KPFA - Against the Grain

Wealth inequality is off the charts, with corporations reaping record profits, and billionaires awash in money. Economist Rob Larson returns to make sense of the Trump administration’s relationship to the multimillionaire and billionaire class. The post Fund Drive Special: The Rule of the Billionaires appeared first on KPFA.

Jodi Dean discusses her book “Capital’s Grave: Neofeudalism and the New Class Struggle.” The post Fund Drive Special: Neofeudalism appeared first on KPFA.

Whether it’s basketball, billiards, or table tennis, sports in the U.S are segregated by sex. And most of the time those divisions are taken to be natural, not the result of social choices. Journalist Laura Pappano asserts that sports play a key role in shaping American politics and argues for breaking down the gender wall in sports. Eileen McDonagh and Laura Pappano, Playing With The Boys: Why Separate Is Not Equal In Sports Oxford University Press, 2007 Photo credit of Manon Rhéaume: Tsunami330 The post Why are Sports Gender Segregated? appeared first on KPFA.

For over half a century, Big Oil and the plastics industry, through their trade associations and front groups, have sold the public the false idea that plastics are recyclable. Recycling became the mantra of good ecological stewardship, promoted by the likes of city governments, school children, and environmental groups. Davis Allen lays out the mass-marketing of a deception. (Encore presentation.) Resources: Center for Climate Integrity, The Fraud of Plastic Recycling: How Big Oil and the Plastics Industry Deceived the Public for Decades and Caused the Plastic Waste Crisis February, 2024 The post The Plastics Recycling Deception appeared first on KPFA.

Max Haiven considers the relationship between board games and politics, and describes a new game he’s designed called Billionaires & Guillotines. He also talks about an initiative that resulted in a book featuring nine speculative-fiction stories written by current and former Amazon workers. The World After Amazon: Stories from Amazon Workers Billionaires & Guillotines and the Kickstarter campaign Max Haiven, “All Games are Political” Jacobin The post Workers’ Stories, Political Games appeared first on KPFA.

Blockbuster drugs are launched by the pharmaceuticals industry to great fanfare — with promises of treating intractable illness and often with a stratospheric price tag. Yet, despite the hype and cost, many of those drugs turn out to be less than useless. How is it that so many drugs that are vetted by the Food and Drug Administration escape real scrutiny? Jerry Avorn, one of the most cited scientists in medicine, discusses the deeply compromised state of drug production and government regulation, in thrall to a for-profit system. Jerry Avorn, Rethinking Medications: Truth, Power, and the Drugs You Take Simon & Schuster, 2025 Alosa Health Center for Science in the Public Interest Worst Pills, Best Pills The post Medicines: Expensive, Poorly Tested, and Often Useless appeared first on KPFA.

How have we been governed, regulated, ruled? What systems of knowledge and power have emerged over time, and with what consequences for individuals and populations? Lawrence Grossberg describes four “diagrams” of governmentality that the French theorist Michel Foucault identified: sovereignty, discipline, biopolitics, and neoliberalism. Lawrence Grossberg, On the Way to Theory Duke University Press, 2024 (Image on main page by Arturo Espinosa.) The post Foucault on Power appeared first on KPFA.

Floods are the most destructive natural disaster and, thanks to a heating climate, the damages caused by floods are expected to worsen significantly. Flood mitigation of the past, such as levies and dams, has proved inadequate and often counterproductive by misallocating precious resources. Tim Palmer argues that it’s time to start relocating our built environment out of the places with a high likelihood of flooding. Tim Palmer, Seek Higher Ground: The Natural Solution to Our Urgent Flooding Crisis UC Press, 2024 Photograph credit: Mark Moran The post Mitigating Flooding appeared first on KPFA.

Not one movement but a multiplicity of movements engaging in protest and direct action brought down France’s absolutist regime in 1789. Micah Alpaugh describes popular uprisings and insurrections in Paris and the provinces that unfolded without central leadership and later inspired anarchists around the globe. (Encore presentation.) Micah Alpaugh, The People’s Revolution of 1789 Cornell University Press, 2024 (Image on main page from Rama.) The post French Revolutionary Movements appeared first on KPFA.

Few things are more necessary than a roof over one’s head, and yet few things feel as precarious as housing. Rents have skyrocketed across the country, far outstripping wages, and homelessness has risen to an historic high. Fellow tenant organizers Tracy Rosenthal and Leonardo Vilchis argue that this is the latest chapter in a century-long assault on tenants, but that we can draw powerful lessons from housing struggles to fight for a world without landlords. (Encore presentation.) Resources: Tracy Rosenthal and Leonardo Vilchis, Abolish Rent: How Tenants Can End the Housing Crisis Haymarket Books, 2024 The post The War on Tenants appeared first on KPFA.