What We’re Reading

Preeti Aroon

• The White Man’s Burden: Why the West’s Efforts to Aid the Rest Have Done So Much Ill and So Little Good. Ever wonder why Africa is still a basket case despite receiving billions of dollars of aid? Former World Bank economist and frequent FP contributor William Easterly explains why: Aid institutions aren’t accountable to the poor people they’re supposed to be helping, they ignore local customs, and they pursue broad utopian ideals rather than specific achievable goals.

Mike Boyer

• Living Large on Oil, by Alexandra Starr in The American Scholar. Just how large is Hugo Chávez’s inner circle living these days? This large: In “a Caracas sushi restaurant that had been enthusiastically recommended: rare tuna could be served—for an exorbitant fee—on the belly of a woman in the buff.” R. Kelly, eat your heart out.

Christine Chen

• Portfolio, Condé Nast’s stylish new business magazine. Not a lot of international coverage in its pages, but what little there is includes a great profile on the prime minister of the UAE and his obsession with horse racing. (And no, I’m not just saying that because the writer, Dan Roth, was an editor of mine a few years ago. Hi, Dan!)

Michael Cognato

• Cultural Amnesia: Necessary Memories from History and the Arts. Clive James has put together a showcase of the most consequential thinkers of the 20th century, from Duke Ellington to Adolph Hitler. The era’s totalitarianisms loom large, but are overshadowed by those who saw through their lies. Reading it is a great substitute for actually being well-read oneself, and reading the many selected excerpts at Slate is even better.

Blake Hounshell

• Missing American feared a victim of ‘dirty war’, by Guy Dinmore and Najmeh Bozorgmehr in this past weekend’s Financial Times. What happened to former FBI agent Robert Levinson? He mysteriously disappeared after meeting an American covert to Islam who lives in exile in Iran.

Prerna Mankad

• Bin Laden’s Eurofighters, by Yassin Musharbash in Spiegel Online. After researching 242 individual jihadists in Europe, two Dutch researchers concluded that there is no standard jihadist profile or network, except that “cells” tend to be ethnically homogeneous and attack targets are consistent. Other key findings: The vast majority of European jihadists are radicalized in the European countries in which they live, and “Euro-terrorists” are essentially recruiting themselves.