Danube Institute Podcast

In January of 2023, Florida’s governor Ron DeSantis announced six additions to the board of New College, a small liberal arts school in Sarasota. In a just world, this should not have been a story. But it was. Because, instead of appointing six liberal progressives, as had somehow seemed a constitutional duty for most colleges for most of the last 40 years, DeSantis instead appointed six conservatives. Who then swept through the place, tearing up the boards of progressive education, firing the leadership, and totally renovating the curriculum. He was, after all, an obvious man to call, if you were going to start a counter-revolution in academia. An Emeritus Professor of English, at Emory University, as far back as 1997 he was penning books like: Literary Criticism: An Autopsy. In 2008, he penned the only half joking: “The Dumbest Generation: How the Digital Age Stupefies Young Americans and Jeopardizes Our Future”. In short, he sits in the lineage of both Alan Bloom and Harold Bloom. Raging against the closing of the American mind, and for the Western Canon. In this episode, Gavin Haynes talks to him about his hands-on experience in reversing the decline of culture – in the practice of long marching back through the institutions. Danube Politics is the current affairs strand of the Danube Institute, a Budapest based think tank, bringing Hungarian conservatism to the Anglosphere and beyond.

Kellie-Jay Keen-Minshull has been at the forefront of trans-exclusionary women's rights for a decade. She is the founder of Let Women Speak, and, in 2018, began a poster campaign involving the slogan “Adult Human Female”. The seemingly innocuous definition of ‘a woman’ became a flashpoint for transgenderist activists in the UK. In 2021, she began a hugely controversial speaking tour of the Antipodes, which resulted in her being denounced by government ministers in Australia, and, in New Zealand, attacked by a mob of activists. On this special edition of Danube Politics, Danube Institute President John O’Sullivan talks to her about her recent victory in the UK Supreme Court — clarifying existing equalities legislation to agree with the ‘adult human female’ definition. And takes a broader sweep of a life of courage. Has the tide finally turned on women’s sex-based rights? And what of relations between the sexes? Is her brand of feminism the answer? Or is it only in a temporary alliance with the broader trunk of conservative thought? Danube Politics is the current affairs strand of the Danube Institute’s podcast output, committed to bringing Hungarian Conservatism to the English-speaking world and beyond.

Metaphysics is back. That’s the word from Nathan Levine, author of the hugely popular Substack, The Upheaval, and a Visiting Fellow at the Danube Institute. Nathan is one of the most crisp thinkers in meta-politics today, and here he goes into depth with the DI’s Head of Research, Calum Nicholson. on what we can expect, as the old structures, the liberal order that has presided since 1945, begins to break down. As he points out, the fables we told ourselves about rule of law, human rights, central planning, neoliberalism, and the supremacy of the individual, are all beginning to warp and fold beneath the pressures of multiple simultaneous revolutions: in tech, in communications, and in the functioning of democracy itself. Yet what is  to come still has not quite been born. We are in an interregnum, between worlds. The technocratic age, the scientistic age, is fading away, and what comes after will have to rely more on ‘magic’, on the right-brain, the Gestalt understanding of who we are. But if we can no longer rely on plans and machines to fulfil our dreams, what even are we? Danube Politics is the current affairs strand of the Danube Institute's podcast output. Subscribe and follow for more.

Can India become a similar global player to China one day? Can it be a power for counterbalancing China? In which sectors is India already a leading power? And is its neutrality on world conflicts and its political parallelism sustainable?We spoke with Dr. Saroj Bishoyi, a Senior Fellow at the Vivekananda International Foundation, who delivered a lecture at the MCC Budapest Summit on Technology and Society.The Danube Lectures is a video podcast of the Danube Institute, a Budapest-based conservative think tank that asks the Institute's guests, decision-makers, experts, academics, and politicians about their unique ideas.Host: Tamás Maráczi, a journalist at the Danube Institute.

When Benjamin Netanyahu flew into Budapest in April 2025, he triggered a political earthquake.Wanted by the International Criminal Court for alleged war crimes in Gaza, the Israeli Prime Minister risked arrest in nearly every European capital. Yet here he was warmly welcomed: the red carpets rolled out, and within days, Hungary announced it would leave the ICC altogether, calling it a “political court.”Why does Hungary stand apart, not just from the EU, but from the entire liberal international order?In this episode of Danube Knowledge, host Adam LeBor takes the long view on Hungary’s embrace of Israel, and what it tells us about shifting alliances in the 21st century. He’s joined by Senior Researcher Peter Szitas, co-author of a landmark paper on Hungarian-Israeli relations, and by Researcher Daniel Farkas. Danube Knowledge is the research brand of the Danube Institute, a Budapest-based think tank, specialising in Hungarian affairs, conservatism and geo-economics.

What does Budapest reveal about Europe’s past—and its possible future? And can the continent recover a sense of political seriousness before the next crisis hits?In this episode of The View From The Danube, Rod Dreher is joined by Matthew Goodwin, British political scientist and author; István Kiss, Executive Director of the Danube Institute; and Michael O’Shea, visiting fellow at the Institute. Together they trace the growing divide between liberal migration policies and public frustration across the continent. From the UK’s broken border system to Poland’s cautious pragmatism, and Hungary’s unapologetic stance, the panel unpacks what happens when mass migration is reshaping the social and political order of a country. Topics discussed in this episode include:• The UK’s net migration crisis: most of the migrants are not looking for jobs or cultural assimilation• Hungary’s model: how tough border policies reshaped the migration debate• Poland’s growing tensions: economic growth, political ambivalence, and migrant fatigue• Islamist influence and identity politics in Britain and France• The backlash against DEI policies and ideological overreach in academia• Trump’s challenge to the global consensus on migration and national sovereignty• Tune in now for a sharp, timely conversation on one of Europe’s most explosive issues.***The View From The Danube is the keystone video podcast of the Danube Institute, a Budapest-based think tank that aims to bring Conservative perspectives from the Anglosphere together, in the heart of the European capital of Conservativism.

What were the major factors that could allow the Trump campaign to win the 2024 presidential election? What mistakes did the Democrats make to become disconnected from reality? And what is the significance of CPAC? We asked Sean Nottoli, a campaign manager from the former Trump team and a visiting fellow at the Danube Institute.The Danube Lectures is a video podcast of the Danube Institute, a Budapest-based conservative think tank that asks the Institute's guests, decision-makers, experts, academics, and politicians about their unique ideas.Host: Tamás Maráczi, a journalist at the Danube Institute.

In the race for the presidency, a right wing candidate faces off against the mayor of the country’s largest city.  In a rising country, the battle is between two identities: the global, liberal one. Versus a national conservative vision.  As with Romania, so now with Poland. On Sunday June the first, Eastern Europe’s new powerhouse will decide its destiny.  Will Poland’s next President be the candidate sympathetic to Donald Tusk’s centrist government? Or will the country’s voters turn right – thereby ensuring a legislative logjam until 2027?  For now at least, everything is still to play for. And just as with Romania, it is a game with many turns left to run. As the race quickens, Gavin Haynes talks to Michael O'Shea, the Danube Institute's Visiting Fellow, who covers the Visegrád states, on whether Karol Nawrocki can do what George Simion could not. Danube Politics is the current affairs brand of the Danube Institute, a Budapest-based think tank, specialising in Hungarian affairs, conservatism and geo-economics.

The battle against ‘progressive education’ is always ongoing. This week in Britain, Michael Gove’s successor as Education Secretary, Bridget Philipson, introduced a bill that will take British education back, to a decolonised, knowledge-light world that “centres the learners”, as the jargon goes. Gove had established a more rigorous, conservative curriculum. It had proved astoundingly successful with learners – albeit less popular with the teaching unions. Now, the pendulum has swung back, and all the same discredited ideas will soon return to English schools. Few will have counted the tocks of the pendulum as well as Professor Anthony O’Hear. From the late 1980s, Anthony advised a number of British governments on education policy, and he set up the department of education at the University of Buckingham. As he explains to Dr Calum TM Nicholson, he wants to warn us about the dangers of forgetting. And to tell us about the redeeming power of a truly liberal education, in a world of hyper-liberal education. *** Danube Knowledge is a podcast from the Danube Institute, showcasing research and ideas from the research department of the Institute. 

Is IMEC simply an anti-Belt and Road Initiative project, or something more? What can the economic and geopolitical benefits be for the US? Can America reclaim global leadership through soft power ? We spoke with Daniel F. Runde, the director of the Project on Prosperity and Development at the Center for Strategic and International Studies.Danube Lectures is a video podcast of the Danube Institute, a Budapest-based conservative think tank that asks the Institute's guests, decision-makers, experts, academics, and politicians about their unique ideas.Host: Tamás Maráczi, a journalist at the Danube Institute.