Editors’ Note

Issue 14: Money

MARCH 12, 2024

They say that money makes the world go round. It exerts a propulsive and destructive force: it can make lives and ruin them, build states and tear them down. The stories in this issue chronicle how the search for financial gain is poisoning the earth and splitting apart societies, how the possession and pursuit of cash structures daily life in communities around the world. 

Danielle Mackey reports from El Salvador, where President Nayib Bukele’s government is loosening restrictions on mining to generate sorely needed funds, undoing decades of environmental progress. Sofía Alvarez Jurado brings us a story about the last ATM in an aging village in rural Spain, where the far-right has made the availability of cash machines part of its campaign. From Bogotá, Christina Noriega reports on Colombia’s attempt to finally end the war on drugs. From Buenos Aires, the photographer Sebastian Lopez Brach and writer Lucía Cholakian bring us scenes from President Javier Milei’s first few months in office and his attempts to dollarize the Argentinian economy.

From Italy, Guido Alfani considers how modern-day bankers might relieve themselves of public resentment — a sentiment that can be traced back to the Middle Ages. History provides a clue, Alfani writes. Paul Osterlund reports from Turkey, where the government is displacing thousands of people in order to build “earthquake-proof” housing. Jakuta Alikavazovic brings us along for her night alone at the Louvre, and dares to ask: “And you, how would you go about stealing the Mona Lisa?”

Finally, we have a short story by the Korean writer Yun Ko-eun about the allure and ambiguity of Iceland. 

– The Editors