Life of the Party

Shanice digs into the Green Party Conference, highlighting some of key motions being debated, and interrogating some of the political tensions at the heart of the Zionism is Racism motion. While Joe questions the Green party's current strategy: offering up some thoughts on how we might practically organise and engage locally to strengthen community relationships and build power from below. REA...

In this week's episode, Joe offers us insights into Zack Polanski's burgeoning campaign for a seat at the parliamentary table. Meanwhile, Shanice dissects the dynamics within contemporary capitalism's information ecosystems. In the context of the gut-wrenching death of Jason Arday, your hosts ask what struggle and contestation looks like when information is organised within an increasingly powerfu...

Joe and Jonas reflect on their recent trip to France to take part in the annual festival of Jean-Luc Melenchon’s radical left party, La France Insoumise, while Shanice offers some reflections on the enduring challenge presented to socialist strategy by nationalism and the nation-state. READINGS Kate Fox - Watching the English Satnam Virdee - Racism, Class and the Racialized Outsider Colson Whitehe...

We are on a summer break so this week you are getting a special preview of our brand new spin-off show, After Hours. In our very first episode of After Hours, Jonas, Joe and Shanice breakdown a recent report from the National Centre for Social Research, investigating what it says about the average Reform voter and what makes this emerging radical right coalition tick. CREDITS Hosted by Shanice McB...

Joe breaks down the Greater Manchester mayoral race and argues that poor candidate selection and even worse political strategy had a significant role to play in the Greens’ bad showing. While Jonas then offers us some thoughts on the contemporary challenges to reaching the Good Life, provoking a deeper conversation on how the internet and the attention economy are harming our collective bonds. REA...

In this week's episode, Jonas takes us through the latest wave of machinations within the Labour Party, arguing that Andy Burnham’s strategy is neither radical nor realistic. Afterwards, Joe asks some fundamental questions of eco socialist strategy, pondering to what extent we could mitigate the climate crisis and what vision of eco socialism is possible on a burning planet. READINGS C.L.R. Ja...

In this week's episode, Joe raises doubts about the Green Party's choice of candidate in the Manchester mayoralty - spurring wider questions about leadership on the left. After discussing the Green Party's proposals for internal democratic reform, your hosts zoom out to discuss politics' most significant wedge issue: immigration. Shanice opens by critiquing the left's go to arg...

Jonas runs through Burnham’s big win in Makerfield and what it might mean for the Labour Party and the country, while Joe gives a deep cut on progressive alliances, assessing their history, viability and whether the Greens should sign up. Live show London 3rd July - Get Your Tickets Readings All in: A Revolutionary Theory to Stop Climate Collapse Bitch: A Revolutionary Guide to Sex, Evolution and...

Shanice opens up the episode probing why the left’s response to the killing of Henry Nowak has been so lukewarm, whilst Joe gives us a deep dive into six months of Zohran Mamdani’s mayoralty, assessing what’s gone well and what challenges might arise for the young democratic socialist politician. Live show: London 3rd July - Get your tickets! Readings Patrick Radden Keefe - London Falling: A Myste...

Who is Andy Burnham? What is Manchesterism? Should the Greens be afraid of Labour's so-called soft left? Jonas, Joe and Shanice dissect the state of British politics after the local elections, and ask where next for the Left in a rapidly disintegrating two-party system. This episode was recorded live at Norwich Transformed 2026. Please subscribe, comment and leave a review! Hosted by Shanice M...

In this week’s episode, Joe takes us on a tour through the recent local elections as we contemplate the end of the two-party system and the brewing Green insurgency. Then Shanice discusses two of this disintegrating system’s morbid symptoms: the rise of both antisemitism and moral panics about antisemitism, asking how the left fights both racism towards Jews and the instrumentalisation of Jewish i...

Jonas breaks down the latest shenanigans inside Your Party and the crew ask themselves how it got so bad. Whilst Joe offers some thoughts on what we do next, now that it seems the Jeremy Corbyn-led party has entered into a zombie state. Readings Anton Jäger - Hyperpolitics: Extreme Politicization without Political Consequences Laleh Khalili - Extractive Capitalism: How Commodities and Cronyism Dri...

Shanice opens us up by comparing the outwards-looking priorities of Zack Polanski’s Greens with their fraught neighbours in Your Party. Whilst Jonas uses the opportunity of the recent mass anti-racist Together march to deep dive into one of its central organisers: the Socialist Workers Party. Readings John Maynard Keynes - The General Theory of Employment, Interest, a nd Money Red Mole Substack -...

Jonas takes us across the pond in this week's news section, analysing the French municipal elections and gleaning some insight from Jean-Luc Mélenchon's La France Insoumise. Whilst Shanice argues that the acceleration of US imperial decline also heralds the fracturing of Western military alliances and the emergence of new possibilities for anti-war politics. Readings Now, the People! Revol...

Shanice brings in this week’s news with a warning that the Green Party needs to tread cautiously as left-wing MPs consider jumping off the sinking Labour ship and defecting to the eco-populist insurgency. Whilst Joe and Shanice clash over the growing recourse to motion maximalism within the Green Party, as the former’s defence of socialist comms rubs up against the latter’s insistence on the prima...

What a week! Shanice, Joe and Jonas dissect the Green party's exciting and decisive victory in the Gorton and Denton by-election. How did Hannah Spencer's campaign win? Is Keir Starmer’s Labour party finished? And where does this leave Your Party? With Jeremy Corbyn's The Many slate coming out of the CEC elections with a big majority, we ask where next for the beleaguered new left part...

With the Your Party CEC elections in full swing, Jonas breaks down the current state of play in the party - and the gang despair at Your Party’s deteriorating culture of political debate. Would Your Party and the Greens be better if they were a little bit more like the Belgium Worker's Party (PTB), or the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA)? Joe challenges the assumptions of the British lef...

With Andy Burnham out for the count - blocked by Keir Starmer and his allies from running to be Gorton and Denton's next MP - Joe, Jonas and Shanice grapple with the dynamics at play in this upcoming, historic by-election that could change the face of British electoral politics. Can the Greens really beat Reform in the North? Are Labour out of the race? And most importantly, why is Reform'...

To kick off series two of Life of the Party Shanice, Jonas and Joe are back to their usual antics with spicy hot takes and pressing party news. This week Jonas gives you the lowdown on Your Party's CEC elections so far. Meanwhile Shanice goes against the grain: arguing that trade unions aren't the only site of working class struggle, and why Your Party and the Greens shouldn't formally...

Wrapping up the first season of Life of the Party Shanice, Joe, and Jonas give out awards for the major players (and wreckers!) on the burgeoning British left. Meanwhile your hosts dust off their crystal balls to give their predictions on the big political moments heading our way in 2026. Readings: Mistaken Identity - Asad Haider The Populist Moment: The Left after the Great Recession -  Anton Jäg...

In the run up to Christmas Joe, Jonas, and Shanice answer your listener questions. Are we revolutionaries, what does that even mean? Should the left run as councillors? What does community organising mean? Why have some of the Independent Alliance remained in Your Party? We answer these questions, and more - as well as give you our favourite reads of 2025. Readings: Workers Can Win - Ian Allinson...

** Help keep the podcast ad free - become a Life of the Party supporter ** Coming back from a wild weekend in Liverpool, Jonas gives us an insider account of the vibes, schisms and politics shaping the long-awaited founding conference of Your Party. Meanwhile Joe probes at critical questions: have the Green party completely over-shadowed Your Party? Should Your Party ditch elections and focus on t...

As Your Party’s founding conference approaches, Joe breaks down the latest financial shenanigans and resignations, whilst Jonas makes the case that even if the launch has been a disaster, the historical opportunity presented by the crisis of British capitalism hasn’t been totally squandered. Reading: Melinda Cooper - Counterrevolution: Extravagance and Austerity in Public Finance Helen Walsh - Onc...

With Your Party's regional assemblies in full swing Jonas breaks down the dynamics and debates shaping the grassroots of the party. Meanwhile, Shanice puts the debates about class and identity politics under the microscope; making the case you cannot understand the seismic and irresistible rise of Zohran Mamdani without taking seriously how class is felt through identity. But what are the less...

As Zack Polanski’s comms campaigning takes the Greens from strength to strength, Your Party releases its founding documents; with debates beginning at regional assemblies. Shanice gives us a look into this contrasting picture, whilst Joe kicks off a debate about NATO, anti-imperialism, and whether Your Party and the Greens need to be more than simply pro-Palestine parties. Reading: Resisting Erasu...