Bungacast

Excerpt: /170/ Reading Club: Streeck's Critical Encounters

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This month we discuss a book by leading German sociologist and public intellectual, Wolfgang Streeck. Critical Encounters is a compilation of book reviews, discussing neoliberal ideas, politics and economy.

We start off by discussing the value of reading books in today's noisy, social media-filled, locked-down climate, as well as what makes a good book review. Then we address five themes: the coming of post-industrial society; popular misconceptions about neoliberalism; German hegemony in Europe; Cosmopolitan delusions; and the future of capitalism.

Our interview with Wolfgang Streeck from November 2020 can be found here.

/169/ Authoritarian Liberalism and Its Discontents ft. Amber A'Lee Frost & Daniel Bessner

On the Biden administration and Trumpist reaction.  

We discuss the riot at the US Capitol and why it was not a (failed) coup attempt. How serious was the event, and what next for Trumpist reaction - will it lead to a split in the Republican Party?

Our guests - journalist Amber Frost and political science academic Daniel Bessner - help us preview what the Biden administration has in store for the US. With Democratic control of both houses, it should be able to pass legislation - but does it have any substantial plans to do so? In foreign policy, we can expect more foreign adventurism and at home, an ominous anti-domestic terrorism bill. Does the alliance of the Democrats with an increasingly domineering Silicon Valley signal the coming-out moment of authoritarian liberalism?

Readings:

• Riot on the Hill, Mike Davis, NLR Sidecar blog
• Render unto Ourselves, What is Ours—or Caesar Will Seize It, Alex Hochuli, Damage
• What Experts on Extremism Want From the Biden Administration, James D Walsh, NYMag
  
• Morbid Symptoms Can Persist for a Long Time, Barry Eidlin, Jacobin
  
• Violence in the Capitol, Dangers in the Aftermath, Glenn Greenwald, Substack
• The revenge of the blob, Alex Ward, Vox
  

 

/168/ Corona, Climate, Communism ft. Andreas Malm

On the 'war communism' solution

As we enter the second year of the Covid-19 pandemic and its attendant turmoil, suffering and lockdown, inevitably the search for systemic causes and systemic responses grows more intense. Swedish ecologist and social theorist Andreas Malm joins us to discuss one possible response - a crisis communism modelled on the War Communism of early Soviet rule, as discussed in his new book ‘Corona, Climate Chronic Emergency: War Communism in the Twenty First Century.’ We discuss the nature of our contemporary crises, and how far the left needs its own distinctive form of emergency politics.

Readings:

• “To Halt Climate Change, We Need an Ecological Leninism”, Jacobin interview with Andreas Malm
• Corona, Climate, Chronic Emergency: War Communism in the Twenty-First Century, Andreas Malm, Verso
• Nature Defends Itself, Dayton Martindale, Boston Review

 

/167/ The Kingdom of God Is on Main Street ft. Todd McGowan

On freedom, authority and responsibility.

 

Theorist Todd McGowan joins us to talk about the End of History, what Hegel can teach us about emancipation, and why Slavoj Zizek’s reinterpretation of Hegel is so important. If contradiction is the basis of modern politics, what is its link to freedom? And what is the connection between freedom and authority? Are stable sources of authority even possible in modernity? We also put some listener questions to Todd, as we learn that the Right, just as much as the Left, evades authority and is unwilling to take responsibility.

Readings:

• Emancipation After Hegel: Achieving a Contradictory Revolution
• Review of book in Marx & Philosophy

/161/ Culture is Bad for You ft. Mark Taylor (UNLOCKED)

On “culture”.

 

We discuss who produces culture and who consumes it – and what those inequalities reveal about culture today. Also, we ask what’s the ploblem with culture anyway and end up defending “low culture” from Red Hot Chili Peppers (well, sorta) to food guys.

 

Reading:

Culture is Bad for You, Orian Brook, Dave O'Brien and Mark Taylor, Manchester UP

Excerpt: /166/ Aufhebonus Bonus (December)

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We round off the year by previewing The End of the End of History and responding to your questions and criticisms, including Strasserism or left-conservatism, revolutionary memories, more on Covid and lockdowns, and other bits.

/165/ Black Spartacus ft. Sudhir Hazareesingh

CLR James’s electrifying 1938 history of the 1791-1804 Haitian Revolution, The Black Jacobins, has long been a staple of many radicals’ libraries. But we now know a lot more about the life of the Haitian revolutionary leader Toussaint L’Ouverture. How does this new knowledge impact our understanding of the Haitian Revolution, and on revolution in general? Sudhir Hazeeresingh, the author of a gripping new biography based on new archival research, ‘Black Spartacus: The Epic Life of Toussaint L’Ouverture, talks with us about about revolutionary leadership and Atlantic history.  

Reading:

• Black Spartacus: The Epic Life of Toussaint L’Ouverture
• ‘You never know when it is going to explode’, interview with CLR James, Marxist Internet Archive

Excerpt: /164/ Reading Club: Culture of Narcissism

This is a short sample. Full episode is available for subscribers at patreon.com/bungacast 

We re-evaluate Christopher Lasch's hugely influential and prescient The Culture of Narcissism. What conjunctural factors led Lasch to his insights, and to what extent are those still present? Lasch wrote during the collapse of postwar Fordist-Keynesian model – is it the collapse of neoliberalism today that makes the book so evocative? And if narcissism has only increased, does the book suggest any political ways-out? 

/163/ Three Articles + Censorship ft. Douglas Lain

On censorship, platform capitalism and the Left.

We talk to Douglas Lain of Zer0 Books about YouTube taking down their video as a result of the algorithm flagging its content – and what this means for free speech.

Then, this month's Three Articles on war, conspiracy theory, and Covid (patrons only - sign up at patreon.com/bungacast) 

Links for part 1:

• Why Did YouTube censor us? Doug Lain's blog post
• Censored YouTube video: Christopher Lasch, Paul Sweezy, and the Great RESET
• Bungacast ep 103 on ethical capitalism
• Bungacast ep 112 on ideology of Silicon Valley
• Alex Hochuli on Zer0 Books podcast

Part 2: Three Articles

• Azerbaijan’s drones owned the battlefield in Nagorno-Karabakh — and showed future of warfare, Robyn Dixon, WaPo
• How can Big Tech best tackle conspiracy theories?, Gillian Tett, FT
• The Covid-19 blunders drive home a harsh truth: the state has failed us, Larry Elliott, The Guardian

/162/ Gaming & Politics ft. Jonas Kyratzes

Game writer & designer Jonas Kyratzes joins us to talk about the art of games, the culture of gaming, the gamification of society, and the identity politics of gamer culture. How far has Jonas’ own philosophy influenced his writing for games, such as “The Talos Principle”? We also talk politics in both Greece, focusing on Syriza failure. Plus, could Bunga co-host Philip Cunliffe’s book ‘Lenin Lives!’ ever be made into a game?

Readings:

• Games & Politics, Centre for Art & Media, Karlsruhe
• Jonas Kyratzes website

 

Excerpt: /161/ Culture Is Bad For You ft. Mark Taylor

Full episode for subscribers only. Sign up at patreon.com/bungacast

 

On “culture”.

 

We discuss who produces culture and who consumes it – and what those inequalities reveal about culture today. Also, we ask what’s the ploblem with culture anyway and end up defending “low culture” from Red Hot Chili Peppers (well, sorta) to food guys.

 

Reading:

Culture is Bad for You, Orian Brook, Dave O'Brien and Mark Taylor, Manchester UP

/160/ Enemies of the People (Large & Very Small) ft. Wolfgang Streeck

On Germany, the hegemon of Europe.

We are joined by leading German public intellectual Wolfgang Streeck to discuss the role of Germany at the end of the End of History. How is it and the EU faring under the assault of Covid-19? We cover Germany’s economic miracles - postwar and post-2008 -, Merkel’s tactical brilliance and strategic ignorance, and how France retains more of a sense of history.

Also: why democracy sometimes needs an AK47.

Readings:

• Critical Encounters, Wolfgang Streeck, Verso (2020)
• Letters from Europe, Wolfgang Streeck (in EN & ES) 

 

/159/ Biden Time ft. Amber A'Lee Frost & Alex Gourevitch

On the US election, a huge turnout and the end of Trump.

We survey the results of the presidential and legislative elections, peer through the exit polls and discuss some counterintuitive facts: Florida goes Trump but opts for a $15 minimum wage; California goes Biden while Uber gets its way; Trump did protectionism but it didn't help him win the Rustbelt; the Republicans win over more Latinos – but do Latinos even exist?

And the big questions: Will Biden and the Democrats have any authority now that they don't have anti-Trumpism to drive them? Is a Biden administration to be a Silicon Valley dictatorship? And will the GOP be Trumpism without Trump?

Readings:

• Are the Democrats losing on purpose? Amber Frost & Daniel Bessner, Jacobin

Excerpt: /158/ Three Articles: Cosmopolitan Austerity & Control

Full episode is for subscribers only. Sign up at patreon.com/bungacast 

In this latest Three Articles, we discuss cosmopolitanism, the end of austerity (maybe?) and social control in the pandemic. 

Readings:

• Is cosmopolitanism our destiny?, Aris Roussinos, Unherd
• Meet the Philosopher Who Is Trying to Explain the Pandemic, Christopher Caldwell, NYT
• Global economy: the week that austerity was officially buried, Chris Giles, FT

 

UNLOCKED /152/ I Can't Believe It's Not Weimar ft. David Broder

On why anti-fascism is a problem. 

 

The Trump presidency and the current protests in the US have led many to argue this is just like the 1930s. The implication is that fascism is rising and the Left must join up with liberals to oppose this evil. Why is this historical analogy so wide of the mark? Was the Left really culpable for the fascists rise to power? And anyway, our age is vastly different to interwar Europe. So what is the real function of calls to anti-fascism?

 

Readings:

• We Don’t Live in Weimar Germany, David Broder, Jacobin
• The Trap The Democrats Walked Right Into, Andrew Sullivan
• The End of Anti-Fascism, David Broder, Jacobin
• What Is Trump?, Dylan Riley, NLR