Jacobin Radio

Over the last four months, the Israeli war on Gaza has spilled over into the rest of the Middle East, from Lebanon to Iraq. But the most dramatic example has been the link between events in Palestine and Yemen. Ansar Allah, the movement known as the Houthis, imposed a blockade on ships going to Israel until there was a ceasefire. In response, the US and the UK have carried out air strikes on Houthi positions in Yemen. The Houthis say they won’t be deterred by military action.Helen Lackner, one of the leading experts on modern Yemen and the author of several books about the country, returns to Long Reads to discuss the recent actions of the Houthis. The interview was recorded on Tuesday, February 20th.Hear our previous episode with Helen, on the history of Yemen, from 2021: https://shows.acast.com/jacobin-radio/episodes/619be5d09c63710019611394Read her recent articles for Jacobin here: https://jacobin.com/author/helen-lacknerLong Reads is a Jacobin podcast looking in-depth at political topics and thinkers, both contemporary and historical, with the magazine’s longform writers. Hosted by features editor Daniel Finn. Produced by Conor Gillies, music by Knxwledge.

There are many markers showing February 2024 to be a landmark month of cruelty — not least in Gaza, but also in Russia, where we turn our focus today. The slow murder of opposition leader Alexei Navalny in the Arctic Circle penal colony Kharp on Friday, February 16, signals a turning point for Putin’s Russia and underscores both the Kremlin’s power and weakness. We cover the turmoil in Russia in the lead-up to the March 2024 rubber-stamp presidential election. We were scheduled to speak to Boris Kagarlitsky, but, on February 13, Kagarlitsky’s appeal trial took place. He had been arrested in July 2024 for his criticism of Kremlin policy and opposition to the war in Ukraine. Kagarlitsky spent four and a half months in pretrial detention in the far northern Republic of Komi and was freed in December 2024. On February 13, the December verdict was overturned. Kagarlitsky was whisked from the courtroom into custody to begin serving five years in a penal colony. Three days later, on February 16, Alexei Navalny died. Suzi speaks to Russian dissident activists and scholars Ilya Budraitskis and Grusha G. to get their understanding of these events. Budraitskis says Navalny is a man the regime truly feared, and they subjected him to a slow, cowardly murder, drawn out over many months. The Marxist critic Boris Kagarlitsky is now in their hands — and international solidarity is required. This is happening in the context of an election and the upcoming 2nd anniversary of the invasion of Ukraine, when the Kremlin looks to portray Russians as united behind Putin. Jacobin Radio with Suzi Weissman features conversations with leading thinkers and activists, with a focus on labor, the economy, and protest movements.

Join historian Abdel Razzaq Takriti, an expert on Arab and Palestinian revolutionary movements, as he delves into the complex legacies of European imperialism in the Arab world. He explores how events like Napoleon's invasion and the aftermath of World War I shaped modern Arab political ideologies. The discussion critiques Eurocentric frameworks while examining colonial influences on Zionist expansion and the rise of independence movements. Takriti highlights the ongoing impact of 20th-century revolutions in shaping today's geopolitics.

Gerald Epstein, author of Busting the Bankers’ Club, discusses the finance racket and how to transform it. Anna Kornbluh, author of Immediacy, examines our sped-up, unmediated cultural eternal present.Behind the News, hosted by Doug Henwood, covers the worlds of economics and politics and their complex interactions, from the local to the global. Find the archive online: https://www.leftbusinessobserver.com/radio.html.

On episode six of Organize the Unorganized: The Rise of the CIO, we go deeper into some of the key CIO unions: the United Electrical, Radio and Machine Workers of America (UE), the International Longshore and Warehouse Union (ILWU), the Textile Workers Organizing Committee (TWOC), and the Packinghouse Workers Organizing Committee (PWOC). There were many other unions that formed the CIO — in oil, printing, transport, and other areas — but these four were some of the biggest and most influential. Listen to the seventh episode here: https://shows.acast.com/jacobin-radio/episodes/organize-the-unorganized-07-war Find all the episodes on the web, or by searching for "Organize the Unorganized" on your podcast app. Organize the Unorganized: The Rise of the CIO is a limited-run history podcast telling the story of the CIO through the voices of labor historians. Hosted by Benjamin Y. Fong and produced by the Center for Work & Democracy at Arizona State University with Jacobin. Find the full show notes for this episode here: https://soundcloud.com/organizetheunorganized/episode-6-from-the-docks-to-the-killing-floors

This podcast episode of Jacobin Radio explores the 'eat the rich' cinema trend and analyzes the film 'The Menu'. They also discuss Elon Musk's cultural influence, Biden's press conference, and the media's protection of the president.

Ajay Singh Chaudhary talks about his new book, The Exhausted of the Earth: Politics in a Burning World. Matt Notowidigdo, co-author of a recent NBER paper, examines how recessions increase life expectancy.Behind the News, hosted by Doug Henwood, covers the worlds of economics and politics and their complex interactions, from the local to the global. Find the archive online: https://www.leftbusinessobserver.com/radio.html.

If you think about the French revolutionary tradition, you’re most likely to picture the storming of the Bastille and the overthrow of the monarchy. But that wasn’t the first time there was a major uprising against the established order in France. In the second half of the fourteenth century, there was a popular revolt known as the Jacquerie, which terrified the French ruling class. They drowned the revolt in blood and set about demonizing the peasants who took part in it. It was only in the wake of a successful revolution four centuries later that historians began taking a fresh look at the Jacquerie.Long Reads is joined by Justine Firnhaber-Baker to discuss this uprising. She's a professor of history at the University of St Andrews and the author of The Jacquerie of 1358: A French Peasants’ Revolt. Published in 2021, the book was the first major study of the Jacquerie since the nineteenth century.Read her article for Jacobin, "The Jacquerie Was a Great Popular Rebellion Against the Rich Nobles of France" here: https://jacobin.com/2023/09/jacquerie-peasant-revolt-france-middle-ages-class-conflict-nobilityLong Reads is a Jacobin podcast looking in-depth at political topics and thinkers, both contemporary and historical, with the magazine’s longform writers. Hosted by features editor Daniel Finn. Produced by Conor Gillies, music by Knxwledge.

Featuring Luke Messac on Your Money or Your Life: Debt Collection in American Medicine. An estimated 100 million people in the US are in debt because they sought medical treatment. Medical debt exacerbates poor and working-class people's physical and psychological suffering while undermining their financial well-being and freedom.Support The Dig at Patreon.com/TheDigSubscribe to a year of Jewish Currents at secure.jewishcurrents.org/forms/subscribe 50% off with special code DIG2024Buy What Was Neoliberalism at haymarketbooks.org/books/2056-what-was-neoliberalism

Are commercial considerations always doomed to taint art? And are commercial considerations really a taint? We discuss Spike Jonze and Charlie Kaufman's meta-movie ADAPTATION (2002) and the artist/hack dichotomy. PLUS: We mark the passing of the world's most famous minimalist sculptor and murder suspect.Michael and Us is a podcast about political cinema and our crumbling world hosted by Will Sloan and Luke Savage.