Listen, Socialist

Highlights from Jacobin Radio, which you should listen to immediately.

Jacobin Radio has been up and running for a month and a half. If you haven’t listened in yet, there’s no time like the present.

We are currently hosting three shows: the Dig, hosted by Daniel Denvir; Stockton to Malone, hosted by Micah Uetricht and RL Stephens; and Jacobin Radio with Suzi Weissman — with more to come in the near future. We have also posted audio from various Jacobin events and conversations with our authors.

Here are a few highlights. After listening, be sure to subscribe, rate, and review Jacobin Radio on Blubrry, Stitcher, or iTunes.

Stockton to Malone: White Privilege vs Obama’s Jordans

Following a panel at the Young Democratic Socialists conference on privilege and cultural appropriation, Jacobin associate editor Micah Uetricht and union organizer RL Stephens discuss Micah’s years speaking with extreme vocal fry to atone for his white male vocal privilege, RL’s performance of the socialist equivalent of Kendrick Lamar’s “Control” at the conference, that time Obama took the bowling alley out of the White House and replaced it with a basketball court (he didn’t), antiracist author Tim Wise’s bloodlust for white coal miners, and RL’s cousin who was in Kriss Kross.

Listen here.

The Way Forward

How does the Left proceed in the Trump era? Suzi Weissman spoke with Jacobin founding editor Bhaskar Sunkara and Robert Brenner, director of the Center for Social Theory and Comparative History at UCLA and co-editor Catalyst: A Journal of Theory and Strategy, a forthcoming journal from Jacobin.

They examine the symptoms that led to Trump’s success, including the neoliberal policies of contemporary Democrats and the shift away from the working-class. Because of the refusal of the liberal establishment to make meaningful change following Clinton’s defeat, Brenner and Sunkara discuss the simultaneous “wide open space” for the radical left and the deficiencies of a labor movement that is weaker than it has been in a century.

Listen here, or read a transcript of the talk here.

The Dig: Mark Blyth on How Austerity Brought Us Donald Trump

In a live taping of the Dig in Providence, Rhode Island, Daniel Denvir sat down with Brown political economy professor Mark Blyth to discuss the conditions for Donald Trump’s surprise victory. Blyth, author of Austerity: The History of a Dangerous Idea, predicted both Brexit and Trump’s win as a consequence of the austerity policies imposed by governments around the globe over the past several decades. Through tracing the arc of such policies, argues that the working class is hurting, and liberals don’t have any answers for them.

Listen here.

Matt Karp and Eric Foner on US Slaveholders’ Foreign Policy

Southern slaveholders had an expansive vision for the role of slavery in nineteenth-century America. Rather than aiming simply to maintain the system in the South, they saw a future in which slavery would spread across the country and around the globe, using an expansionist federal government to promote their vision.

That’s the argument made by Jacobin contributing editor and Princeton assistant professor of history Matt Karp, whose book This Vast Southern Empire: Slaveholders at the Helm of American Foreign Policy explores the political economy of mid-19th century American foreign policy. At a talk at the New School, he discusses the book with Eric Foner, Dewitt Clinton Professor of History at Columbia University and author of many books on the Civil War, including Reconstruction and The Fiery Trial.

Listen here.

Why Do Socialists Care So Much About Workers?

In the first of a series of events tied to our book The ABCs of Socialism — which you can still buy prints of for only $5 or read online for free — NYU sociology professor Vivek Chibber explains why workers are at the core of socialist theorizing and organizing.

In discussion with Jacobin‘s Jason Farbman, Chibber, author of Postcolonial Theory and the Specter of Capital, also discusses why socialists should aim to escape the “margins” and why fears of automation are overblown.

Listen here.

The Dig: Marie Gottschalk on Mass Incarceration and Trump’s Carceral State

To understand the causes and consequences of mass incarceration, Daniel Denvir speaks with Marie Gottschalk, a political scientist at the University of Pennsylvania, and the author of Caught: The Prison State and the Lockdown of American Politics, and The Prison and the Gallows: The Politics of Mass Incarceration in America.

They discuss the “law and order” politics that defined Donald Trump’s presidential campaign, as well as why white, rural voters should be interested in criminal justice reform.

Listen here.

Lessons from the 1980s for a New Sanctuary Movement

In the wake of Donald Trump’s recent attacks on immigrant and refugee communities, many on the Left have focused on creating “sanctuary” spaces to protect these vulnerable populations. While novel to many, this isn’t the United States’ first sanctuary movement. In the 1980s, churches and other groups mobilized to protect Central American refugees fleeing the terror created by US-backed regimes in the region.

To trace this history, Jacobin’s Micah Uetricht spoke with Hillary Goodfriend, a researcher in San Salvador, El Salvador, who recently wrote about the history of the 1980s sanctuary movement. They discuss the role of church in the movement and the Reagan administration’s repression in response.

Listen here.