Hegemonicon - An Investigation Into the Workings of Power

In this solo season finale, William makes his case for his approach to voting in this year's presidential election. Looking ahead, he lays out his vision for where left movements need to start building infrastructure next, regardless of the election outcomes, based on what he learned from his guests this season about international solidarity.

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Mijente Policy Director Jacinta González joins William for this episode. Jacinta is an expert in organizing against immigration enforcement and criminalization of Latinx and immigrant communities. Their conversation explores how local, in-person community organizing is key to defending migrants threatened by increasingly violent, aggressive, and isolationist US border and immigration policy.

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On this episode of Hegemonicon, Will talks with Ikaika Hussey, an organizer and a candidate for Hawaii State House District 29. They delve into Hawaii's often-ignored pre-colonial history and its current struggles as a state in the American empire.

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Hegemonicon will be taking an intermission to record a few more episodes and wrap up this present series on internationalism. We're very much looking forward to bringing you more important and necessary discussions to tie together what we're learning about internationalism, the global role of the United States, and what that means for organizers in the belly of the beast.

Thank you so much for listening to this podcast. William does this show on top of his daily organizing and other political work because he believes in the value of open-ended, rigorous, non-dogmatic dialogue about strategy and organizing on the Left. If you find that in this show and enjoy it, please share it with your friends and collaborators.

And while you're at it, rate the show and leave a review on your podcast app. We'll be back in October.

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Khury Petersen-Smith joins the show to discuss internationalist organizing and ideologies among Black communities in the US.

Khury Petersen-Smith is the Michael Ratner Middle East Fellow at the Institute for Policy Studies. He researches US empire, borders, and migration and strategizes with activists to work against the violence that the US carries out and supports around the world. Khury's work focuses especially on US militarism in the Middle East and in the Pacific, and movements that resist it. He is one of the co-authors and organizers of the 2023 Black Voices for Ceasefire statement, which was signed by over 6,000 Black activists, artists, and scholars, and he is the co-founder of Black 4 Palestine.

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This episode features a conversation with two experienced unionists about the history of, and barriers to, solidarity between US workers and those abroad.

Carl Rosen is the General President of UE, the United Electrical, Radio & Machine Workers of America. UE is a famously democratic, progressive, and independent union, and they have done arguably the best work of any US union in building mutual alliances of solidarity with labor unions abroad over the last several decades, including a long collaboration with the Mexican Frente Auténtico de Trabajo.

Bob Master recently retired after 45 years in the labor movement, the last 36 with the Communications Workers of America. He was a founding co-chair of the New York State Working Families Party, and remains a member of the WFP National Executive Committee. Bob is also a big-picture strategic thinker, strategist and writer about matters of US politics, political economy, and class struggle.

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Cindy Wiesner of the Grassroots Global Justice Alliance joins the show to share reflections on her 35 years of internationalist organizing on the US Left—from the global justice movement of the 1990s and early 2000s, through the antiwar movement of the 2000s, to the growing international climate justice movement of the 2000s–2010s. Throughout that journey, she has been working to build power from the grassroots in the US, and with allies across the globe, especially in the Americas. She shares her perspective on that trajectory, and where we find ourselves now.

Cindy Wiesner is the Executive Director of the Grassroots Global Justice Alliance (GGJ). She helped co-found the Climate Justice Alliance and the Rising Majority and has been a leader in many cross-border movement-building initiatives.

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David Adler (@davidrkadler) returns to the show to share the work of Progressive International, including its election observatory, its research portal on the "Reactionary International," its online advocacy campaigns, and, most ambitiously, its efforts to cohere ideas and people that could guide a "New" New International Economic Order. David shares his perspective on where allies are to be found in the pursuit of a just global system. David Adler is a political economist and the co-General Coordinator of Progressive International. He was a Fulbright Scholar at the Colegio de México and a Rhodes Scholar at the University of Oxford. He writes regularly for The Guardian.

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Tim Sahay returns to the show provide a world tour of the flows and chokepoints of goods and finance that make up our global economy. 

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Van Jackson (@realvanjackson) joins the show to discuss the dangerous strategy of global primacy that drives US foreign policy. Van Jackson is a scholar of international relations specializing in East Asian and Pacific security, critical analysis of defense issues, and the intersection of working-class interests with foreign policy. He worked in the Department of Defense during the Obama administration and has since become an outspoken critic of US foreign policy. He writes the Un-Diplomatic newsletter and is the author of several books.

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