidential rematch.