Day: August 7, 2025

Political exile refers to a state of residence outside the territory of a nation. Often people are displaced for political reasons, such as a coup d’état or a foreign occupation. In these situations, a government-in-exile may be established abroad to command the country’s armed forces. Such governments-in-exile have also formed in the wake of popular uprisings or to challenge the legitimacy of a regime. The most famous example of this is the Tibetan government-in-exile, headed by the Dalai Lama.

The practice of exile has long been a part of the international politics of conflict and change. In recent years, the anthropological study of exile has become increasingly important, given the growing interest in topics such as transnationalism and diaspora, conflict and violence, and nationalism and social memory. The study of refugees and refugee societies in particular draws attention to the relation between space, place, and identity, as well as challenging notions in anthropology of community and culture as bounded and territorial entities.

People who are displaced for political reasons can be adrift in their new homes, lacking a firm sense of identity and feeling disconnected from a home that is no longer accessible. This adriftness can lead to the formation of group solidarity, based on shared suffering, that is reinforced by rhetorical and symbolic references to homelands. This group solidarity can, in turn, produce hostile attitudes toward outsiders – especially those who are not from the same linguistic or ethnic background as those displaced.

When a nation threatens to use nuclear weapons, the world takes notice. It’s a defining moment that invokes the darkest chapter of human history. Explicit nuclear threats have been the default mode of international behavior for decades, because they are the essence of deterrence—the idea that if you attack us, we will destroy your society or your most vital military assets.

In the 1950s, as warheads were developed for aircraft bombs and then for strategic ballistic missiles, Western game theorists realized that a full-scale nuclear exchange could wipe out cities and towns and kill large numbers of civilians. This would mean that neither the United States nor Soviet Union/Russia could emerge a pyrrhic victor in such a conflict. That is why they developed a doctrine of mutually assured destruction (MAD).

As a result, nuclear weapons have been largely kept out of the hands of hostile states, but today the world’s superpowers maintain about 12,000 warheads. Nuclear weapons have the power to kill billions of people, both directly and indirectly through effects such as famine or global warming.

The first sign of a nuclear explosion is an intense, blinding flash that can be seen from miles away. A few seconds later, a boom echoes through the sky. Then a mushroom cloud forms—sometimes it’s green, sometimes gray.

The threat of nuclear weapons has resurfaced with the tensions between North Korea and the United States, and the false alarm in Hawaii. New polling from the Chicago Council on Global Affairs and Carnegie Corporation of New York finds that Americans are split on how they feel about nuclear weapons.