Macrodose

Followers of Macrodose may remember our Roundtable episode from earlier this year, in which Adrienne spoke to James and the brilliant Brett Christophers about the many and varied reasons why — despite all the hype about how cheap renewables have become — the transition to renewable energy cannot be left to the market and the profit motive. What that conversation didn't leave us with, however,...

James returns after a Summer break! This week we're running a special episode on Macrodose theory, taking you behind the scenes to look at some of the theoretical building blocks of how we put the show together (1:23).  What is Macrodose, why are we doing it, and who are the thinkers we should be reading to understand the world we now live in today? READING LIST Michael Kidron 'Failing gro...

On this week's Macrodose, Craig Gent explores algorithmic management. What is at stake when we speak of the creeping introduction of algorithms? Is it just an inevitable fact of the long march toward progress? Or does it open a new frontier that we need to take seriously and strategically? Craig Gent is a writer and researcher and the North of England Editor at Novara Media. He’s also the auth...

As a listener of The Break Down, chances are you’re living in a political system that could be defined as “liberal”. But what does “liberalism” really describe? Is it about democracy? Free markets? The protection of individual freedom? Ask ten different people, and you’re likely to get ten different answers.  According to Chris Shaw, liberalism can boiled down to a system oriented around the “bour...

In this episode of  Macrodose , guest host Isabelle Ferreras delves into the often-overlooked contradiction at the heart of modern democratic societies: while we live in democratic states, our workplaces are far from democratic. Isabelle explores the concept of "economic bicameralism" as a solution to bridge this gap and extend democratic principles into the workplace. She argues that if...

On this week’s Macrodose James Meadway breaks down: the big tech stock plunge at the start of August (2:30), a brief look at new inflation figures in the UK (12:33) and Kamala Harris’ recent rhetoric on price controls (16:07). A massive thank you to all of our existing Patreon subscribers, your support keeps the show running and we are very grateful. If you have the means and enjoy our work, head...

On this week's Macrodose, Helen Hester invites you to consider what the world will look like as work becomes increasingly automated. What will this mean for people whose job involves looking after people? What about the domestic caring work that is often unpaid and tends to fall most heavily on women and racialised minorities? How do we envision a world after work ? Helen Hester is a professor...

“To the question how shall we ever be able to extricate ourselves from the obvious insanity of this position, there is no answer.,” These words were written fifty years ago by philosopher Hannah Arendt, but are just as relevant to the present moment, in which our political leaders and systems continue to fail to grapple with climate and ecological crisis at the scale or urgency they demand. The de...

On this week's Macrodose, Luke de Noronha unpacks the political economy of migration and what we might expect from the new Labour government. In the context of the recent spate of far-right riots, it's more important now than ever to understand how we got to this point and to unmask the  “legitimate concerns about migration” that have supposedly fuelled such racist violence. Luke de Noronh...

Today we're publishing part two of our sell-out live event recorded at London's Union Chapel on July 26th. For this discussion we teamed up with our friends over at Verso Books and the Dig Podcast for a podcast extravaganza. Eleanor Penny of the Verso Podcast and Dig host Daniel Denvir sat down with writer and academic Laleh Khalili and the freshly re-elected, newly independent, MP Jeremy...

This week we are very excited to bring you a recording of the live event we hosted with the Verso and Dig podcasts last Friday at the Union Chapel in Islington.  The Union Chapel is the most beautiful venue and it was a joy to share the evening with so many of you. Thank you to Dalia Gebrial who chaired the event and our panelists James Meadway, Thea Riofrancos and Asad Rehman. A massive thank you...

If you listen to this podcast, chances are you’ve heard of the global target of “net zero emissions” by 2050. You’ve probably also heard about how off track we are from meeting it. But what if I told you we’re even more off track than you might think, because thanks to some effective lobbying, governments don’t have to count the emissions from their militaries, despite their being some of the worl...

On this week's Macrodose, Adam Elliot Cooper takes a close look at prisons. What can we learn when we begin to think about the prison through an economic lens? What is the role of mass incarceration in our economy? And what can the relationship between crime and capitalism tell us about the world we are living in today? Adam Elliot-Cooper is a lecturer in public and social policy at Queen Mary...

On this week's Macrodose, Eleanor Shearer takes us in a deep dive into AI and the enormous processing power that goes into sculpting vast quantities of data. How does the ownership and control of computing power define the very nature of our digital economy? What can we realistically do to prevent the monopolisation of compute by Big Tech? And is there a role for the government in sculpting th...

Capitalism could not exist without the power and structure of the law — that’s the simple but radical argument made by my guest today, Katharina Pistor, law professor at Columbia University, and the author of The Code of Capital: How The Law Creates Wealth and Inequality.  On today’s episode, we break down how the law ‘encodes’ capital and invisibly structures our world, from giving corporations t...

This week on Macrodose, as James takes a summer break, Olly Haynes breaks down the weekend's French election results, in which the New Popular Front left alliance surprisingly emerged as the largest party ahead of Le Pen's RN and Macron's Ensemble. Olly unpacks how the French left snatched a tentative victory from the jaws of defeat, potential outcomes of the gridlock, and a mixture of...

Today's episode of Election Economics is a post-election debrief - hosted by Ayeisha Thomas-Smith who is joined by Phil Burton-Cartledge. They touched on their immediate reactions and analysis of the results, if the Tory losses were inevitable, what next for a Labour government, and the openings & contradictions of the new political UK landscape. Ayeisha Thomas-Smith is host of the New Eco...

Today's episode of Election Economics is a crossover show with Politics Theory Other, where PTO host Alex Doherty invited James Meadway and Richard Seymour to discuss their outlooks on the post-election political horizon in the UK. They discussed potential new right-wing formations between Reform and the Conservatives, the echoes of populism and anti-populism in this campaign, the left-wing pu...

Today on Macrodose Election Economics, James is joined by Polly Smythe, to unpack her research on the links between oil, gas and arms companies and 31 Labour MP candidates. They also touch on the upcoming organizing and union ballots with Amazon workers in the UK. Polly is a writer and journalist, and currently the labour movement correspondent for Novara Media. You can read Polly's full piece...

What would you say a human life is worth? According to the US government, for an American it’s about $7.2 million, compared with the global average of approximately $1.3 million. If you’re Swiss though, you’re worth a pretty penny at $9.4 million. While these estimates might sound absurd, they're really important to understand: these kinds of figures and the models that produce them are a core...

On this week’s Macrodose, James Meadway breaks down a post-pandemic rise in diseases across the world, and how this overlaps with our ideas of health, work and care in the UK (1:10), before looking at how the political uncertainty in pre-election France has caused the European Central Bank to withdraw it's borrowing support, and what this means for future power balances in the Eurozone (08:23)...

Today on Macrodose Election Economics, James is joined by Olly Haynes to talk through the upcoming French elections, the far-right’s resurgence, and how the French left is mobilising to counter it. Olly is a freelance writer and journalist, and host of the FLEP24 podcast - a regular podcast covering the French 2024 elections in further detail: x.com/flep24pod   TICKETS to our MACRODOSE LIVE event...

Today on Macrodose Election Economics, James is joined by Maeve Cohen to discuss the We Are The Economy coalition project, and different ways to frame the relationships between austerity, work and social wellbeing.  Maeve is project lead at The Social Guarantee, and convenor at We Are The Economy - a coalition of organisations who are coming together to call for more investment in public services:...

Today on Macrodose Election Economics, James is joined by Zack Polanski to talk through the Green Party's current campaign, and their ideas for economic, ecological and social futures. Zack has been the deputy leader of the Green Party since September 2022. He is a Londonwide member of the London Assembly, where he is chair of the Environment Committee, and the national spokesperson for the Gr...

On this week’s Macrodose James Meadway breaks down what Reform UK’s “contract” for voters tells us about the future battlegrounds for economic policy (1:46), a preview of the upcoming French election (13:25) and a quick recommendation - a new paper from economist Isabella Weber, proposing responses to an age of “overlapping crises” (20:35). You can find the report here: https://t.co/zaYDO6fFvS A m...