KPFA - Against the Grain

Many U.S. military establishment bigwigs are pushing the development of automated and autonomous weapons systems. Roberto González questions whether this robo-fanaticism, as he calls it, is justified. He also describes efforts to address human warfighters’ distrust of machines. (Encore presentation.) Roberto J. González, War Virtually: The Quest to Automate Conflict, Militarize Data, and Predict the Future University of California Press, 2022 The post Automated Warfare appeared first on KPFA.

The complicity of white workers in maintaining the capitalist status quo has been much argued on the U.S. left. One of the key combatants and contributors to the debate was the influential radical thinker Noel Ignatiev, who died in 2019. Economist Geert Dhondt reflects on the key ideas of Ignatiev on race and the notion of dual power in moments of revolutionary upheaval. Resources: Noel Ignatiev, Treason to Whiteness is Loyalty to Humanity (Edited by Geert Dhondt, Zhandarka Kurti, and Jarrod Shanahan) Verso, 2022 Noel Ignatiev, Acceptable Men: Life in the Largest Steel Mill in the World Charles H Kerr, 2021 Hard Crackers The post The Politics of Noel Ignatiev appeared first on KPFA.

The movement of Chinese people – around 300 million of them – from rural areas to China’s cities has been called the largest mass migration in human history. Have the working-class migrants who’ve built China’s megacities been rewarded for their efforts? Eli Friedman describes the obstacles and injustices they’ve encountered, particularly when trying to get schooling for their children. Eli Friedman, The Urbanization of People: The Politics of Development, Labor Markets, and Schooling in the Chinese City Columbia University Press, 2022 (Image on main page by Matt Ming.) The post Migrant Workers in China appeared first on KPFA.

It’s been described at the most turbulent period of global class struggle in history — the turn of the 20th century when revolutionaries around the world found common cause against capital and empire. Christina Heatherton discusses the revolutionary internationalism swirling around the Mexican Revolution and the remarkable intersection of radicals at that time. Resources: Christina Heatherton, Arise! Global Radicalism in the Era of the Mexican Revolution UC Press, 2022 The post The Radical International appeared first on KPFA.

In arguing for the urgency of moving from anthropocentrism toward ecocentrism, Aaron S. Allen distinguishes between environmental crises and ecological change; argues against the “balance of nature” paradigm; differentiates between strong and weak forms of sustainability; and describes the role that expressive culture and the environmental liberal arts can play in driving awareness and activism. (Encore presentation.) McDowell, Borland, Dirksen, and Tuohy, eds., Performing Environmentalisms: Expressive Culture and Ecological Change University of Illinois Press, 2021 Allen and Dawe, eds., Current Directions in Ecomusicology: Music, Culture, Nature Routledge, 2016 (Image on main page by Nelson Pavlosky.) The post Toward Ecocentrism appeared first on KPFA.

They are among the biggest companies in the world: Google, Apple, Microsoft, Facebook, and Amazon have an outsized impact on the global economy and on our daily lives. Rob Larson examines the companies that have become synonymous with the glories and ills of contemporary capitalism. He makes the case for online socialism. (Encore presentation.) Resources: Rob Larson, Bit Tyrants: The Political Economy of Silicon Valley Haymarket Books, 2020 The post The Unmitigated Power of Big Tech appeared first on KPFA.

Trotskyism played a key role in the development of the U.S. revolutionary left. Among American Trotskyists, James Cannon stood out. Bryan D. Palmer talks about Cannon’s beliefs, his engagement with radical left formations in the U.S., and his involvement in militant labor struggles in the early twentieth century. (Encore presentation.) Bryan Palmer, James P. Cannon and the Emergence of Trotskyism in the United States, 1928-38 Brill, 2021 Bryan Palmer, James P. Cannon and the Origins of the American Revolutionary Left, 1890-1928 University of Illinois Press, 2007 (Image on main page by Adam Jones.) The post Pioneering Trotskyist appeared first on KPFA.

How did term gender take on the meaning that it has today? How was it developed as a social pairing to the purportedly fixed notion of sex? Surprisingly, historian Sandra Eder traces its origins to a Pediatric Endocrinology Clinic at Johns Hopkins University in the 1940s. She discusses the significance of the introduction of the idea of a culturally-constructed gender, in the Cold War context of mid-20th century America, and the inherited baggage of the term today. Resources: Sandra Eder, How the Clinic Made Gender: The Medical History of a Transformative Idea University of Chicago Press, 2022 The post Constructing Gender appeared first on KPFA.

Does it spark joy? That’s the criterion Marie Kondo has set for deciding which personal belongings to keep, and which to relinquish. Maureen Ryan considers Kondo’s decluttering method and her television show in the context of pervasive burnout and insecurity. (Encore presentation.) Richard Grusin, ed., Insecurity University of Minnesota Press, 2022 Maureen Ryan, Lifestyle Media in American Culture: Gender, Class, and the Politics of Ordinariness Routledge, 2018 (Image on main page by mycurrency.com.) The post Kondo Critiqued appeared first on KPFA.

How should we understand the ecological crisis accelerating around us? In a book that has sparked debate on the European left, Ulrich Brand and Markus Wissen trace the origins of the Western mode of production and living, which is now spreading around the world. They connect such resource and emissions-intensive consumption to the political instability of our times, and point to alternatives beyond capitalism. (Encore presentation.) Resources: Ulrich Brand and Markus Wissen, The Imperial Mode of Living: Everyday Life and the Ecological Crisis of Capitalism Verso, 2021 The post Everyday Life and the Ecological Crisis of Capitalism appeared first on KPFA.