The Another Europe Podcast

Ten years after the Brexit referendum, Britain is still living with its political and cultural consequences. In this episode, Luke Cooper is joined by Kojo Koram and Alena Ivanova to ask what Brexit was really about—and why its legacy continues to shape British politics. Was Brexit simply a revolt against Brussels, or did it reflect a deeper desire to restore Britain's imperial place in the world?...

Eight of the ten richest men in the world built their fortunes through Big Tech. As artificial intelligence drives unprecedented profits and market power, a handful of corporations are reshaping economies, politics and societies on a global scale. In this episode of COUNTER•POWER, host Nick Dearden is joined by Sofia Scasserra of the Transnational Institute and Anita Gurumurthy of IT for Change to...

In this episode, we're talking about the people's sport, football, and its fascinating relationship with anti-fascism and the political power of sport ahead of the 2026 World Cup. Host Nick Dearden speaks with Chris Lee, author of The Defiant: A History of Football Against Fascism, Daniel Noroña from Amnesty International US, and Shaista Aziz , co-founder of The Three Hijabis.   Throughout history...

What does it mean to build a political movement rooted in working-class organizing, anti-imperialism, and grassroots activism in a moment of deep instability across Europe?  Co-Hosts Seema Syeda and Nick Dearden discuss this with Danièle Obono , a left-wing deputy in the French National Assembly and member of La France Insoumise.  In 2024, France’s New Popular Front captured the imagination of pro...

Syria and the new world war Are we witnessing the beginnings of a new global war? With conflicts stretching from Afghanistan and Pakistan to Ukraine, and across the Middle East and Africa, it can feel like the world is spiraling into chaos. In this episode, Host Nick Dearden speaks to guests Elif Sarican , a writer and contributing editor at The Amargi, and Mazen Gharibah , an academic with the Co...

This episode steps back from the daily news cycle to examine the structural roots of the current global energy crisis. Host Zoe Williams speaks to Chris Hayes , the Chief Economist at Common Wealth, and Luke Cooper, LSE academic.  Drawing parallels to the 1970s oil shock, their conversation explores how decades of policy decisions have left economies—particularly the UK—dangerously exposed to vola...

War and resistance in Ukraine Just over four years ago, as Putin launched Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine, he expected the war to be over in a matter of days. But Putin’s army would soon be shocked by the resistance they encountered, and today Ukraine still hasn’t fallen. But it hasn’t won either. This is now a complex, attritional war for endurance against an autocratic, imperial state th...

The issue which has, more than any other, shown the depth of hypocrisy in the international rules based order is Palestine. In Gaza, the world watched a genocide in real time. Despite massive global protests, the machine rolled on – yet Palestinians remain hopeful.  Host Nick Dearden speaks with Omar Barghouti , founder of the BDS (Boycott, Divest, Sanctions) Movement and the Palestinian Campaign...

Islamophobia and antisemitism are unfortunately no longer fringe. Increasingly open, increasingly violent, they are reshaping what it means to be Muslim or Jewish in Britain today. And yet these hatreds are rarely examined directly. Instead, they are instrumentalised, folded into debates about immigration, national security, public order, and foreign policy, in ways that often do not represent the...

Fascism has never really gone away—but it has changed shape. From the street-level racism and open organising of the British National Party in 1990s East London to today’s globalised far right, this episode traces how authoritarian politics have moved from the margins to the mainstream. Host Nick Dearden draws on personal experience of anti-fascist organising, and is joined by Seema Syeda from the...

The first year of Donald Trump’s second term is over — with three long years still to go. Far from the myth of “Trump the peacemaker,” the past twelve months have been marked by war, repression, corruption, and growing global resistance. In this episode, we take stock of Trump’s record so far: from bombing seven countries and backing Israel’s assault on Gaza, to embracing tech oligarchs at home an...

To much fanfare, Britain has announced yet another "strategic" defence review - the fifth that a UK Government has undertaken in the last 15 years. The peculiar thing, however, is that despite the frequency of these reviews, they have a strong tendency to assert continuity over change. This is certainly the narrative of the present UK Government's latest review: that nothing has changed in UK and...

In an age of war and permanent crisis, is it all too easy to forget the fundamentals? How do we look after each other, care for one another and create economies that prioritise our human development? In this podcast, Seema Syeda and Zoe Williams welcome back Tim Jackson to talk about his new book, The Care Economy (Polity 2025). Going back to the philosophical fundamentals, the book re-centres the...

The drift of the global billionaire oligarchy to the radical right is quickening its pace. The Arc conference - billed as a "far right Davos" and with ticket prices to match - recently descended on London, and was joined by the various luminaries and politicians from the British right. On this podcast, Zoe Williams and Luke Cooper are joined by Stella Tsantekidou, a rising star in the UK media and...

With the return of Donald Trump in the White House - and his insistence that Kyiv and Moscow strike a peace deal "in 24 hours - huge uncertainty now hangs over the future of Ukraine's democracy and freedom. In this podcast, Luke Cooper and Zoe Williams discuss the huge challenges and hardships Ukraine has experienced in the war, drawing on insights from Luke's recent visit to Ukraine. They are joi...

Millions of people across the world have looked on at the American election result with a sense of dismay and fear. As the world tries to compute and digest a second Trump presidency, Luke Cooper and Zoe Williams try to put the pieces of this catastrophe together and work out what comes next. A reminder that members of Another Europe Is Possible get access to extra material as a benefit of members...

After 14 years of frankly horrendous Conservative rule, millions celebrated Labour’s decisive victory. But since that fateful July day the new comms team at Number 10 has kicked into action. Their aim it seems is a simple one: to get you to put your hopes and dreams away and be as miserable as possible. So what do we make of it all? And what do we expect to happen next? In this podcast, Luke Coope...

With white supremacist riots targeting Muslims and peoples of colour, this was a summer to forget for many of our communities in the UK. Building on the work that Another Europe has undertaken for several years on challenging anti-Muslim racism across Europe, Luke Cooper spoke to Shaista Aziz, a co-director of the anti-racist campaign group, Three Hijabis, a longstanding member of Another Europe a...

A huge protest movement has taken to the streets in Georgia against the "foreign agent" law. This new legislation would require all organisations that receive foreign funding to declare it on a national register. Protestors have argued that this is the thin end of the wedge amid an increasingly authoritarian climate in the country for human rights advocacy and civil society organisations.  To disc...

Liz Truss has managed to persuade herself of a very convenient (from her perspective) "truth": she wasn't a terrible prime minister with a flawed economic strategy, but the victim of a deep state conspiracy. Swinging aggressively to the far right, she has been courting Steve Bannon and the American Trumpists on a recent US tour. What does this mean for the future of British conservatism? What's th...

He's the city trader that went rogue. But he didn't lose the bank money. Quite on the contrary, he made them hundreds of millions from the fallout of the financial crisis. Then he dared to speak out against a system that was broken for the many but working for the few. In The Trading Game former city trader and friend of the Another Europe podcast Gary Stevenson has now put his remarkable story do...

George Galloway has done it again, in a byelection as predictable as it was depressing. But surely this is isn't just about one individual. It feels like a moment of crisis and disruption in British politics. After the dust had settled on the result, Zoe Williams and Luke Cooper spoke to James Meadway and Michael Chessum about what it means for British politics in this age of crisis and contention...

Poland has dumped its far right government in a historic election victory for pro-democratic forces. After years of authoritarianism and anti-migrant racism, the Law and Justice party have been defeated by a coalition of pro-democratic parties.  In this podcast, Zoe Williams and Luke Cooper talk to Polish activist Ana Oppenheim about the historic triumph of liberals, pro-democrats and the left. A...

It was a scientific discovery that changed the world forever. The nuclear bomb was largely a brainchild of left wing scientists who were determined Nazi Germany would not win the race to build this terrible weapon. The recent Hollywood biopic focuses on the role of Robert Oppenheimer in this fascinating period in history, the man who led the team working under the direction of the American governm...

In the first podcast in our Ukraine and the World series, Luke Cooper talks to Masha Shynkarenko, a Research Associate with the Ukraine in European Dialogue programme at the Institute for Human Sciences in Vienna and an expert on the Russian colonisation of Crimea and the Crimean Tartar national movement.  They discuss the long history of Russian and Soviet imperialism in the Crimean peninsula, li...