Arts & Culture

Whether or not he was always a pious man himself, Tocqueville stressed the importance of religion in the maintenance of a democratic society. Witnessing American life at a time when religion was the norm and atheism was the exception, he understood firsthand how religion contributed to a stable society and counteracted the forces of despotism. In modern America, religion has been on the decline — and so too has democracy. Although common wisdom attributes the democratic backsliding in this country to racial discrimination, private money, and hyperpartisanship, perhaps the impact of religion, or the lack thereof, on democracy should not be underestimated. In terms of the direct influence that religion has on democracy, it promotes a sense of equality of conditions. Tocqueville recalls th...

On March 25, 2020, the Buckley Program hosted a public lecture with Michael Lewis on the topic “Art History at Yale.” Michael J. Lewis teaches modern architecture and American art at Williams College, and he is the architecture critic for the Wall Street Journal. Professor Lewis is also the author of the Commentary article “Yale’s Art Department Commits Suicide”. The transcript of this interview has been lightly edited for clarity. Kevin Xiao: Professor Lewis, thank you for agreeing to do an interview with us. I wanted to start with your Wall Street Journal article from this past December with the title “The Decade in Architecture: Strutting Structures Soaring in Triumph.” I saw that you noted, from a Yale symposium in 2014, that architects had lost their appetite for imaginative specul...

On November 30, 2018, the Buckley Program hosted host a lunch and discussion on the legendary Soviet dissident and Nobel Prize winner Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn. To celebrate the 100th anniversary of his birth this year, this event offered a discussion on his life and work. The program featured Daniel J. Mahoney and Jay Nordlinger. Mr. Nordlinger is a Senior Editor at National Review and a Fellow of the National Review Institute, and he has written frequently for National Review on the subject of Solzhenitsyn. Mr. Mahoney is a Professor of Politics at Assumption College. He is associate editor of Perspectives on Political Science, book review editor for Society magazine, and the author of the critically acclaimed Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn: The Ascent from Ideolo...