The Dig

Olúfẹmi Táíwò guest hosts an interview with Daniela Gabor and Ndongo Samba Sylla on how financial power has shaped the global economic order from colonialism through Bretton Woods, the Washington Consensus, and today’s Wall Street Consensus. Read Daniela’s work: people.uwe.ac.uk/Person/DanielaGabor Read Ndongo’s work: rosalux.de/en/profile/es_detail/N8SVHTS8SA/ndongo-samba-sylla?...

An in-depth interview on the historical and political-economic context of the Ukraine crisis with Ukrainian sociologist Volodymyr Ishchenko. Read Volodymyr’s work: truthout.org/articles/ukrainians-are-far-from-unified-on-nato-let-them-decide-for-themselves/ ponarseurasia.org/how-maidan-revolutions-reproduce-and-intensify-the-post-soviet-crisis-of-political-representation/ lefteast.org/ukrain...

Epidemiologist Justin Feldman makes a comprehensive and devastating critique of Biden’s pandemic response. Read Justin’s essay: jmfeldman.medium.com/?p=88452c696f2 Support this podcast at Patreon.com/TheDig Buy Angela Davis: An Autobiography haymarketbooks.org/books/1741-angela-davis

Historian Gabriel Winant discusses The Next Shift: The Fall of Industry and the Rise of Health Care in Rust Belt America. It’s a fascinating study of the emergence of the service sector and a new working class out of the wreckage of deindustrialization through the story of the rise and fall of unionized steel in Pittsburgh and its replacement by a massive hospital industry. Listen to my past...

Everyone feels bad right now because conditions are awful and the outlook is bleak. What is going on, and where might things be headed? How might we become unstuck from this interregnum? Dan interviews returning guests Aziz Rana, Nikhil Pal Singh, and Wendy Brown. Support The Dig at Patreon.com/TheDig

Episode two of our two-part series on cryptocurrency: political theorist Stefan Eich on how crypto fits into Hayek’s old neoliberal dream of private money and why that vision emerged in a new form in the wake of the 2008 financial crisis. Read Stefan’s article: static1.squarespace.com/static/5ae8a7b625bf02c0b85aec02/t/5c923c13eef1a1ce843836ff/1553087508427/Stefan+Eich%2C+Old+Utopias%2C...

Edward Ongweso Jr. and Jacob Silverman on cryptocurrency, NFTs, Elon Musk, the metaverse, meme stocks, and techno-utopianism amid the crushing reality of our neoliberal hellscape. The first in a two-episode series on crypto. Read Dan’s new essay on border control politics: nplusonemag.com/online-only/online-only/border-crises/ Support The Dig at Patreon.com/TheDig

How neoliberal conditions create popular constituencies, ideologies, and subjectivities among poor and working-class people for a violent, mean, and repressive neoliberalism—and how those reactionary politics from below converge with those generated from above. Political theorist Rodrigo Nunes analyzes Bolsonarismo (the ideology and politics surrounding far-right Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro...

Bolsonaro is presiding over mass COVID deaths and the destruction of the Amazon. Lula is free and polling way ahead for next year’s presidential election. But the conditions that brought the far-right to power remain in place. Sociologist Sabrina Fernandes and historian Andre Pagliarini on Brazil. Check out Sabrina’s Tese Onze YouTube channel youtube.com/channel/UC0fGGprihDIlQ3ykWvcb9h...

The second of Dan’s two-part interview with Piero Gleijeses on his book Visions of Freedom: Havana, Washington, Pretoria, and the Struggle for Southern Africa, 1976–1991. This is the story of Cuba’s military defense of the Angolan government against a US and South Africa-backed effort to overthrow the People’s Movement for the Liberation of Angola (MPLA). The future of the entire region was on the...

Part one of Dan’s two-part interview with Piero Gleijeses on his book Visions of Freedom: Havana, Washington, Pretoria, and the Struggle for Southern Africa, 1976–1991. This is the story of Cuba’s military defense of the Angolan government against a US and South Africa-backed effort to overthrow the People’s Movement for the Liberation of Angola (MPLA). The future of the entire r...

Astra Taylor interviews archaeologist David Wengrow on The Dawn of Everything: A New History of Humanity, his new book co-authored with the late David Graeber. Support us at Patreon.com/TheDig Check out Hannah Arendt by Samantha Rose Hill reaktionbooks.co.uk/display.asp? ISB=9781789143799

Guest host Gabriel Winant interviews labor journalists Alex Press and Jonah Furman, as well as IATSE member Victor P. Bouzi. Listen to Primer, Alex’s podcast about Amazon patreon.com/primerpodcast Listen to Victor’s podcast WAIT, Why Am I Talking? podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/wait-why-am-i-talking/id1515308564 Support The Dig at Patreon.com/TheDig

A Striketober episode from The Dig archives. Support The Dig at Patreon.com/TheDig and receive our weekly newsletter by email

What are the politics of sex? Incels, porn, sexual racism, the feminist sex wars, and more. Philosopher Amia Srinivasan on her new essay collection The Right to Sex: Feminism in the Twenty-First Century. Want our very good weekly newsletter emailed to you? Support us at Patreon.com/TheDig Interested in the book advertised on this week’s Dig? thenewpress.com/books/empire-of-rubber

A very short ep on a great new documentary about the history and present of American socialism: The Big Scary S-Word. It’s by Yael Bridge, and it’s the perfect film to show to your skeptical uncle or to someone new to (or curious about) socialist politics. You can watch The Big Scary S-Word on iTunes, Apple TV or a number of other sites by visiting: www.socialismmovie.com/screenings

Legendary socialist scholar Tariq Ali on the long history of Afghanistan: the 19th and early 20th-century wars against the British Empire; the communist coup, Soviet invasion, and US-backed mujahideen war; the rise of the Taliban; and the 2001 US-led NATO invasion through the recent US defeat and withdrawal. Plus, a lot about Pakistan. Pre-order Ali’s forthcoming book The Forty-Year War in A...

Kim Stanley Robinson on science fiction, climate crisis, Marxism, geo-engineering, political violence, green Keynesianism, and a lot more. Interviewed by guest host Daniel Aldana Cohen, who read 11 of Robinson’s books during the pandemic quarantine, running from Red Mars through The Ministry for the Future. Support this podcast at Patreon.com/TheDig and receive our new weekly newsletter by email.

It’s Occupy Wall Street’s tenth anniversary. Dan interviews Astra Taylor. Support The Dig at Patreon.com/TheDig and get our new weekly newsletter. Listen to other pods in the retrospective series https://rosalux.nyc/occupy/

Episode three of The Dig’s War on Terror trilogy with Spencer Ackerman: Decadence, Trump, and Biden. Subscribe to Spencer’s Substack: foreverwars.substack.com/people/2576701-spencer-ackerman Support The Dig at Patreon.com/TheDig and (starting next week) get our weekly newsletter

Episode two of The Dig’s War on Terror trilogy with Spencer Ackerman: Obama, ISIS, and the Sustainable War. Subscribe to Spencer’s Substack: foreverwars.substack.com/people/2576701-spencer-ackerman Support The Dig at Patreon.com/TheDig and (starting next week) get our weekly newsletter

Episode one of The Dig’s three-part War on Terror series the with Spencer Ackerman: 9/11, bipartisan war fever, and George W. Bush. Subscribe to Spencer’s Substack: foreverwars.substack.com/people/2576701-spencer-ackerman Support The Dig at Patreon.com/TheDig and (very soon) get our weekly newsletter

Media critic Adam Johnson and New York Magazine’s Eric Levitz on the media’s warmongering attack on Biden’s withdrawal of US troops from Afghanistan. Further reading: nymag.com/intelligencer/2021/08/media-bias-biden-polls-approval-afghanistan-withdrawal.html thecolumn.substack.com/p/on-afghanistan-withdrawal-nyts-peter Sign up for Adam’s Substack: thecolumn.substack.com Sup...

Dan interviews scholars Aldo Madariaga and Camila Vergara about how Chilean politics have been playing out since the massive popular uprisings that began in October 2019. Further reading: jacobinlat.com/2021/06/19/el-neoliberalismo-atenta-contra-la-democracia-2 newleftreview.org/sidecar/posts/burying-pinochet jacobinmag.com/2021/06/rene-rojas-interview-democracy-new-constitution-constituent-assemb...

Dan interviews historian Kristin Kobes Du Mez on her book Jesus and John Wayne: How White Evangelicals Corrupted a Faith and Fractured a Nation . “Having replaced the Jesus of the Gospels with the vengeful warrior Christ, it’s no wonder many came to think of Trump in the same way.” Support The Dig at Patreon.com/TheDig We now have a Discord for patrons and, starting in September, a wee...