Featuring Aziz Rana on the making of the American project and its legitimation through popular worship of the US Constitution. This episode, the third in what is now a four-part series, looks at how black movements responded as the Vietnam War and the limits of formal civil rights victories combined to explode the Cold War's contradictions. Support The Dig at Patreon.com/TheDig Buy Reconsidering Reparations at Haymarketbooks.com Subscribe to a year of Jacobin for only $15 — a special offer for D...
Apr 26, 2025•1 hr 37 min
April 30th marks the 50th anniversary of the end of the Vietnam War. But although the conflict still looms large in American memory, the reasons why the US went to war have been distorted in the mainstream account. In this episode of Confronting Capitalism , Vivek Chibber and Melissa Naschek explain the real imperialist history and remember the courageous struggles of both the Vietnamese resistance and the US anti-war movement. Confronting Capitalism with Vivek Chibber is produced by Catalyst: A...
Apr 23, 2025•47 min
Suzi talks to Alan Wald, Professor Emeritus at the University of Michigan and a member of the academic council of Jewish Voice for Peace, to unpack the Trump offensive against higher education — a campaign that escalated after last spring’s clampdown on student encampments protesting the Israel–US war on Gaza. Since October 7, universities have cracked down on protests under the guise of protecting “Jewish student safety.” What does it mean when many of those protesting are themselves Jewish? An...
Apr 22, 2025•56 min
Quinn Slobodian , author of Hayek’s Bastards , talks about the IQ- and race-obsessed goldbugs of second generation neoliberalism. 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 online: https://www.leftbusinessobserver.com/radio.html...
Apr 21, 2025•53 min
Featuring Aziz Rana on the making of the American project and its legitimation through popular worship of the US Constitution. This episode, the second in a three-part series, takes the story from World War I’s hyper-nationalist, xenophobic First Red Scare, through the convulsions of the middle decades of the 20th century: the Communist Party USA, the New Deal, World War II, the civil rights movement, the Warren Court, and ultimately the Cold War, when American liberalism, anti-communism, and em...
Apr 20, 2025•2 hr 41 min
For many years, Palestine had one of the strongest left-wing movements in the Arab world, represented by prominent figures such as Emile Habibi, Leila Khaled, and Ghassan Kanafani. At the beginning of the First Intifada in the 1980s, Palestinian left groups were still the main challengers to the hegemony of Fatah, although the Left has lost much of its influence in the period since then. Red Star Over Palestine: Histories of the Palestinian Left is a six-part series from Long Reads exploring rad...
Apr 19, 2025•36 min
Charlie Eaton and Alina Gibadullina, coauthors of a recent paper , discuss the increasing prominence of hedge fund and private equity titans on elite university boards. Malcolm Harris, author of What’s Left , lays out a trio of political approaches to the climate crisis. 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 online: https://www.leftbusinessobserver.com/radio.html...
Apr 14, 2025•53 min
Featuring Aziz Rana on the making of the American capitalist, imperialist project and its legitimation through popular worship of the US Constitution. This episode, the first in a three-part series, traces the foundation of the American settler empire from the revolutionary generation up to the eve of World War I. Support The Dig at Patreon.com/TheDig Buy White City, Black City at Plutobooks.com Subscribe to a year of Jacobin for only $15 — a special offer for Dig listeners! bit.ly/digjacobin Th...
Apr 12, 2025•2 hr 19 min
President Trump has threatened to upend the US’s role in NATO unless the Europeans increase their military spending. But far from just a budget reshuffling, European remilitarization massively increases the prospects for war and austerity. On this episode of Confronting Capitalism , Vivek Chibber and Melissa Naschek explain the Cold War origins of NATO, how the US organizes European geopolitics, and why Russia and China have been deemed national security threats. Confronting Capitalism with Vive...
Apr 09, 2025•54 min
Jason Wade of the UAW explains the union’s endorsement of Trump’s auto tariffs. Sam Gindin, former long-time adviser to what used to be known as the Canadian Autoworkers Union and the author of a recent article for nonsite.org , takes a look at the issues obscured by the tariff controversy. 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 online: https://www.leftbusinessobserver.co...
Apr 08, 2025•53 min
For many years, Palestine had one of the strongest left-wing movements in the Arab world, represented by prominent figures such as Emile Habibi, Leila Khaled, and Ghassan Kanafani. At the beginning of the First Intifada in the 1980s, Palestinian left groups were still the main challengers to the hegemony of Fatah, although the Left has lost much of its influence in the period since then. Red Star Over Palestine: Histories of the Palestinian Left is a six-part series from Long Reads exploring rad...
Apr 05, 2025•36 min
Jeff Schuhrke on his book Blue Collar Empire: The Untold Story of US Labor’s Global Anticommunist Crusade . During the Cold War, organized labor’s top leadership acted as an agent of the US national security state abroad: undermining left-wing unions, fomenting right-wing coups, and promoting the US-led capitalist order. At home, those same forces destroyed left-wing unions and organizers. That history goes a long way in explaining the weakened, conservative, and ineffectual workers’ movement we...
Apr 04, 2025•1 hr 44 min
Journalist and historian Joy Neumeyer joins Suzi from Warsaw to discuss her March 13 piece in the New York Review of Books , “Russia: Letters from the Opposition.” Last summer, Neumeyer wrote to 14 of Vladimir Putin’s political prisoners — dissidents locked away in penal colonies for opposing Russia’s war on Ukraine. While human rights organizations estimate that some 20,000 anti-war critics have been detained, a smaller number face trial and sentencing, disappearing into Russia’s vast prison sy...
Apr 02, 2025•58 min
Samuel Moyn talks about Trump and the courts. Chris Maisano, author of a recent Jacobin article about class “dealignment,” discusses class and politics. Finally, Evgenia Kovda reflects on hipster nihilism, which she wrote about for the Nefarious Russians newsletter. 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 online: https://www.leftbusinessobserver.com/radio.html...
Mar 29, 2025•53 min
The Republican Party has become a hegemonic force in US politics today. But how much of their dominance is predicated on Donald Trump’s personal rule? On this episode of Confronting Capitalism , Vivek Chibber discusses the historic evolution of the Republicans with Paul Heideman, author of “Trump’s Takeover of the Republican Party,” an essay in the upcoming issue of Catalyst . Vivek and Paul focus on the business coalitions behind Trump, how he was able to muster elite support, and how the level...
Mar 26, 2025•30 min
Featuring more analysis from Ilias Alami and Tim Sahay on the shape of global geopolitics and geoeconomics. We discuss: the fault lines of the green energy transition; the US and China battle for dominance while the rest of the world seeks advantage and opportunities for leverage; the US and Russia’s full-throttle commitment to fossil capitalism; the IMF’s ongoing imposition of neoliberal austerity on the world’s poorest countries, which, in opposition to these plans, want to remake the entire w...
Mar 25, 2025•2 hr 19 min
Brent Cebul and Lily Geismer, editors of the new collection Mastery and Drift , discuss professional-class liberalism. Plus: a brief reprise of a 2019 interview with Gabriel Winant about the PMC. 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 online: https://www.leftbusinessobserver.com/radio.html...
Mar 25, 2025•53 min
Last year, Narendra Modi celebrated a decade in office as India’s prime minister. Modi was aiming for a third consecutive election victory and a parliamentary landslide that would give him a free hand to advance his right-wing, Hindu nationalist agenda. But the election proved to be a disappointment for Modi and his allies, who lost their majority in parliament. Modi had to form a coalition to maintain his grip on power. Long Reads is joined by one of Modi’s leading journalistic opponents to dis...
Mar 21, 2025•1 hr 11 min
Featuring Ilias Alami and Tim Sahay on a global conjuncture defined by Washington’s shredding of the liberal international order’s legitimacy amid a panic over decline: the escalating Cold War with China; Gaza genocide; Trump’s tariff wars and militarism, and his pivot toward Putin on Ukraine; European defense buildup and fiscal revolution; what this all means for the poor majority of the Global South, and more. Part one of a two-part series. Subscribe to The Polycrisis newsletter phenomenalworl...
Mar 20, 2025•1 hr 52 min
Vanessa Wills, author of the book Marx’s Ethical Vision , speaks about the morality behind Marxian science. Mathis Ebbinghaus discusses the recent paper he co-wrote about the effects of the summer 2020 anti-cop protests on police budgets. 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 online: https://www.leftbusinessobserver.com/radio.html...
Mar 17, 2025•53 min
There are plenty of reasons to be discouraged about the world today, but the labor movement is giving us real cause for hope. Across industries and regions, workers are organizing on a scale we haven’t seen in decades — and they’re winning. What sets this new wave of labor activism apart from the usual staff-driven campaigns is that workers themselves are leading the way. Important challenges remain. Organizing is up, but nowhere near the scale needed to reverse labor’s trajectory. And with the ...
Mar 14, 2025•1 hr 8 min
Featuring Eric Blanc on We Are the Union: How Worker-to-Worker Organizing Is Revitalizing Labor and Winning Big . Interview conducted by guest host Gabriel Winant. Support The Dig at Patreon.com/TheDig Defend federal workers and federal services: actionnetwork.org/forms/let-us-work/ Contact the Emergency Workplace Organizing Committee (EWOC) for help organizing your workplace: workerorganizing.org Contact Workers Organizing Workers (WOW) if you are interested in taking a job in a strategic indus...
Mar 13, 2025•1 hr 40 min
Donald Trump has made restoring American industry a priority across his administrations. But rather than continue Biden’s efforts to bolster domestic manufacturing through subsidies, Trump has instituted a series of tariffs intended to reshore former pillar industries and improve US trade balance. In this episode of Confronting Capitalism , Catalyst editor Vivek Chibber and Jacobin contributor Melissa Naschek explore the promises and limits of a state-led industrial growth strategy. While indust...
Mar 12, 2025•46 min
Ben Tarnoff talks tech worker militancy and the bosses’ reaction: a crackdown and hard turn to the right. Jodi Dean, author of Capital’s Grave , discusses the concept of “neofeudalism.” 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 online: https://www.leftbusinessobserver.com/radio.html...
Mar 10, 2025•53 min
Featuring TrueAnon hosts Brace Belden and Liz Franczak on our freakish and reactionary tech oligarchy. Musk and friends built a technological infrastructure that has warped everyone’s minds, including their own. Now they’re seizing the state. The hideous AI “art” we discuss: https://bit.ly/4ksG1aM http://bit.ly/3DmDfTD Support The Dig at Patreon.com/TheDig Register for the Socialism Conference at Socialismconference.org before April 25th for an early bird discount! Use code “DIG” for 30% off a s...
Mar 06, 2025•2 hr 32 min
Eric Blanc, author of We Are the Union , talks about worker-led organizing at Amazon, Starbucks, and beyond. Molly O'Neal , Quincy Institute fellow, analyzes the recent German election. 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 online: https://www.leftbusinessobserver.com/radio.html...
Mar 04, 2025•53 min
Jacobin Radio presents a webinar, moderated by Suzi and sponsored by Haymarket Books and the Ukraine Solidarity Network, marking the third anniversary of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Just days after this discussion, the Trump administration laid out a deal that trades an end to the fighting for U.S. economic control over Ukraine’s minerals without providing security guarantees. This is no peace plan but a surrender, a betrayal of Ukraine’s fight for self-determination. Denys Pilash , Grusha Gil...
Mar 03, 2025•1 hr 21 min
Featuring Olúfẹ́mi O. Táíwò, Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor, and Mike McCarthy on the MAGA and DOGE war on woke, the complicity of bankrupt liberal identity politics, and the centrality of various oppressions to the class domination of capital and struggles against it. Support this podcast at Patreon.com/TheDig Read Mike’s article “The Problem of Class Abstractionism” epublications.marquette.edu/socs_fac/356 Buy Enemy Feminisms at Haymarketbooks.com Buy Solidarity Betrayed at Plutobooks.com The Dig goe...
Feb 27, 2025•2 hr 28 min
Among the many government agencies facing cuts from President Trump’s Department of Government Efficiency, USAID has garnered wide support in the media. But for whatever humanitarian good it’s done in the world, the agency has played a role in US imperialism. In this episode of Confronting Capitalism , Vivek Chibber examines the true history of USAID and breaks down the false dichotomy between soft and hard US power. Confronting Capitalism with Vivek Chibber is produced by Catalyst: A Journal of...
Feb 26, 2025•38 min
On February 21, Suzi talked to Zakhar Popóvych, a Ukrainian researcher and activist in Kyiv with roots in labor and socialist organizing, and Ilya Budraitskis, a Russian historian and political theorist now in exile, about Trump’s foreign policy moves regarding Ukraine on the eve of the third anniversary of Russia’s invasion. The Trump administration has engaged in peace talks in Saudi Arabia that excluded Ukraine entirely. Trump has even embraced Putin’s revisionist narrative claiming Ukraine s...
Feb 25, 2025•58 min
