With increased polarization and ongoing budgetary disputes, the U.S. government does not seem to be acting in the way that the American forefathers intended. Host Ravi Agrawal brings on historian Jill Lepore to share more. Lepore is a professor at Harvard University and the author of We the People: A History of the U.S. Constitution.

Plus, One Thing from Ravi on the U.S. government shutdown.

Rishi Iyengar: How a U.S. Government Shutdown Could Impact Washington’s Foreign Policy

John Haltiwanger: Why America’s ‘Unusual’ Democracy Leads to Shutdown

Andrew O’Donohue: The U.S. Judicial Crisis Is Uniquely Dangerous

Stan Veuger: Americans Need to Acknowledge Their Unwritten Constitution

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Qatar often presents itself as a neutral mediator in the world’s trickiest problems, but on Sept. 9, its sovereignty was violated as Israel launched a strike to assassinate top Hamas leaders in Doha. Will Qatar change its strategy? No, explains Majed al-Ansari, the spokesperson of the country’s Foreign Ministry, at a live event with host Ravi Agrawal along the sidelines of the 80th U.N. General Assembly. 

Plus, One Thing from Ravi on a feeling that seems in rare supply but was surprisingly abundant in New York this week: hope.

Mina Al-Oraibi: Qatar Strike Creates Rift but Not Rupture in Gulf-Israel Ties 

Matthew Duss: Recognize Palestine, Then Put Real Pressure on Israel

Ravi’s interview with Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus

Ravi’s interview with Prince Zeid Ra’ad Al Hussein

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How is Europe navigating the Trump administration and a troubling moment in the trans-Atlantic relationship? FP Live host Ravi Agrawal sits down with Kaja Kallas, the European Union’s top diplomat, on the sidelines of the United Nations’ annual meetings to discuss relations with Washington, Russia’s war in Ukraine, recognizing Palestine, and dealing with China. 

Plus, One Thing from Ravi on a spate of countries recognizing Palestine.

South China Morning Post: China Tells EU it does not want to see Russia lose its war in Ukraine: Sources

Sam Skove: Trump Makes U-Turn on Ukraine Rhetoric 

Christian Caryl: Europe Is on Its Own With Russia Now

Ravi Agrawal: How Europe Is Navigating Trump

Agathe Demarais: Europe’s Hippopotamus Strategy for Handling Trump

Caroline de Gruyter: Europe Has Found Its True Language

Anchal Vohra: Trump’s Trade Deal With Europe Is Already Unraveling

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The dismantling of the U.S. Agency for International Development this year left countries scrambling, with many analysts going as far as calling the shutdown inhumane. But values were never the real driver of the global development agenda, says FP columnist Adam Tooze—it was actually about power. Now that the United States has stepped back, can China fill the void? Does it want to? Tooze sits down with host Ravi Agrawal to discuss his piece “The End of Development” in FP’s latest print issue.

Plus, One Thing from Ravi on the global connections to the Charlie Kirk killing.

Alejandro Reyes: Why Charlie Kirk’s White Nationalism Resonated With Some Nonwhites Abroad

Adam Tooze: The End of Development

Adam’s economics podcast: Ones and Tooze

Daniela Gabor: How Big Finance Ate Foreign Aid

Henry Tugendhat and James Palmer: Can China Replace USAID?

David C. Engerman: The Problem With the Global South’s Self-Help Push

Suparna Chaudhry: Why the World Turned on NGOs

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Michigan Sen. Elissa Slotkin has a plan for the U.S. Democratic Party. She’s promoting what she calls a “war plan” to revive the middle class as a way for her party to not only challenge President Donald Trump—and win the future for America. She joins host Ravi Agrawal to game out how to put her vision into action. 

Plus, One Thing from Ravi on the Russian drones fired into Polish airspace earlier this week.

Council on Foreign Relations: A New Vision for America’s National Security

Julian E. Zelizer: Why Democrats Should Proceed to the Center With Caution

Matthew Duss: Democrats Should Reclaim the Anti-War Mantle From Trump

Christian Caryl: Russia Just Attacked NATO. Again.

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FP columnist Emma Ashford makes the case that we’re entering a post-unipolar world—that countries can sense that the United States is no longer an unchallenged superpower. If that’s the case, how should Washington adapt its foreign policy? 

Ashford sits down with host Ravi Agrawal to discuss her new book, First Among Equals: U.S. Foreign Policy in a Multipolar World. 

Plus, One Thing from Ravi on South Korea’s latest soft power hit, KPop Demon Hunters.

Ravi Agrawal: Is America Now Merely the First Among Equals?

Emma Ashford: Passing the Baton in Europe

Stephen M. Walt: The Realist Case for Global Rules

Michael Hirsh: Why Everyone in Washington Is a ‘Realist’ Now

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The relationship between the world’s two largest democracies—India and the United States—could be in trouble. Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi warmly embraced his Russian and Chinese counterparts at a summit this week, shortly after the Trump administration pushed ahead with sky-high tariffs on Indian exports. Is New Delhi considering a shift in its geopolitical posture?

Former Indian Foreign Secretary Nirupama Rao sits down with host Ravi Agrawal. Plus, One Thing from Ravi on China’s massive military parade this week.

Nirupama Rao: Strategic Autonomy Is Nothing to Fear

C. Raja Mohan: Modi, Lee, and Trump’s Nobel Prize Obsession

Sam Roggeveen: China’s Military Is Now Leading

Rudra Chaudhuri: Can India and the U.S. Repair Their Relationship?

Anchal Vohra: India Is Struggling to Figure Out Trump

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We talk a lot about Iran on this show, but we don’t often hear from Iranian leaders. I wanted to change that this week—and so I asked Mohammad Javad Zarif to come on the program. Zarif played a major role in crafting Iranian foreign policy over the last 15 years, as foreign minister from 2013 to 2021 and as the lead negotiator of the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action. While Americans perceived him as the diplomatic face of Iran, at home he was seen as a reformer trying to hold off the hard-liners. Zarif served as Iran’s vice president of strategic affairs from 2024 to earlier this year, but he’s now out of government and a bit more free to express his opinions. He spoke with me about the June war between Israel and Iran and the prospects for diplomacy with the Trump administration.

Mohammad Javad Zarif: The Time for a Paradigm Shift Is Now

Trita Parsi: The Next Israel-Iran War is Coming

Steven A. Cook: In the Middle East, a Cold War Redux?

Charli Carpenter: Why the Nuclear Taboo Is Stronger Than Ever

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The United States and China are constantly looking for a leg up in their rivalry for geopolitical primacy. But what if the real advantage lies in adopting a bit of the other’s culture? A new book makes the case that while China has become an engineering state obsessed with building, the United States has become a lawyerly society focused on procedures and blocking. Can they learn from each other? Author and scholar Dan Wang sits down with Ravi Agrawal to discuss his new book, Breakneck: China’s Quest to Engineer the Future.

Dan Wang: Breakneck: China’s Quest to Engineer the Future

Ravi Agrawal: Why China’s Tech Dominance Is Not Inevitable

Bob Davis: America’s Flailing Industrial Policy Can Take Lessons From China

James Palmer: A Guide to Censorship in China

Brought to you by: quince.com/fplive

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The Trump-Putin summit on Friday, followed by Monday’s unprecedented White House meeting with Ukrainian President Zelensky and seven other European leaders, has left analysts wondering whether recent diplomacy will result in an end to hostilities—or if it’s all just pageantry. Andrea Kendall-Taylor and Sergey Radchenko sit down with Ravi Agrawal to debrief these two high-level meetings.

Kendall-Taylor is a former CIA analyst and a senior fellow at the Center for a New American Security. Radchenko is a Johns Hopkins University professor and the author of To Run the World: The Kremlin’s Cold War Bid for Global Power.

Ravi Agrawal: Grading Trump’s Ukraine Diplomacy

Ivo H. Daalder: Russia and Ukraine Are as Far Apart as Ever

Stephen M. Walt: Trump Has No Idea How to Do Diplomacy

Rishi Iyengar: Key Takeaways From Trump’s Meeting with Zelensky

Keith Johnson: 7 Lingering Questions After the Trump Ukraine Summit

Michael Hirsh: Trump’s Putin Gambit Failed—but Maybe It Was Still Worth Trying

Sergey Radchenko: Not Unprecedented but Unprincipled

Christina Lu: ‘There’s No Deal Until There’s a Deal’

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