KPFA - Against the Grain

The world is facing two existential threats, one acknowledged but inadequately addressed, and the other largely forgotten until recently: global warming and nuclear weapons. Scholar Michael Klare discusses the dangerous great power politics highlighted by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and their deleterious effects on nuclear proliferation and the struggle to slow the climate disaster. Resources: Arms Control Association photo: Pixabay The post The Ukraine Invasion, Great Power Conflict, and the Climate Emergency appeared first on KPFA.

Richard Wright, best known for his books “Native Son” and “Black Boy,” was a crucial figure in the Black radical and anticapitalist traditions. So asserts Joseph Ramsey, who has written widely on Wright’s life, literary production, and political commitments. Ramsey also elaborates Wright’s views toward Black nationalism, views that Ramsey contends should be heeded by progressives and radicals today. Joseph Ramsey, “Rest in Power, Richard Wright!” Socialism & Democracy Shelter & Solidarity The post Richard Wright’s Radicalism appeared first on KPFA.

Since well before Covid, U.S. media has been in dire straits. Hedge funds demanding sky-high profits have gobbled up established newspapers, while local reporting has disappeared. Media conglomerates have laid off journalists in record numbers, gutting coverage of the misdeeds of the powerful. And yet over the last five years, as Jon Schleuss of the NewsGuild-CWA lays out, there’s been a remarkable surge in labor organizing among media workers. Resources: The NewsGuild-CWA The post Organizing Media Workers appeared first on KPFA.

Did the Freedmen’s Bureau, established in 1865, help the formerly enslaved, or harm them? Priya Kandaswamy traces the Bureau’s activities in relation to vagrancy legislation and the placement of Black domestic workers in white people’s homes. Labor discipline and white surveillance, she argues, took precedence over public assistance and meaningful forms of freedom for African Americans. Priya Kandaswamy, Domestic Contradictions: Race and Gendered Citizenship from Reconstruction to Welfare Reform Duke University Press, 2021 The post Emancipated, Unfree appeared first on KPFA.

The early 20th century had much in common with our time. It was an epoch of great extremes of wealth and poverty, of globalization and free trade, of war and imperialist occupation. But one crucial difference stands out: it was also a time of great militancy by the radical working class. And nowhere was this more apparent than in San Francisco on the eve of World War One, when a bomb exploded during a pro-war parade on Market Street. Joseph Matthews discusses the class war in San Francisco, a century ago. The post Class War in San Francisco appeared first on KPFA.

What do neoliberal policies and institutions do to people’s ability to care well for others? According to Sarah Clark Miller, caregivers experience moral precarity and moral injury, brought on by the fact that they can’t care for loved ones in ways that are consistent with their ethical principles. Maurice Hamington and Michael Flower, eds., Care Ethics in the Age of Precarity University of Minnesota Press, 2021 Sarah Clark Miller, The Ethics of Need: Agency, Dignity, and Obligation Routledge, 2014 The post Caregiving in Neoliberal Times appeared first on KPFA.

Veterans are a prominent symbol in U.S. politics, evoking patriotism and military might. The right recruits them and they populate the police, private security, and often militia groups. But the struggles of veterans, and those currently working for the military, should be of concern for the left, argues Suzanne Gordon and Steve Early. They discuss the always non-union labor of military work, attempts to privatize veterans’ healthcare, and the political orientation of veterans and the organizations claiming to represent them. Resources: Suzanne Gordon, Steve Early, Jasper Craven, Our Veterans: Winners, Losers, Friends, and Enemies on the New Terrain of Veterans Affairs Duke University Press, 2022 The post The Labor of Veterans 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. 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.

The United States is a strikingly unequal country. The Republican Party is rightly credited with aiding the wealthy, but historian Lily Geismer argues that’s just half of the story. She examines the key role played by the Clinton-era Democratic Party in widening inequality through microenterprise schemes and development zones, free trade policies, and charter schools, while gutting public housing and welfare. Resources: Lily Geismer, Left Behind: The Democrats’ Failed Attempt to Solve Inequality Public Affairs, 2022 The post Inequality and the New Democrats appeared first on KPFA.

Is a world of nation-states desirable? If ultranationalism is pernicious, are some forms of nationalism beneficial? Should struggles framed in terms of national liberation be lauded and supported? Nandita Sharma emphasizes the exclusions inherent in all nationalist politics, exclusions dictated by considerations of who does and does not belong to the nation. Nandita Sharma, Home Rule: National Sovereignty and the Separation of Natives and Migrants Duke University Press, 2020 (Image on main page by Joel Kramer.)   The post The Nation, Reconsidered appeared first on KPFA.