Jacobin Radio

Historian Margarita Fajardo on her book The World That Latin America Created: The United Nations Economic Commission for Latin America in the Development Era . Fajardo discusses the Latin American economists at the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (CEPAL) who conceptualized the division of the global economy between center and periphery, and how that later gave rise to...

Dinesh D'Souza believes he has uncovered shocking proof that the Democratic Party stole the 2020 election in 2000 MULES (2022), a documentary so shoddy that even right-wing media is hesitant to publicize it. We follow the trail of Dinesh's conspiracy theory to its inevitable endpoint: a contempt for democracy itself. PLUS: we discuss the billionaire whose name is on everyone's lips, Elon Musk. Mic...

As the London mayor plans to conduct a review on cannabis legalization, Grace speaks with Kojo Koram, lecturer in law at Birkbeck and author of several books, including The War on Drugs and the Global Colour Line , about drug policy and history. They discuss the roots of drugs criminalization, the neoliberal roots of the war on drugs in the UK and US, and prospects for reform. A World to Win is a...

Matthew Huber , author of Climate Change as Class War , explains why the environmental movement needs to take class and production more seriously. Next up, Adam Kotsko explores why evangelicals are so obsessed with abortion Behind the News , hosted by Doug Henwood, covers the worlds of economics and politics and their complex interactions, from the local to the global. Find the archive here: https...

The documentary WHITE NOISE (2020) follows three very prominent members of the alt-right (you'll be familiar with all of them, folks) as their fortunes rise and fall during the Trump era. We discuss the ethics of interviewing/"platforming" ideological enemies, the differing aesthetic styles of various alt-right personalities, and what happens to political "scenes" during periods of eclipse. PLUS:...

Tom Mills, lecturer in sociology at Aston University and the author of The BBC: Myth of a Public Service , joins Long Reads for a discussion about the history of the BBC, its ideological and soft-power functions, and the future of public broadcasting. Read Tom's article "The Left Should Stand for a Democratically Run BBC" here: https://www.jacobinmag.com/2022/02/defend-bbc-funding-public-broadcast...

Live from New York: Dan interviews Amazon Labor Union president Chris Smalls, Jaz Brisack of Starbucks Workers United, SEIU Local 1199NE president Rob Baril, Jacobin writer Alex Press, and Labor Notes writer Luis Feliz Leon on the return of labor militancy that we see sweeping Amazon, Starbucks, and workplaces all around the US. Support The Dig at Patreon.com/TheDig

This week, Grace talks to John Bellamy Foster, professor of sociology at the University of Oregon and editor of  Monthly Review . They discuss Marx’s metabolic theory of nature and the "metabolic rift" that shapes the relationship between humanity and nature under capitalism, as well as the ongoing relevance of the theory of monopoly capital put forward by Monthly Review  founders Paul B...

This week on The Jacobin Show , Natalie Shure explains why she doesn't think the SCOTUS decision to overturn Roe v. Wade will turn out Dem voters in the midterms, Jen Pan pours some cold water on liberal excitement over corporations' sudden and newfound interest in reproductive rights, and Matt Huber discusses his new book Climate Change as Class War out this month from Verso, and why we have...

THE TRUMAN SHOW (1998) is widely remembered as a prescient film that anticipates the rise of social media and reality TV. But how accurate was its forecast, really? And what, exactly, was it saying? And hey—did the audience watch Truman go to the bathroom? We investigate. "The Audience is Us" by Jonathan Rosenbaum: https://jonathanrosenbaum.net/2021/07/the-audience-is-us/ Michael and Us is a podca...

A timely interview from the archives: legal scholars Aziz Rana and Amna Akbar, and Movement for Black Lives lawyer Marbre Stahly-Butts, on SCOTUS, liberal court veneration, and other big questions on the law and politics facing the left. Find Eslanda at haymarketbooks.org/books/1769-eslanda Support The Dig at Patreon.com/TheDig

Jen Pan speaks with Ben Burgis about why the left should continue focusing on concrete organizing and policy and not the culture wars. She also speaks with Clay Aldern, co-author of the new book Homelessness is a Housing Problem , about how to solve the housing crisis in the US. Also on the show: a look at how private universities are making a killing while paying no taxes. Jacobin May Day sale: h...

This week, Grace talks to brilliant young climate campaigner Mikaela Loach about her work trying to shut down oil production in the North Sea, taking the UK government to court over fossil fuel subsidies, and the best ways to organize among Gen Z! Mikaela has been involved with campaigns such as Stop Cambo , Stop Jackdaw , and Paid to Pollute . A World to Win is a podcast from Grace Blakeley and T...

The Monkees were a prefabricated pop band who didn't play their own instruments and didn't get much respect. But in 1968, they teamed with director Bob Rafelson and a young writer named Jack Nicholson to take charge of their image with HEAD (1968), a corrosive satire that asks: what do the Monkees have in common with the Vietnam War? Donate to an abortion fund: https://www.thecut.com/article/donat...

Doug speaks with David Adler of the Progressive International on an impending debt crisis, with an emphasis on the role of the IMF. Plus: Sudip Bhattacharya on the Asian American population: its diversity, its unity, its politics. David's Guardian article about the IMF: https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2022/apr/18/will-biden-ever-stand-up-to-the-imfs-abuses-of-power Behind the News , host...

Ayşe Zarakol on her book Before the West: The Rise and Fall of Eastern World Orders. How centuries of Asian empires from Genghis Khan to Timur and the early Ming Dynasty through the Ottomans and Mughals built dominant world orders and, ultimately, shaped the rise of Europe—and how that all might shape how we think about the crisis in the world order today. Support The Dig at Patreon.com/TheDig Che...

This week, Grace is joined by Barnaby Raine, co-author of a recent essay for Salvage magazine analyzing Russia’s invasion of Ukraine through the lens of rising nationalism, a feature of global politics especially since the 2008 financial crisis. They discuss this world-historic crisis of capitalism, how it is fueling the growth of nationalist and neo-fascist movements around the world, what that m...

Jen Pan speaks with Matt Bruenig on the terrible influence of corporate think tanks on our politics and David Dayen about how decades of pro-corporate policies have ruined our supply chains. Jen’s weekly segment focuses on why Joe Biden’s approval rating is lower among Latinos than any other group, and why so many mainstream explanations of this fact are off the mark. See coverage of supply chain...

Australian land and British institutions mix uncomfortably in Peter Weir's PICNIC AT HANGING ROCK (1975). We speculate from our Canadian vantage points why this story has become one of the iconic documents of Australia's national identity. PLUS: the boys cannot stop talking about Bob Dylan! "Picnic at Hanging Rock: What We See and What We Seem" by Megan Abbott - https://www.criterion.com/current/p...

Suzi talks to Alan Minsky and Harvey Kaye about the 21st Century Economic Bill of Rights , which they see as both a campaign platform and governing program to rescue and renew American democracy. This is more than a to-do or must-do list for progressives, but in their words, a compelling and transformative unifying project, a manifesto to advance democracy. We ask whether they think this program i...

Doug interviews Donna Murch , author of Assata Taught Me , on Black radical politics from the Panthers to the Movement for Black Lives. Plus: Kyle Shybunko, author of a recent article on the New Left Review blog , discusses Hungary’s leader Viktor Orbán, a hero to many on the American right. Behind the News , hosted by Doug Henwood, covers the worlds of economics and politics and their complex int...

Gilbert Achcar joins Long Reads for a conversation about the second wave of Arab uprisings—and the possibility of a third. Gilbert is professor of development studies at SOAS in London. The second edition of his book The People Want: A Radical Exploration of the Arab Uprising has just been published. Read a 2020 interview with Gilbert in Catalyst , "The Arab Spring, a Decade Later" here: https://c...

Destin Jenkins on his book The Bonds of Inequality: Debt and the Making of the American City, which makes a powerful argument about how the ubiquitous and in many ways invisible dependence of American cities on municipal debt to fund basic infrastructure has devastating consequences for democracy and entrenches spatial, racial, and wealth disparities. Support The Dig at Patreon.com/TheDig Tickets...

Jen Pan discusses why “cannabis equity” programs, which were designed to provide opportunities for victims of America’s decades-long drug war, have been a complete failure. Paul Prescod talks about the importance of forging electoral campaigns deeply rooted in the labor movement. And finally, Lily Geismer gives a history of the New Democrats' assault on labor and social programs. Her new book is L...

This week, Grace talks to Sam Moore, co-author with Alex Roberts of The Rise of Ecofascism: Climate Change and the Far Right . Sam and Alex host their own podcast, 12 Rules for WHAT , which focuses on the rise of the far right. They discuss how far-right politicians are weaponizing the climate crisis to build support for an extremist, exclusionary politics based on "batteries, bombs, and borders,"...