Behind the News, 10/22/24 - guests: William Hartung on arming Israel, Scott Schieman on how people actually like their jobs - Doug HenwoodAv Doug Henwood

William Hartung, co-author of this paper, on how much aid the US has given to Israel over the last year (plus some wacky stuff on AI weapons) • sociologist Scott Schieman on his surprising research showing that people actually like their jobs The post How much US aid goes to Israel? • people actually like their jobs, a study shows appeared first on…

Today on Speaking Out of Place we are honored to speak with three international volunteers from the International Solidarity Movement. They are all involved in the effort to save the Masafer Yatta region in the Occupied West Bank. While it has been a common practice of psychological warfare for the IOF to place military firing ranges near villages,…

Today, Sunday morning, October 20, former general Prabowo Subianto is being sworn in as Indonesia’s new president. We release a conversation we had earlier this month with Intan Paramaditha and Michael Vann about the road leading up to this inauguration, beginning in the 1960s with the Suharto regime. Prabowo is a strong-arm authoritarian figure wi…

Behind the News, 10/17/24 - guests: Anatol Lieven on the Biden/Harris grand design • Lily Lynch on the emptying Balkans - Doug HenwoodAv Doug Henwood

Anatol Lieven on the ambitiously aggressive grand design of the Biden/Harris foreign policy • Lily Lynch, author of this article, on the emptying out of the Balkans The post The Biden/Harris vision of the world, the emptying of the Balkans appeared first on KPFA.Av KPFA

Today on Speaking Out of Place we are joined by three members of the University of California faculty who are part of groups that have filed a landmark compliant against the UC system. This September, faculty associations from seven University of California campuses along with the systemwide Council of UC Faculty Associations filed an unfair labor …

Today, on Speaking Out of Place, we are honored to talk with Munira Khayyat, a Lebanese anthropologist whose book, A Landscape of War: Ecologies of Resistance and Survival in South Lebanon examines what she calls “resistant ecologies in a world of perennial warfare.” Drawing on long-term fieldwork in frontline villages along Lebanon’s southern bord…

Behind the News, 10/10/24 - guests: Paul North and Paul Reitter on their new edition of Marx's Capital vol. 1 • Nimrod Flaschenberg and Alma Itzhaky on the political culture of Israel after October 7 - Doug HenwoodAv Doug Henwood

Paul North and Paul Reitter on their new translation of Marx’s Capital • Nimrod Flaschenberg and Alma Itzhaky, authors of this article, on the political culture of Israel after October 7 The post Translating Marx’s Capital, Israeli society after October 7 appeared first on KPFA.Av KPFA

Behind the News, 10/3/24 - guests: Rashid Khalidi on a century of war on Palestinians, Aurélie Daher on Hezbollah after Nasrallah - Doug HenwoodAv Doug Henwood

Rashid Khalidi, author of The Hundred Years War on Palestine, talks about Israeli settler-colonialism and its imperial patrons • Aurélie Daher looks at Hezbollah and the challenges it faces after the assassination of its leader The post A century of war on Palestinians, a look at Hezbollah after Nasrallah appeared first on KPFA.…

Today on Speaking Out of Place, we talk with Maya Wind about her book, Towers of Ivory and Steel, How Israeli Universities Deny Palestinian Freedom, published by Verso. Through meticulous research into the archives of Israeli universities and hundreds of other documents, Wind furnishes proof of just how deeply and completely Israeli universities ar…

Behind the News, 9/26/24 - guests: Forrest Hilton on fires in Brazil and Lula's political impotence • Edwin Ackerman on AMLO, Sheinbaum, and judicial reform - Doug HenwoodAv Doug Henwood

Forrest Hylton, author of this article, on wildfires in Brazil and the political impotence of Lula’s administration • Edwin Ackerman on politics in Mexico, as AMLO hands over power to Claudia Sheinbaum, having engineered a controversial overhaul of the judiciary (article here) The post Fires in Brazil, successes in Mexico appeared first on KPFA.…

Behind the News, 10/19/24 - guests: Niobe Way on masculinization, Branko Milanovic on economists' view of inequality over the centuries - Doug HenwoodAv Doug Henwood

Niobe Way, author of Rebels with a Cause, on the emotional and social lives of boys and what they’re telling us about our society • Branko Milanovic, author of Visions of Inequality, reviews what economists have had to say about the topic The post The problem with boys and a history of inequality appeared first on KPFA.…

Today we speak with two scholar-activists who are using satellite technologies and other tools to work for environmental justice, with specific attention to prisons and prison populations. They monitor air quality, water quality, extreme weather and other quantities relevant to EJ. Ufuoma Ovienmhada and Nick Shapiro show how people of color and oth…

Neil Sehgal, co-author of this paper, on the durability of slaveholder wealth, via a look at Congress • Emily Jashinsky with a conservative’s view of the election The post Fundraising special: durability of slaveholder wealth, a conservative looks at the election appeared first on KPFA.Av KPFA

Today we speak with Rebecca Vilkomerson and Rabbi Alissa Wise about their foundational work in starting and growing Jewish Voice for Peace. It’s a story captured in their new book, Solidarity Is the Political Version of Love: Lessons from Jewish Anti-Zionist Organizing. We learn about the different phases in the organization’s life—its growing pain…

Robert Pausch of Die Zeit on the far right’s strong showing in German regional elections • Rob Larson, author of Mastering the Universe, looks at the superrich The post German neo-Nazis on the march, a look at the superrich appeared first on KPFA.Av KPFA

Recently, twenty-three lecturers in the highly successful Creative Writing program at Stanford were summoned to a Zoom meeting where they were first praised, and then summarily fired. One of the most surprising aspects of this purge is the fact that it was carried out not by top-tier university administrators, but by tenure-track faculty in the pro…

The Palestine Exception opens as campus encampments increase across the US in protest against Israel’s war in Gaza. In the largest anti-war movement since the 1970s, students, faculty and staff make demands on their institutions to divest from companies that do business with Israel. The film unfolds as a character-driven story featuring academics w…

Naomi Hossain explains the uprising in Bangladesh that deposed PM Shekih Hasina • Sandipto Dasgupta, author of Legalizing the Revolution, examines the transformation of India from colony to nation through the exercise of constitution-writing The post Bangladesh uprising, writing India’s constitution appeared first on KPFA.…

Today we speak with journalists and political commentators Liza Featherstone and Doug Henwood about the state of the US Presidential elections. Recorded just after the Democratic National Convention in Chicago, we muse about Kamala Harris’s ascension, her choice of running mate, the strangely abiding popularity of Donald Trump, and the Democratic p…

Jake Werner on a progressive China policy (paper here) • Gabriel Hetland, author of this article, on the record of Colombian president Gustavo Petro, a leftist trying to govern a deeply conservative country The post A progressive China policy, and Petro’s record in Colombia appeared first on KPFA.Av KPFA

Pankaj Mishra, author of this article, on the propaganda-induced debasement of the Holocaust • Nancy Folbre, one of four authors of this report, on assigning a monetary value to care work [vacation rebroadcast of the March 28, 2024 show] The post Behind the News – August 15, 2024 appeared first on KPFA.…

Naomi Paik is the author of Bans, Walls, Raids, Sanctuary: Understanding U.S. Immigration for the 21st Century (2020, University of California Press) and Rightlessness: Testimony and Redress in U.S. Prison Camps since World War II (2016, UNC Press; winner, Best Book in History, AAAS 2018; runner-up, John Hope Franklin prize for best book in America…

Arielle Klagsbrun of the All Eyes on Yass Campaign on the insufficiently known right-wing moneybags Jeff Yass • Sohrab Ahmari and Hamilton Nolan debate the existence, real or imagined, of pro-worker Republicans The post Who’s Jeff Yass, and more on those allegedly pro-worker Republicans appeared first on KPFA.…

Heidi Matthews analyzes the World Court’s declaration of Israel’s occupations illegal • Molly White on how crypto is spending its money in politics • Nausicaa Renner psychoanalyzes Joe Biden The post World Court v Israel, crypto politics, psychoanalyzing Biden appeared first on KPFA.Av KPFA

Today we speak with legal scholar and historian Aziz Rana about his deep study into the ways the Constitution has been critiqued, reimagined, and adapted from liberal, conservative, radical, progressive, decolonial, and other groups since its inception. What emerges from his book is a demystification of a document that is both durable and malleable…

For our snap episode on the snap elections in the UK and France, we're joined by eminent decolonial scholar activists, Françoise Vergès in France and Priyamvada Gopal in the UK. Following the defeat of right wing parties in both countries in the polls, we discuss what's changed with the elections, what hasn't changed, and what should movements, act…

Cole Stangler on the monumentally inconclusive French elections • David Palumbo-Liu on the Silicon Valley world that launched JD Vance as a politician • a brief bit from Jane McAlevey on power The post The French elections, Vance’s background, Jane McAlevey (very briefly) on power appeared first on KPFA.…

Charged by the United Nations General Assembly to ascertain the legality of the continued presence of Israel, as an occupying Power, in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, on July 19th, 2024, the International Court of the Justice, the highest court in the world on matters of international law, determined that “The Israeli settlements in the West B…

Brandon Mancilla of the UAW looks behind the GOP’s pro-worker facade • Adam Hilton, author of True Blues, on the bizarre nature of the US political party system The post JD Vance, no friend of the working class • the chaos of the American political party system appeared first on KPFA.Av KPFA

Richard Seymour discusses the British election (Sidecar article here) • Trita Parsi, the Iranian election • remembering Jane McAlevey with a 2017 BtN interview (catalog of interviews here) The post elections in Britain and Iran, in memory of Jane McAlevey appeared first on KPFA.Av KPFA

Far too few people know about the terrible war and the massive famine taking place in Sudan. Today learn about the long history behind these events, the people and groups involved, and the roles that foreign governments and international organizations like the IMF have played. Importantly, we learn how civil society groups are bringing a form of mu…

Robert Pape on how, despite Israel’s murderous onslaught on Gaza, Hamas is winning (article here) • Wanda Bertram on how US incarceration rates stack up against the rest of the world (massively), and other news on crime & punishment (report here) The post Israel is killing a lot of people but losing its war, and the latest on the US carceral state …

For decades, the works of scholar Angana Chatterji and author and journalist Siddhartha Deb have exposed the violence and fascism lying behind the mythology of India as the world's largest democracy. In the wake of India's most recent elections, in which the far right Hindutva BJP was surprisingly reduced from its former majority to a ruling minori…

Robert Fatton explains Haiti’s further descent into poverty and chaos • Steve Fraser, author of this article, analyzes and mourns the death of any sense of a better future [holiday-induced reprise of a show first broadcast on March 14, 2024] The post Haiti and the death of the future appeared first on KPFA.…

Steven Simon on Israel and the Arab states’ relations with it • Jennifer Berkshire, co-author of The Education Wars, on the right-wing’s latest educational ploys. (And here’s Marcus Brown’s website that I mentioned in the intro.) The post Israel and the Arab states and the latest on the education wars appeared first on KPFA.…

Today we speak with acclaimed author and activist, and San Francisco legend, Chris Carlsson about his new novel, When Shells Crumble. It begins in December 2024, when the US Supreme Court nullifies the popular vote in the Presidential election and awards the presidency to an authoritarian Republican, who proceeds to demolish democracy and install a…

Sociologist Edwin Ackerman on the Mexican elections, and the reasons for AMLO’s immense popularity (Sidecar piece here) • Joel Whitney, author of Flights, on radical and revolutionaries’ battles with the CIA The post Mexican elections and radicals on the run appeared first on KPFA.Av KPFA

Today we speak with co-authors Sami Hermez and Sireen Sawalha about their book, My Brother, My Land: A Story from Palestine. The eminent Palestinian author Hala Alyan calls it “A breathtaking display of literary prowess that tells the story of an entire homeland through the frame of one woman’s life.” In our conversation Hermez and Sawalha explain …