Learn political analysis by reconstructing what explanations leave out
This section is not a collection of articles or opinions.
It is a space designed to train political reasoning.
Each Political Analysis Puzzle presents a real political case as an incomplete story.
What you read will feel coherent—but insufficient.
Key actors, decisions, or institutional mechanisms are deliberately left in the background.
Your task is not to guess facts or reach a single correct answer.
Your task is to rebuild an explanation that no longer feels incomplete.
How These Puzzles Work
- You start with a short narrative that explains events too easily.
- Along the way, brief questions interrupt comfortable interpretations.
- At the end, a set of clues points you toward what the story leaves out.
Some puzzles include links to full analytical cases on PoliticLab.
Those cases do not provide “solutions”—they provide material for reconstruction.
A puzzle is solved when you move beyond:
- atmosphere,
- polarization,
- inevitability,
and begin to identify actors, roles, procedures, and decisions.
What These Puzzles Are (and Are Not)
They are:
- guided analytical exercises
- tools to practice institutional and strategic thinking
- entry points into deeper political analysis
They are not:
- quizzes
- summaries of events
- moral judgments
- opinion pieces
If a puzzle feels easy, it has not done its job yet.
How to Use This Section
You can approach these puzzles in two ways:
- Individually — explore a single case that interests you
- As a series — follow a progression designed to develop analytical skill step by step
If you are new, we recommend starting with the first puzzle in a series and moving forward in order.