Hemispheric relations, Hispanic heritage, and the geopolitics of the Americas. We investigate USMCA renegotiations, nearshoring, Pan-American diplomacy, bilingual governance, Spanish colonial law, Latin American urbanism, and U.S. double standards. Half of America lives in former Mexican territory—this geography shapes everything.
13 articles
Medellín''s Miracle? Urban Design, Politics, and the Limits of Transformation
Once suffering extraordinarily high violence rates, Medellín remade itself through transit, public libraries, and public-space investments. This essay traces the politics, innovations, ambivalences, and lessons for U.S. cities seeking equitable urban transformation.
October 13, 2025
America''s Other Founding: The Spanish Story
The most American thing about the United States is that we keep mistaking prologue for plot. We nod at Spain and Mexico in the opening credits, then hit fast-forward to railroads and robber barons. But the decisive drama—the social inventions, the legal improvisations, the urban.
September 29, 2025
Why the U.S. Treats Latin America Differently
Walk into any American newsroom on a slow afternoon and point to a globe. Paris elicits sighs; Prague, a study-abroad anecdote; Berlin, a memory of train schedules that ran to the minute. Say Tegucigalpa, and the room tilts. Not hostility—just air pockets of unknowing.
September 25, 2025
The Hidden Hemisphere: How Spanish America Built the United States—and Why We Forgot
Every nation is a story told about land. The United States has preferred the tidy novella: thirteen British colonies, a heroic revolution, then Manifest Destiny. But walk any city with your ears on—Los Angeles, San Antonio, Santa Fe—and the place names remind you that the harmony was written in.
September 18, 2025
Neighbors at Arm's Length: The Anti-Woke Turn and the Architecture of Democratic Distance
From Florida's classrooms to Hungary's parliament halls, the 'anti-woke' movement reveals itself as more than culture war—it's a systematic attempt to redesign the distance between citizen and state, neighbor and neighbor, in ways that fundamentally alter democratic participation across the.
September 11, 2025
Pan‑American Solidarity: Shared Futures Across Hemispheres
Climate, migration, trade — the Americas are entwined. This essay argues that effective responses to shared crises require institutional designs that match hemispheric interdependence: joint infrastructure, finance, and democratic cooperation.
September 8, 2025
The Forgotten Republics of Light: Reading America Through the Ghost of New Spain
Beneath every American highway lies the dust of empires that spoke in another grammar. The Spanish colonial past offers an alternative genealogy where identity was not binary but layered—a continental experiment from Florida to California that still defines our moral noon.
September 4, 2025
The Double-Standard Doctrine
How Washington treats Europe like a roommate and Latin America like a distant cousin—and what it would take to change the house rules. An empire doesn't have to call itself an empire. Sometimes it just keeps two sets of house rules. When Europe coughs, the U.S. shows up with casseroles and cash.
August 25, 2025
The De-Risked Hemisphere
Why Latin America's next boom is North America's best insurance policy. For two decades the world's factory pointed east by reflex. Then pandemics and geopolitics broke muscle memory. 'De-risking' entered the catechism, and procurement teams began measuring distance again—how far the ship must.
August 21, 2025
Neighbors at Arm's Length
The double standard that warps U.S. policy toward Latin America—and how to fix it. Europe gets the Rules for Allies; Latin America gets the Rules for Neighbors. Here's a field guide to ending the whiplash.
August 18, 2025