Deborah Chasman

Photo portrait of Marielle Franco with a crowd in the background.

Brasilian feminist activist Marielle Franco's killers have just been convicted. From the archive, here's an article of hers we published at the time of her assassination.

newleftreview.org/issues/ii110...

The First Lady’s New World Melania is less about one woman than the disposability of them all in Trump 2.0.

"There’s no need for pretense anymore: women, even the wife of the most powerful man in the world, are put on earth to be dominated." Devastating new piece by @judith-levine.bsky.social: www.bostonreview.net/articles/the...

The Crypto Chokehold Trump’s return has vaulted pro-crypto interests into power. As they capture ever more Democrats, the political will to stop them is dwindling.

A long read, but worth it. Sharp analysis by an economics professor of the threat that cryptocurrencies play, especially with Trump stumping for them. www.bostonreview.net/articles/the...

Turning a Blind Eye A memoir of daily accommodation to fascism.

Vivian Gornick thinks through our times with a Joachim Fest's memoir of Nazi Germany: "You’ll see how easily it can all happen—how easily we can all become good Germans." www.bostonreview.net/articles/tur...

Turning a Blind Eye A memoir of daily accommodation to fascism.

“We—that is, Americans—live most of the time inside the cocoon of our small daily lives. Except for fire, flood, or outright war, the history-making world hardly ever impinges on most of us. For the most part, it is over there and we are over here.”

New from Vivian Gornick:

One reason Minneapolis remains in the world's eye is we have one of the most robust & independent media ecosystems remaining in the country. You all need this...and more! @mprnews.org @startribune.com @sahanjournal.bsky.social @minnesotareformer.com @minnpost.bsky.social @racketmn.com etc.

Occupying Hospitals From Gaza to Minneapolis, attacks on health care turn spaces of refuge into sites of state violence.

Alex Pretti's murder struck a nerve in the health care community, not just as a tragic loss of one of their own but as emblematic of the dangers facing workers and the moral basis of medicine itself. @joelleabirached.bsky.social www.bostonreview.net/articles/occ...

The Path to the Trump Doctrine From Syria to Lebanon to Gaza, the coercion central to the new regime has been incubated in the Middle East.

"The partition is simply another vehicle for annexation. This is no Marshall Plan for Palestinians, to say the least, but effectively a fire sale of their land and resources." An essay on how we got here from Aslı Ü. Bâli and Aziz Rana: www.bostonreview.net/articles/the...

Renee Good's Murder and Other Acts of Terror An interview with Robin D. G. Kelley on how to think about ICE—and the broader history of police violence.

Must reading (as so much is) from the @bostonreview.bsky.social. @debchasman.bsky.social's interview with Robin D.G. Kelley on placing the ruthless brutality of ICE within the broader history of police violence. www.bostonreview.net/articles/ren...

ICE Threw Thousands of Kids in Detention, Many For Longer Than Court-Prescribed Limit Former immigration staffers argue ICE is choosing to detain families for prolonged periods to speed deportations and compel them to leave.

We don't really know how many children are in immigration jail. A few thousand. Many are being held long past the permitted time (20 days, which, ...). Some are babies.
www.themarshallproject.org/2025/12/17/c...

Revolutionary Consent What the public life of American colonists can teach us about politics.

"The colonists, fewer of whom could vote, and all of whom were supposed to defer to the judgment of their representatives, nonetheless assumed a capacity to consent to law or withhold consent “after the fact.” www.bostonreview.net/articles/bar...

Walz: "What's happening in MN defies belief. News reports simply don't do justice to the level of chaos & disruption & trauma the federal govt is raining down... This long ago stopped being a matter of immigration enforcement. Instead, it's a campaign of organized brutality against the people of MN"

"The first ICE inspection report on Camp East Montana revealed a litany of abuses: makeshift construction, broken sinks and toilets, flooded cells, insufficient food." www.bostonreview.net/articles/pro...

We're $351 away from $15,000. Thank you to everyone who has contributed and shared. gogetfunding.com/black-zine-f...

Renee Good's Murder and Other Acts of Terror An interview with Robin D. G. Kelley on how to think about ICE—and the broader history of police violence.

I did an interview with Robin Kelley about the murder if Renee Good — and what we know from history about strategies of resistance to armed agents of the state. www.bostonreview.net/articles/ren...

I am already seeing reporters parrot DHS's version of the story, which is journalistic malpractice. Every story they spun about being under threat in Chicago was either seriously undermined by subsequently revealed evidence or outright proven false in court. Lying is ALWAYS their first move.

A Brief History of AI Psychosis A short story.

It's as if the spirits of Umberto Eco and Borges were summoned to confront the absurdity of LLMS. Absolutely brilliant.
www.bostonreview.net/articles/a-b...

Our Most Loved Pieces of 2025 - Boston Review Revisit the writing from this year that readers turned to the most.

Throughout 2025, our writers delivered fearless analysis and creative resilience—refusing to compromise on fundamental values of justice and humanity in the face of brazen cruelty and democratic decline.

Revisit the writing readers turned to the most:

The Land Question - Boston Review It’s easier to imagine the end of apartheid than the end of settler colonialism.

Like their South African counterparts, Palestinian activists have confronted the limits of a “segregationist apartheid” paradigm. @panashechigumadzi.bsky.social: www.bostonreview.net/articles/the...

Extraordinary text by Honora Spicer, situating context & origins of horrors of contemporary migrant detention at Fort Bliss in El Paso ("Camp East Montana"), exemplifying systematic abuses of Trump 2.0's campaign of persecution & terror vs migrant communities
www.bostonreview.net/articles/pro...

The Real Border Crisis - Boston Review The problem isn't immigration. It's the failure of liberal democracy itself.

In the latest forum of @bostonreview.bsky.social I wrote about migration, social class and the causes of displacement around the world. You can read the essay, the responses and the response to the responses online here & also subscribe to Boston Review!

The Care Factory - Boston Review In the decades since the Wages for Housework movement, care work has become a site of profit in ways its leaders could never have predicted.

.@emilybaughan.bsky.social: What happens If enough daycare centers and community hospitals close, if workers cannot access the care that allows them to show up and generate profit for others, if the most fundamental mechanisms of social reproduction collapse? www.bostonreview.net/articles/the...

First Day of School in South Rimal - Boston Review Classes have started for a lucky few, but Gaza’s public sector lies in ruins.

On the destruction not only of public schools in Gaza, but all of the public sector: With only private companies entering, "the markets are full of things that are not really necessary: ketchup, a thousand kinds of chocolate, fruit juices, even sodas." www.bostonreview.net/articles/fir...

I wrote about care, capitalism and going on strike

“But I thought this was why Columbia had to pay the government a zillion dollars and accept restructuring,” said no one ever

this is more or less the whole thing imo

First Day of School in South Rimal - Boston Review Classes have started for a lucky few, but Gaza’s public sector lies in ruins.

The new schools in Gaza are private, and their scarcity drives up prices. Gaza journalist Rami Abu Jamous takes his son to the first day of kindergarten: www.bostonreview.net/articles/fir...

Building a Political Home - Boston Review Activist and scholar Cathy J. Cohen on winning power in the midst of a “generational war.”

“Anti-wokeism is about giving ideological cover to longstanding priorities on the right—dismantling the welfare state and ramping up the carceral state, especially in the form of immigrant deportation and detention.”

Activist and scholar Cathy J. Cohen:

What Is Political Violence? - Boston Review Pundits and politicians conceal the truth: it’s all around us, perpetrated by our political system itself.

As ICE agents terrorize Chicago neighborhoods and rough up my friends, patients, neighbors, and elected officials with total impunity, this essay I wrote for Boston Review last week on the myths surrounding "political violence" is as pressing as ever.
www.bostonreview.net/articles/wha...

Hundreds of Alligator Alcatraz detainees drop off the grid after leaving site As of the end of August, the whereabouts of two-thirds of more than 1,800 men detained at Alligator Alcatraz during the month of July could not be determined by the Miami Herald.

More than 1800 detainees are missing after the closure of Alligator Alcatraz. Their families and lawyers can’t find them and they’ve vanished from the ICE database. Feels like this should be a much bigger story www.miamiherald.com/news/local/i...