Richard Seymour joins me to discuss the reasons for Labour's electoral defeat and why the left overestimated Labour's chances. We also chatted what we can expect from Boris Johnson's government and the broader issue of 'disaster nationalism'. Finally, we spoke about the likely outcome of the Labour leadership race.
Time is a bourgeois concept, the New Year - doubly so. Nonetheless, here are the best things Joana Ramiro (host of #RedHacks) and I read in 2019.
The Clamour of Nationalism, Race and Nation in Twenty-first-century Britain, Sivamohan Valluvan, Manchester University Press, (2019)
At the end o...
Sivamohan Valluvan joins me to discuss his new book, The Clamour of Nationalism, Race and Nation in Twenty-first-century Britain. We spoke about why the current era is better characterised as a reactionary nationalist one, rather than as a populist moment, and we spoke about the flirtation of parts of the European left with an anti-migrant politics. We also spoke about the differences and affinities between neoliberalism and conservatism and why we may be witnessing a disarticu...
2019-12-19 12:11:36 +0000 UTC View Post
David Wearing joins me to discuss the defence, security and international trade policies of Labour and the Conservatives, and why the election result is a matter of life and death for many people beyond Britain's borders.
2019-12-09 21:10:15 +0000 UTC View Post
Adrienne Buller joins me to discuss the climate emergency and the general election. We spoke about the policy platforms of the parties, the recent Channel 4 climate change debate and what it tells us about public discourse around climate, and finally we chatted about whether the 'Green Industrial Revolution' is the right framing for mobilising around the climate crisis.
James Meadway joins me to discuss whether the Conservative manifesto and its limited spending promises will prevent the Tories taking Labour seats in the Midlands, the north of England and Wales. We also spoke about the usefulness of opinion polling, why the Liberal Democrats are once again failing to disrupt the two-party duopoly, and the role of the media in the election and whether the UK is becoming a 'Managed Democracy'.
Thea Riofrancos joins me to discuss A Planet to Win: Why We Need a Green New Deal a new book co-authored by Thea. We spoke about why the New Deal is the right framing for a project to avert the worst consequences of the climate crisis, why environmental victories are necessarily entwined with the struggle against inequality, and the importance to the climate movement of forging alliances across borders and through supply chains and how to achieve rapid roll out of renewable technolog...
2019-11-26 12:21:01 +0000 UTC View Post
Will Davies joins me to discuss conservative's response to Labour's policy on free full-fibre broadband, whether Boris Johnson really is the great campaigner his admirers claim he is, and we also discussed Labour's messaging around taking on billionaires.
2019-11-17 14:24:31 +0000 UTC View Post
Paulo Gerbaudo joins me to discuss online campaigning, the recent cyber attack on Labour's campaigning platforms, the contrasting effectiveness of the Labour and Tory digital campaigns in 2017, and we also chatted about whether social media platforms have an inherent right-wing bias.
2019-11-13 12:19:22 +0000 UTC View Post
Jake Werner joins me to discuss the ideological makeup of the Hong Kong protest movement, the material and cultural grievances that gave rise to the movement, the increasing nationalism of the Chinese ruling elite, how Chinese economic development can be characterised as "cheating at a rigged game" and, finally we discussed the increasing likelihood of armed conflict between China, the US and US regional allies.
Articles by Jake that we discussed included:
A Global ...
2019-11-08 16:19:03 +0000 UTC View Post
Momentum co-founder Emma Rees joins me to discuss Momentum's Plan to Win the General election and the inspiration for Momentum's 'distributed Organising' model.
You can read the plan here:
plantowin.peoplesmomentum.com/
2019-11-06 12:44:41 +0000 UTC View Post
Phil Burton-Cartledge joins me to discuss conservative party strategy in the 2019 election. We spoke about Boris Johnson's re-heated Mayism, the likely effects of a significant Brexit Party vote on Tory prospects, and the division of labour between the Conservatives and the Tory-supporting press.
2019-11-03 20:04:27 +0000 UTC View Post
Eleanor Penny joins me to reflect on the coming General election campaign. We talked about whether this will be the Brexit election we were promised in 2017, why Labour is behind in the polls, and what to expect from the Liberal Democrats.
2019-10-31 10:40:14 +0000 UTC View Post
Corey Robin joins me to discuss his recent article on the memoirs of Barack Obama's White House staffers, the legacy of the Obama administration, and what separates the Obama/Clinton wing of the democrats from the new insurgent democratic left.
You can read Corey's article here.
Earlier this month and to coincide with Black History Month Jeremy Corbyn called for schoolchildren to be taught about the British Empire and the history and legacy of colonialism. To discuss the teaching of empire and migration in UK schools I spoke to Kimberley McIntosh, co-author of the report, 'Teaching Migration, Belonging, and Empire in Secondary Schools', published by the Runnymede Trust.
2019-10-23 09:44:35 +0000 UTC View Post
Jeremy Gilbert joins me to discuss the concepts of Acid Communism and Acid Corbynism and why transforming human subjectivity through practices of collective joy derived from the 1960s counterculture is so important to building a successful left project.
Beth Stratford joins me to discuss the crisis of UK land ownership and housing and the solutions outlined in the Land for the Many report, co-written by Beth. We also discussed the tabloid media's hysterical reaction to the report.
You can read the full report here.
Sound: J.A.Pinto
Richard Seymour joins me to discuss Brexit and the machinations of the Johnson administration, the electoral strategy of the Labour Party, and whether the fraction of capital that supports a hard Brexit will be able to subordinate business more broadly to their project.
Quinn Slobodian joins me to talk about neoliberalism as a project of institutional design, the significance of the Hapsburg Empire to the neoliberal concept of double government that came to be instantiated in such institutions as the WTO and the IMF, and we also talked about the European Union and the possibility of reforming the EU in a progressive direction.
In the first #RedHacks live event Joana Ramiro chats with Owen Jones, Kimberly McIntosh, and Simon Childs at The World Transformed festival in Brighton about the problems facing journalism and how both the general public and those working in the media can start bringing in change to a fundamentally neoliberal industry.
Sound Recording: J.A.Pinto
Live Sound: James Tranmer @ Green Door Store
Kojo Koram joins me to discuss the history of the war on drugs, the role of drug prohibition in the production of racism after the end of formal imperialism, the central role of the United States in the emergence of the global war on drugs, and the possibility of the Boris Johnson government returning to a more punitive approach to drug prohibition.
Our conversation was prompted by the new book 2019-09-17 14:21:51 +0000 UTC View Post
Alex Niven joins me to talk about the erosion of support for the Labour Party in the north of England, the causes of that decline and how the Labour Party and the broader left might seek to reverse it. Our conversation was prompted by his recent article in Tribune:
https://tribunemag.co.uk/2019/08/has-labour-lost-the-north
Sound by
2019-09-07 09:54:00 +0000 UTC
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James Meadway, former economics advisor to John McDonnell joins me to discuss whether the Johnson government's move to prorogue parliament is really part of a strategy to achieve no deal, why the opposition to the government needs to move from parliamentary tactics and judicial reviews to mass protest and direct action, and we also discussed the likely consequences of a No Deal Brexit, and why it is that capital has been unable to exert authority over the Conservative Party.
Lida Maxwell joins me to discuss her new book, Insurgent Truth: Chelsea Manning and the Politics of Outsider Truth-Telling. We discussed the contrasting nature of the disclosures of Chelsea Manning and Edward Snowden and the way Manning's leaks placed her outside the lineage of respectable whistleblowing. We also talked about the relationship between Manning's gender identity and how her experience of living under Don't Ask Don't Tell in the US military informed her broader critique ...
2019-08-27 11:49:22 +0000 UTC View Post
Richard Seymour joins me to discuss his new book, The Twittering Machine. The title is taken from Paul Klee's 1922 painting in which the the bird-song of a diabolical machine acts as bait to lure humankind into a pit of damnation. Richard argues in the book that this is a chilling metaphor for our relationship with so-called social media. We spoke about the nature of social media addiction, the way in which the platforms incite users into performing unpaid labour, and how we might co...
2019-08-18 12:26:55 +0000 UTC View Post
Natasha Lennard joins me to discuss her book, Being Numerous: Essays on Non-Fascist Life. We spoke about whether or not Donald Trump and the movement that has coalesced around him ought to be characterised as fascist, we also talked about the contributions of Wilhelm Reich, Michel Foucault, and other figures in the anti-psychiatry movement to theorising fascism. We discussed the legitimacy and history of anti-fascist violence and its treatment by the media, and finally we spoke about...
2019-08-11 09:16:21 +0000 UTC View Post
In the first episode of PTO Extra I spoke to Phil Burton-Cartledge about the prospects for Boris Johnson, his Brexit strategy, and the internal crisis of the conservative party.
Our conversation was prompted by Phil's recent article for the Verso Books blog:
https://www.versobooks.com/blogs/4391-the-meaning-of-boris-johnson
Andy Beckett joins me to explain why he believes, despite being in power on both sides of the Atlantic, conservatism is in decline and how conservative ideology is proving itself unable to adjust to the challenges of the 21st century. The interview was prompted by Andy's long-read in the Guardian,
‘A zombie party’: the deepening crisis of conservatism':
2019-07-21 18:20:27 +0000 UTC
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Christopher Connery joins me to talk about the nature of the Chinese economy following the initiation of market reforms from the late 1970s, the compatibility between authoritarianism and neoliberalism, and we also discussed the legacy of the Tiananmen Square massacre. The interview was prompted by Christopher's excellent article on neoliberalism in China which you can find in the Jan-Feb issue of the New Left Review, which is called 'Ronald Coase in Beijing:
2019-07-08 12:43:06 +0000 UTC
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Frances Ryan joins me to discuss her new book Crippled: Austerity and the Demonisation of Disabled People. We spoke about the impact of austerity on people living with disability, the way in which New Labour's support for means testing and conditionality paved the way for the coalition government's welfare cuts and we also talked about the current state of disability rights activism.