An international student-run journal.https://theconfluence.org/Looks at what happens when AI trading algorithms hit a commodity futures market under stress, and which circuit breakers actually stop the damage.https://theconfluence.org/articles/conditional-fragilityhttps://theconfluence.org/articles/conditional-fragilityTrump's second term is the latest turn of a recurring cycle in American politics that goes back to Hofstadter's writing on paranoid, anti-elite movements.https://theconfluence.org/articles/make-america-great-againhttps://theconfluence.org/articles/make-america-great-againWhere you happen to be born decides most of your life, which is why global poverty is best understood as a question of justice.https://theconfluence.org/articles/the-lottery-you-cannot-leavehttps://theconfluence.org/articles/the-lottery-you-cannot-leaveThirty years of climate treaties have produced agreement without compliance, because international law has no way to force a country to follow through.https://theconfluence.org/articles/unenforced-not-unsolvablehttps://theconfluence.org/articles/unenforced-not-unsolvableHistory bends toward justice only when people push it there, and the article asks who has been doing the pushing.https://theconfluence.org/articles/bent-by-handhttps://theconfluence.org/articles/bent-by-handTests Bertrand Russell's claim that ties Hitler, Churchill and Roosevelt to Enlightenment philosophers, weighing how much of it is actually true.https://theconfluence.org/articles/can-philosophy-explain-politicshttps://theconfluence.org/articles/can-philosophy-explain-politicsCovers the four factors behind Ukraine's resistance, arguing that leadership and the ability to adapt in the field mattered more than firepower alone.https://theconfluence.org/articles/ukraine-ammunition-not-a-ridehttps://theconfluence.org/articles/ukraine-ammunition-not-a-rideExplains why Canadian voters rejected a carbon tax that returned most households more money than it cost them.https://theconfluence.org/articles/axe-the-taxhttps://theconfluence.org/articles/axe-the-taxA philosopher who builds mathematical models of human behaviour maps the attention economy through three character types.https://theconfluence.org/articles/your-attention-spenthttps://theconfluence.org/articles/your-attention-spentBig data and algorithmic pricing have worn away the privacy that once kept consumers from paying exactly what they were willing to.https://theconfluence.org/articles/end-of-the-sticker-pricehttps://theconfluence.org/articles/end-of-the-sticker-priceHuman attention has quietly become a raw material bought and sold at scale, with costs landing even on services marketed as free.https://theconfluence.org/articles/your-attention-pricedhttps://theconfluence.org/articles/your-attention-pricedRussia's expectation of a quick fall of Kyiv fell apart under its own overconfidence and flawed planning, made worse by a military still built for an earlier kind of war.https://theconfluence.org/articles/three-day-special-military-operationhttps://theconfluence.org/articles/three-day-special-military-operationUses Edinburgh's boom and Aberdeen's long-term unemployment, just 92 miles apart, as a case study in how growth clusters around a handful of cities.https://theconfluence.org/articles/tale-of-two-scottish-citieshttps://theconfluence.org/articles/tale-of-two-scottish-citiesThe electricity use hidden behind every seemingly weightless AI query traces back to the data centres that carry the cost.https://theconfluence.org/articles/who-pays-for-intelligencehttps://theconfluence.org/articles/who-pays-for-intelligenceAn Icelandic economist ties the stalled rollout of a constitution backed by two-thirds of voters fourteen years ago to the resource curse playing out inside a wealthy democracy.https://theconfluence.org/articles/when-votes-dont-matterhttps://theconfluence.org/articles/when-votes-dont-matterAn Egyptian political economist explains how Middle Eastern states manage to be authoritarian and weak at once, and argues that formal title to informal property won't fix it.https://theconfluence.org/articles/what-states-and-deeds-cant-dohttps://theconfluence.org/articles/what-states-and-deeds-cant-doA philosopher on why patriotism feels good but falls apart once you try to defend it logically.https://theconfluence.org/articles/what-we-shouldnt-lovehttps://theconfluence.org/articles/what-we-shouldnt-loveLooks at Asian mining countries and finds they actually do better on quality of life than non-mining ones, suggesting what matters is who controls extraction.https://theconfluence.org/articles/resource-richhttps://theconfluence.org/articles/resource-richWhy the dollar prices trade between other countries, and how demand for the Swiss franc left Switzerland's central bank holding one of the world's largest balance sheets.https://theconfluence.org/articles/countryless-currencyhttps://theconfluence.org/articles/countryless-currencyAI is wiping out some job tasks and leaving others alone, and the ones left standing are becoming more valuable.https://theconfluence.org/articles/what-ai-doesnt-destroyhttps://theconfluence.org/articles/what-ai-doesnt-destroyA Greek MP argues basic income won't be enough once AI displaces labour, proposing housing, dividend-paying capital, and a personal AI agent for everyone instead.https://theconfluence.org/articles/universal-capital-not-incomehttps://theconfluence.org/articles/universal-capital-not-incomeThe Civil Rights Movement completed American democracy while also breaking apart the exclusionary bargain that had kept it stable, leading directly to today's polarisation.https://theconfluence.org/articles/a-nation-dividedhttps://theconfluence.org/articles/a-nation-dividedCompares deontology and utilitarianism with care ethics and argues the latter does a better job explaining why white lies aren't always wrong.https://theconfluence.org/articles/the-kindest-lieshttps://theconfluence.org/articles/the-kindest-liesDraws on the collapses of Enron and Carillion, both highly profitable on the surface until they weren't, to show how profit figures can be manipulated in ways cash flow can't.https://theconfluence.org/articles/beyond-the-bottom-linehttps://theconfluence.org/articles/beyond-the-bottom-lineWhat an economic model tells a government to do and what that government can get away with before an election are often two different things.https://theconfluence.org/articles/economic-models-cant-votehttps://theconfluence.org/articles/economic-models-cant-voteLebanon's power-sharing system, designed to stop any one sect from dominating, has made the country nearly impossible to govern or reform.https://theconfluence.org/articles/built-to-failhttps://theconfluence.org/articles/built-to-failDefends capital punishment for the worst crimes, as long as it is carried out under strict legal limits.https://theconfluence.org/articles/an-eye-for-an-eyehttps://theconfluence.org/articles/an-eye-for-an-eyeAn engineer who once built offshore drilling rigs now runs a platform that connects Korean and Southeast Asian green-tech firms, and explains why the partnership works.https://theconfluence.org/articles/oil-rigs-to-climate-techhttps://theconfluence.org/articles/oil-rigs-to-climate-techDecades-old scientific agreement on climate change has been held back by a lack of political will, and the piece looks at why.https://theconfluence.org/articles/climate-crisis-politicalhttps://theconfluence.org/articles/climate-crisis-politicalPhones have changed centuries-old student activism, speeding its reach from campus petitions to protests that can topple governments in weeks.https://theconfluence.org/articles/social-changehttps://theconfluence.org/articles/social-change