The global politics podcast at the end of the End of History. Politics is back but it’s stranger than ever: join us as we chart a course beyond the age of ’bunga bunga’. Interviews, long-form discussions, docu-series.
Episodes
Tuesday Nov 24, 2020
Tuesday Nov 24, 2020
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
Tuesday Nov 17, 2020
Tuesday Nov 17, 2020
Tuesday Nov 10, 2020
Tuesday Nov 10, 2020
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)
Saturday Nov 07, 2020
Saturday Nov 07, 2020
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
Tuesday Nov 03, 2020
Tuesday Nov 03, 2020
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
Monday Nov 02, 2020
Monday Nov 02, 2020
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We Don’t Live in Weimar Germany, David Broder, Jacobin
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The Trap The Democrats Walked Right Into, Andrew Sullivan
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The End of Anti-Fascism, David Broder, Jacobin
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What Is Trump?, Dylan Riley, NLR
Sunday Nov 01, 2020
Sunday Nov 01, 2020
This is a sample. For full access, go to patreon.com/bungacast
This month we discuss Todd McGowan's Emancipation After Hegel: Achieving a Contradictory Revolution - an introduction to, defence and radical re-interpretation of Hegel emphasising the importance of contradiction to thought and being. We try to tease out the political consequences of the book, focusing on authority, freedom, and identity.
Tuesday Oct 27, 2020
Tuesday Oct 27, 2020
Internationalism used to be a defining characteristic of the Left. Globalism is a defining characteristic of neoliberal capitalism. Both seem to be characteristic of Islamist jihadism. How did Islamist reaction become globalised? How far does Islamist globalism connect to radical legacies of Third Worldism, internationalism and radical solidarity? Political anthropologist Darryl Li, author of The Universal Enemy: Jihad, Empire, and the Challenge of Solidarity joins us to discuss the transnational history of jihad over the last 30 years.
Reading:
The Universal Enemy - Book Forum, The Immanent Frame, Various Authors
Friday Oct 23, 2020
Friday Oct 23, 2020
On the Covid election.
Thursday Oct 22, 2020
Thursday Oct 22, 2020
Full episode for subscribers only. Go to patreon.com/bungacast
We start off by discussing the beheading of a French teacher for having shown his pupils the Mohammed cartoons in a class on free speech. Then we discuss your points, questions and criticisms from September and October (on class politics, antifa, Covid, unemployment and more). Finally, 25 minutes of bonus content from our chat with Sontag biographer Benjamin Moser on the 1619 Project, identity politics, literature, and cosmopolitanism and empire.
For the rest of the original episode with Moser, that's number 147: Podbean / Patreon
Tuesday Oct 20, 2020
Tuesday Oct 20, 2020
Full episode is for subscribers only. Sign up at patreon.com/bungacast
On the Covid election.
Tuesday Oct 13, 2020
Tuesday Oct 13, 2020
On the country of the future.
Italy has stagnated for 30 years, becoming a neoliberal gerontocracy with crumbling infrastructure (sound familiar?). Worse, it's a country without a Left. How did the populist right come to triumph? What is the relationship between high emigration and hostility to immigration? And how were the seeds sown 30 years ago with the collapse of the First Republic, Europeanisation, and Berlusconi's rise? Is there now a possibility of 'Italexit'?
Readings:
First They Took Rome: How the Populist Right Conquered Italy, David Broder, Verso
Tuesday Oct 06, 2020
Tuesday Oct 06, 2020
On why anti-fascism is a problem.
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We Don’t Live in Weimar Germany, David Broder, Jacobin
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The Trap The Democrats Walked Right Into, Andrew Sullivan
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The End of Anti-Fascism, David Broder, Jacobin
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What Is Trump?, Dylan Riley, NLR
![[UNLOCKED] /146/ Class is Cancelled ft. Ben Tippet](https://pbcdn1.podbean.com/imglogo/ep-logo/pbblog2148233/class-tippett-ig_300x300.png){kind=logo}
Sunday Oct 04, 2020
Sunday Oct 04, 2020
On class.
Class as an idea and an identity is now supposedly redundant. It’s been replaced by conflicts between generations and transcended by more up-to-date identities linking people together through common experiences of victimhood and inequality, rather than along lines related to production or power. Or is it? We discuss these questions with Ben Tippett, author of Split: Class Divides Uncovered to find out whether class still has any place in society and theory (spoiler: it does).
Reading:
- Split: What Love Island Tells Us About Culture & Class In Modern Britain, Ben Tippet, The Quietus (Excerpt from book)
Split: Class Divides Uncovered, Ben Tippet, Pluto Press
Friday Oct 02, 2020
Friday Oct 02, 2020
Episode for patrons $10+. Subscribe at patreon.com/bungacast
This month we discuss Polish economist Michal Kalecki's landmark essay, "Political Aspects of Full Employment". This follows on from our recent free episode, 'It's Not Robots, It's Capitalism' (ep 149) focusing on unemployment.
Kalecki anticipated both the Keynesian postwar settlement as well as its undoing, and the neoliberalism that followed. We focus on how Kalecki introduces the question of political authority into economics.
For reference, the next five Reading Clubs have already been announced: https://www.patreon.com/posts/41524278