Engelsberg Ideas

Engelsberg Ideas Engelsberg Ideas is free to read, providing access to excellence.

Engelsberg Ideas is the home to great writing from the world’s leading thinkers on history, culture, and ideas, featuring essays, historical portraits and regular podcasts.

It may appear to be a welcoming symbol, but history tells us a red carpet is often a trap.Rolling out the red carpet | A...
18/08/2025

It may appear to be a welcoming symbol, but history tells us a red carpet is often a trap.

Rolling out the red carpet | Armand D'Angour

It may appear to be a welcoming symbol, but history tells us a red carpet is often a trap.

When the terms for ending a conflict are left undefined, a state can drift towards defeat, with the choice of peace arri...
18/08/2025

When the terms for ending a conflict are left undefined, a state can drift towards defeat, with the choice of peace arriving only when the power to shape it has gone.

How wars end | Reyhan Silingar

When the terms for ending a conflict are left undefined, a state can drift towards defeat, with the choice of peace arriving only when the power to shape it has gone.

The decision to drop the atomic bombs, rather than order an extended land invasion of Japan, was a moral choice between ...
18/08/2025

The decision to drop the atomic bombs, rather than order an extended land invasion of Japan, was a moral choice between two tragedies.

The invasion of Japan that never was | Peter Caddick-Adams

The decision to drop the atomic bombs, rather than order an extended land invasion of Japan, was a moral choice between two tragedies.

The Yasukuni Shrine is more than just a memorial to Japan's war dead.The Yasukuni Shrine and the shadow of the past | Ke...
15/08/2025

The Yasukuni Shrine is more than just a memorial to Japan's war dead.

The Yasukuni Shrine and the shadow of the past | Keith Lowe

The Yasukuni Shrine is more than just a memorial to Japan's war dead.

The lesson of the Allied victory over Japan in August 1945 is that war, though terrible, is sometimes a necessary instru...
15/08/2025

The lesson of the Allied victory over Japan in August 1945 is that war, though terrible, is sometimes a necessary instrument of justice.

The real meaning of VJ Day | Robert Lyman

The lesson of the Allied victory over Japan in August 1945 is that war, though terrible, is sometimes the necessary instrument of justice.

Animal Farm works at a deeper level than politics. It is an allegory about human nature, and George Orwell's greatest wo...
14/08/2025

Animal Farm works at a deeper level than politics. It is an allegory about human nature, and George Orwell's greatest work.

Animal Farm, Orwell’s true masterpiece | Jeremy Wikeley

Animal Farm works at a deeper level than politics. It is an allegory about human nature, and George Orwell's greatest work.

The tortuous practice of Russian-Western summitry has, for all of its all-too-frequent failures, occasionally produced i...
14/08/2025

The tortuous practice of Russian-Western summitry has, for all of its all-too-frequent failures, occasionally produced impressive results.

The enduring allure of the summit | Sergey Radchenko

The tortuous practice of Russian-Western summitry has, for all of its all-too-frequent failures, occasionally produced impressive results.

A modest but moving exhibition of Jean-François Millet’s works illuminates the divisions, routines and solitude of Frenc...
13/08/2025

A modest but moving exhibition of Jean-François Millet’s works illuminates the divisions, routines and solitude of French 19th-century rural life.

Millet’s rural rides | Alexandra Wilson

A modest but moving exhibition of Jean-François Millet’s works illuminates the divisions, routines and solitude of French 19th-century rural life.

Conservatism, once grounded in enduring moral and cultural truths, has lost its poetic soul.The case for a conservative ...
13/08/2025

Conservatism, once grounded in enduring moral and cultural truths, has lost its poetic soul.

The case for a conservative canon | Michael Lucchese

Conservatism, once grounded in enduring moral and cultural truths, has lost its poetic soul.

The first detonation of a thermonuclear weapon in 1952 heralded the true dawn of the nuclear age.The day we learned how ...
12/08/2025

The first detonation of a thermonuclear weapon in 1952 heralded the true dawn of the nuclear age.

The day we learned how to end the world | Peter Hoskin

The true dawn of the nuclear age did not come with the Trinity test in 1945, but seven years later, with the first detonation of a thermonuclear weapon.

The recent round of fighting between Thailand and Cambodia has its roots in a dramatic falling out between two of Southe...
12/08/2025

The recent round of fighting between Thailand and Cambodia has its roots in a dramatic falling out between two of Southeast Asia’s most powerful families.

A tale of two dynasties | Imran Shamsunahar

The recent round of fighting between Thailand and Cambodia has its roots in a dramatic falling out between two of Southeast Asia’s most powerful families.

Conflict fundamentally alters social norms and cultural values, including how people eat.Food as a weapon of war | Carol...
11/08/2025

Conflict fundamentally alters social norms and cultural values, including how people eat.

Food as a weapon of war | Caroline Eden

Conflict fundamentally alters social norms and cultural values, including how people eat.

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Welcome to Engelsberg Ideas

Engelsberg Ideas is a new home for great writing and podcasts on history and culture, featuring leading writers and thinkers.

Although this is an exciting new publishing venture, it also has deep roots – in the Engelsberg Seminars that have taken place for more than two decades every June in Engelsberg, Sweden, at the centre owned by the Axel and Margaret Ax:son Johnson Foundation. An illustration of Engelsberg is above.

The Axel and Margaret Ax:son Johnson Foundation for Public Benefit is a private foundation, founded in 1947, with the primary purpose of promoting scientific and scholarly research. Its focus today is on the humanities, and on social sciences, working with leading scholars and universities around the world.

Engelsberg Ideas features essays, historical portraits and notebooks from our editorial team. There is a regular podcast – History Lessons – each featuring a leading historian, and a monthly podcast on the big themes and trends shaping geopolitics.