Bungacast

/369/ Information-War and War-Politics ft. Jacob Siegel

On the war on disinformation and the war in Gaza. 

 

Jacob Siegel, senior editor at Tablet, joins us to talk about Hamas's attack on Israel and Israel's assault on Gaza. We also discuss how the US crusade against 'disinformation' has led it to apply counterinsurgency tactics to its own citizens.

 

Why did Hamas attack when it did? Has it been successful in stopping Israeli-Saudi rapprochement? How much will this change Israeli society? And what does Israel want to achieve in bombing - and soon invading - Gaza? 

 

Meanwhile, how has domestic politics become war? The state has meshed with corporate power to create an almighty surveillance apparatus. How can we start dismantling it? 

 

And how do we escape the postmodern hall of mirrors in which high diplomacy and low culture-war merge, in which domestic and international, and peace and war, all blur into each other?

 

Links:

• On disinformation: A Guide to Understanding the Hoax of the Century, Jacob Siegel, Tablet
• A trap has been set for Israel, Jacob Siegel, Unherd
• End US Aid to Israel, Jacob Siegel & Liel Leibovitz, Tablet
• On data: The Nanny vs. The Nanny State, Jacob Siegel & John Robb, Tablet
• Manifesto Podcast, Jacob Siegel & Phil Klay

/367/ Don’t Pay Them Back ft. Jerome Roos

On sovereign debt and taking back control.

 

The leading candidate in Argentina's election this month wants to avoid defaulting on the country's debt at all costs. But back in 2001, after a mass revolt, Argentina reneged on its debts – one of the very rare cases over the past 70 years of unilateral default. 

 

Why are nations so eager to pay back creditors nowadays, especially when it means endless austerity and little prospect of economic development?

 

We talk to scholar Jerome Roos about his book, Why Not Default? and discuss a range of cases: Mexico, Greece, Zambia, Sri Lanka, Ghana - and of course Argentina. We find that the old free market system used to accept that reneging on your debts was a risk creditors had to take. No longer: transnational institutions make sure that creditors get paid every time. 

 

How might countries free themselves from international financial dictatorship?

 

For part two of the interview and the After Party, subscribe at patreon.com/bungacast

 

Links:

• Why Not Default?: The Political Economy of Sovereign Debt, Jerome Roos
• Memoria del saqueo (Social Genocide), film on 2001 debt crisis and uprising in Argentina (many versions available online)
• /83/ Now It’s Syrizous (episode on Syriza's defeat in Greece)
• The World in One Country: Greece, Jonas Kyratzes (part of ep.200)

/366/ Reading Club: Legitimacy (IV)

On polycrisis.

 

[Patreon Tier II and III Exclusive -  subscribe at patreon.com/bungacast]

 

We reflect back on Jurgen Habermas' Legitimation Crisis as a whole, having gone through it section by section in previous episodes, before exploring what the idea of 'polycrisis' is about. Everyone from Adam Tooze to the FT to the World Economic Forum think we're in a polycrisis. How does this notion compare to Habermas' understanding of crisis? 

 

We also explore some related themes: cynical ideology and how it deflects criticism; whether we are more or less individualised today, and how you can have less collectivism and less individualism at the same time; and the difference between crisis and emergency.

 

Links:

• Why the West's elites invented a permacrisis, Thomas Fazi, Unherd
• Welcome to the world of the polycrisis, Adam Tooze, FT 
• Year in a word: Polycrisis, Jonathan Derbyshire, FT 
• On the crisis of crisis: /327/ Capitalism on Edge ft. Albena Azmanova 
• On the structural reasons why the regime survives: /246/ Why Isn’t There Revolution? ft. Vivek Chibber 

 

/365/ It’s So Over (Again) ft. Ryan Zickgraf

On the end of politics.

 

Is the craziness of the past years, since 2016, ebbing away? Is the establishment back in charge? Journalist Ryan Zickgraf joins us to argue that, yes, the period of 'hyperpolitics' has passed. 

 

Trump has lost his edge, BLM has imploded, boring Biden rules, the Proud Boys are nowhere to be seen. Fewer protests, fewer small campaign donations, fewer news articles shared.

 

What is the implication of this? It seems that people are exhausted by the politicisation of everything. The upsurge in engagement in formal politics may be dwindling. But the culture wars are as hot as ever. And the venues for 'escape' from politics are more politicised than ever. 

 

Accelerated social decline means we aren't exactly going back to the 1990s, but is history over all over again?

 

Readings:

• America's Politics of Nothing, Ryan Zickgraf, Compact
• After Anti-Politics: The Apeiron, Alex Hochuli, Sublation
• Everything is Hyperpolitical, Anton Jäger, The Point
• /361/ A Nightmare on the Brains of the Living ft. Benjamin Studebaker

UNLOCKED: /361/ A Nightmare on the Brains of the Living ft. Benjamin Studebaker

On US politics being stuck.

 

[This was originally a subscriber exclusive. Sign up now at patreon.com/bungacast]

 

We talk to political theorist Benjamin Studebaker about his new book, The Chronic Crisis of American Democracy: The Way is Shut. Studebaker holds that hope is a problem because it's used by professionals to keep people engaged in a system that simply doesn't deliver. Hence the culture wars and the focus on various 'vices'.

 

How are both left and right complicit in this situation? What's the solution? Are we dependent on oligarchs going rogue to shake the system? Do we need to hit rock bottom to rekindle our political imaginations?

Excerpt: /364/ The Eternal Sunshine of the Bourgeoisie

On satire of the bourgeoisie.

 

[Patreon Exclusive. Sign up at patreon.com/bungacast]

 

We discuss Luis Buñuel's "deranged masterpiece" from 1972, The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie, and debate the social ritual of dinner, and why the guests in the film never get to eat theirs.

 

How does this early 70s surrealist film – which in many ways set the template for cinematic satires of the bourgeoisie – compare to more recent portrayals such as The Menu or Triangle of Sadness? Ultimately, who are the bourgeoisie and do they still exist, in a world of distributed ownership and managerialism?

 

Readings:

• ‘A deranged masterpiece’: why you should watch The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie, Luke Buckmaster, The Guardian
• What Have the Bourgeoisie Done for us Lately?, Stephan Bertram-Lee, Sublation
• A Brief History of the Bourgeoisie, or We Are All Bourgeois Now, David Polansky, Strange Frequencies
• The Bourgeois(ie) as Concept and Reality, Immanuel Wallerstein, New Left Review

UNLOCKED: /351/ Eating the Left’s Lunch? ft. Cecilia Lero & Tamás Gerőcs

On the radical right in the global periphery.

 

[This was originally a Patreon Exclusive]

 

Erdogan, Modi, Orban, Bolsonaro, Duterte. Though the latter two are gone, the first three are still going strong, in government for a decade or more. What unites these figures? They’re all right wing and authoritarian, but also popular and anti-establishment.

 

How similar are these politicians to their analogues in the core of global capitalism? Might they even be seen to be forerunners of developments in the rich world? And to what extent are they able to resolve the crises of the end of the end of history?

 

In this episode, we talk to two of the editors of a new book, The Radical Right: Politics of Hate on the Margins of Global Capital.

 

Previous episodes on this theme:

• Turkey /339/ Erdogone? People vs Nation in Turkey ft. Alp Kayserilioglu
• Brazil: /299/ Micropower & Transcendence in Brazil (Bungazão 2022) ft. Miguel Lago
• Brazil: /292/ Bungazão 2022: Unrealistic Pragmatism, ft. Unbridled Possibility Collective
• India: /198/ Universal India ft. Achin Vanaik
• Hungary: /33/ Hungary's Illiberal Democracy ft. Tamas Gerocs
• Philippines: /52/ Duterte's Despotism ft. Nicole Curato

Excerpt: /363/ Outsourcing the State

On the politics of consultancy

 

[Patreon Exclusive. Sign up @ patreon.com/bungacast]

 

The past 40 years have seen a whole range of things the state used to do itself outsourced to third parties. Now there is a turn against these practices. But can the state actually get stuff done, or is it doomed for its prior reliance on consultants?

 

It's not just the left the criticises outsourcing - the right now does too. How do these positions differ? And how are these questions related to another critique – that of 'bullshit jobs'?

 

Readings & Links:

• In Clover, Laleh Khalili, LRB (attached)
• The Big Con — the case against consultancies (review of Mazzucatto & Collington), Diane Coyle, FT (attached)
• Letter: Groundless assertions about a trusted profession (response from a consultant), FT
• How PwC captured Australia, Shahar Hameiri, Unherd
• Consultancies Have Been the Handmaidens of Neoliberalism, Nathan Akehurst, Jacobin
• Radical Centrism: Uniting the Radical Left and the Radical Right, Ashwin Parameswaran, Macroresilience
• The limits of government outsourcing, Martin Bortz, Pursuit
• /267/ South Africa Mafia State ft. Benjamin Fogel

/362/ Life Doesn’t Have to Zuck ft. Cory Doctorow

On the internet being sh*t.

 

Tech critic, author and blogger Cory Doctorow joins us to talk about his new book, The Internet Con. He tells us his ONE SIMPLE TRICK to fix the internet: interoperability. Breaking down the tech giants' walled gardens is the first step to dethroning them. 

 

How does Big Tech depend on intellectual property to cement their monopolies? How can their grip be loosened? How do we make tech work for us?

 

In the After Party, the boys debate Doctorow's anti-monopolist arguments, and look at the wider ways tech is affecting everything from agriculture to services. We conclude by asking what the best way to guarantee freedom of expression is. 

 

Links:

• The Internet Con: How to seize the means of computation, Cory Doctorow, Verso 
• Pluralistic, Cory Doctorow's blog
• Big Tech and the Current Challenges Facing the Class Struggle, Tricontinental Institute

Excerpt: /361/ A Nightmare on the Brains of the Living ft. Benjamin Studebaker

On US politics being stuck.

 

[Patreon Exclusive]

 

We talk to political theorist Benjamin Studebaker about his new book, The Chronic Crisis of American Democracy: The Way is Shut. Studebaker holds that hope is a problem because it's used by professionals to keep people engaged in a system that simply doesn't deliver. Hence the culture wars and the focus on various 'vices'.

 

How are both left and right complicit in this situation? What's the solution? Are we dependent on oligarchs going rogue to shake the system? Do we need to hit rock bottom to rekindle our political imaginations?

Excerpt: /360/ Reading Club: Legitimacy (III)

On the 3rd and final part of Jurgen Habermas' Legitimation Crisis.

 

[Patreon Tier II & III Exclusive]

 

We wrap up this challenging book by debating some key points. Habermas already felt we lived in a post-truth society. How does his notion differ from the contemporary one concerned with misinformation? And is it possible to get beyond the notion of political authority grounded in (arbitrary) rules and laws – to an order rooted in truth and meaning?

 

Habermas also discusses his Frankfurt School colleagues and 'the end of the individual'. What does this mean? Is there any hope for free, rational, democratic politics?

 

Reading:

• Legitimation Crisis, Jurgen Habermas
• The Return of the Repressed, Wolfgang Streeck, NLR 104, March–April 2017

/359/ Apollo Gets High ft. Benjamin Fong

On the American drug binge.

 

Forget all the stereotypes – drug use is no longer confined to particular subcultures. US Americans are taking world-historic levels of drugs. Benjamin Fong tells us about his new book, Quick Fixes: Drugs in America from Prohibition to the 21st Century Binge, which covers everything from morphine to mushrooms, SSRIs to speed, caffeine to cocaine. 

 

Ultimately, is all this drug-taking about reckless abandon, or about control?

 

For more, go to patreon.com/bungacast

 

Subscribe to Damage Magazine

 

Links:

• Building Big Things, Damage Magazine, Issue 1
• Quick Fixes: Drugs in America from Prohibition to the 21st Century Binge, Benjamin Y. Fong, Verso
• Who Deserves Amphetamines, Benjamin Fong, The Point

/357/ Lucky, Meaty Nations ft. Shahar Hameiri & Tom Chodor

On Australian and New Zealand at the End of History.

 

Antipodean political scientists Shahar Hameiri and Tom Chodor join us to discuss the history and politics of Australia and New Zealand. If Australia is the “lucky country”, what about New Zealand? What explains the courses both countries took economically and politically over the twentieth century? And where do the two countries find themselves today - did they escape the end of the End of History?

 

Part 2: patreon.com/bungacast

 

Readings:

• Australian Labor’s hollow victory, Shahar Hameiri & Tom Chodor, UnHerd
• Jacinda Ardern still haunts New Zealand, Tom Chodor, UnHerd
• /136/ Banana Monarchy ft. David Edgerton

/356/ Land of the Unfree ft. Sohrab Ahmari

On everyday, private tyranny. 

 

 

Sohrab Ahmari, one of the editors of Compact Magazine, joins us to talk about his book, Tyranny, Inc. We discuss the sorts of private coercion that are found in the US workplace and marketplace, rather than originate with the state – and how relatively uncommon it is for a conservative like Ahmari to follow that line of critique. 

 

Also: the NY Post's scathing front covers, alliances between socialists and conservatives, the world of JG Ballard's Super Cannes, and critiquing the right from the right and the left from the left. 

 

Excerpt: /355/ F***ing and shooting are not the same

On film and left-wing terrorism.

 

[Patreon Exclusive]

 

We talk about Uli Edel’s 2008 film The Baader Meinhof Complex, which tells the story of the Red Army Faction in 1960s and 70s Germany. What sorts of myths do films create? Is the attempt to break down myths in fact a way of re-making those myths? Is a Red Army Faction response possible today - and what does terrorism at the End of the End of History look like?

 

We also discuss the image-sausage-grinder theory of film and reflect on six years of podcast urban guerilla activity.

Links:

• Episode on Berlusconi biopic, Loro: UNLOCKED /87/ Berluscoming  
• Symptom of the post-political – Terrorism in Contemporary German, British and Hollywood Cinema, Maren Thom (pdf)
• "The State I Am In", Christian Petzold (2000)