RADIKAAL

My guest is Amarnath Amarasingam, an assistant professor in the School of Religion at Queen’s University in Ontario, Canada. Amar is also a Senior Research Fellow at the Institute for Strategic Dialogue and an Associate Fellow at the International Centre for the Study of Radicalisation, both in London, England. His research interests are in radicalization, terrorism, diaspora politics, post-war reconstruction, and the sociology of religion. He is the author of Pain, Pride, and Politics: Sri Lankan Tamil Activism in Canada, published by the University of Georgia Press in 2015, and co-editor of Sri Lanka: The Struggle for Peace in the Aftermath of War, published by Hurst in 2016.

Amar and I talk about religion and terroris, about Canadian foreign fighters in Iraq and Syria, and far right terrorism, and about... Eminem!

This  week RADIKAAL has a premiere, as I will be interviewing two guests, at the same time. Carles Viñas is a researcher in the Department of History of the University of Barcelona, who has published extensively on the far right, skinheads, and ultras, mostly in Catalan and Spanish. Natxo Parra is a labor lawyer and cooperative partner at Col.lectiu Ronda. Together they wrote the excellent new book St. Pauli: Another Football Is Possible, which just came out with Pluto Press. We will talk about the German cult club and the role of radical politics in contemporary football. 

My guest is Louis Wierenga, a former US Marine who went to study in Canada befoire moving East. He is currently a junior Research Fellow at the Johan Skytte Institute of Political Studies of the University of Tartu, where he works on a PhD on the far right in contemporary Estonia and Latvia. You can follow him on Twitter at @louis_wierenga.

Louis and I talk about far right politics in Estonia, in particular the Conservative People's Party of Estonia (EKRE), currently a member of the national coalition government, and its "alt-right" youth branch, Blue Awakening. We also discuss the link to the "alt-right" in the US.

My guest is Lisa Nandy. Lisa has been a Member of Parliament for Wigan since 2010. Earlier this year she came third in the election to succeed Jeremy Corbyn as leader of the Labour Party. She is currently the Shadow Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs and, given the state of Britain and the world, extremely busy.

Lisa and I talk about post-Brexit Britain, about post-Corbyn Labour Party, about populism and progressive patriotism, and about the importance of saving Wigan Athletic. You can follow Lisa on Twitter at @LisaNandy.

My guest is Sophia Solomon, a PhD student in political science at Ben Gurion University of the Negev in Beer-Sheva, Israel. Her current research focuses on civil-military relations in Britain, Canada and Israel, with a particular focus on so-called “shooting soldiers”, i.e. soldiers who killed suspected terrorists after they were captured. However, Sophia and I talk about her previous research, for her MA thesis, which focuses on the Israeli football club Beitar Jerusalem, its infamous ultras/hooligans La Familia, and the connections to and significance for the far right in Israel. 

My guest is Tara Martin Lopez. Tara is an Associate Professor of Sociology and the Chair of Humanities and Social Sciences of at Northern New Mexico College. Her work focuses on the intersection between gender, race, and social movements with a particular focus on the US punk movement. She also wrote a book on one of the most tumultuous period in postwar British history, entitled “The Winter of Discontent: Myth, Memory and History”, which was published by Liverpool University Press in 2014. 

Tara and I talk about the "winter of discontent" in the UK, about "the greatest punk rock band in the world", and about the punk scene in El Paso, Texas.

My guest today is activist and author Gabriel Kuhn. As an activist and author of books on both music and politics and sports and politics, Gabriel is the personification of RADIKAAL. Gabriel has written on pirates and Straight Edge music, a topic I hope to tackle another time with him, as in this episode we focus primarily on sports and politics. Gabriel is not on social media, but you should really buy his books, in particular “Soccer vs the State: Tackling Football and Radical Politics” and “Playing As If the World Mattered: An Illustrated History of Activism in Sports.”

Cas and Gabriel talk about the complex relationship between the workers movement and football as well as capitalism and football, reminisce about the good old days, and fantasize about a football beyond the Champions League.

My guest today is Daphne Halikiopoulou. Daphne is Professor in the Department of Political Science and International Relations at the University of Reading in England. She has published extensively on nationalism and far right politics in Europe and her latest book, co-authored with Sofia Vasilopoulou of York University, is “The Golden Dawn’s ‘National Solution’: Explaining the Rise of the Far Right in Greece”, which was published by Palgrave in 2015. If you want to know more about Daphne Halikiopoulou, you can follow her on Twitter at @halikiopoulou. 

My guest today is Mona Lena Krook. Mona is Professor of Political Science and Chair of the Women and Politics PhD Program at Rutgers University in New Brunswick, New Jersey. She is one of the foremost scholars on gender and politics and has published many articles and books on the topic. In this episode, we will talk in particular about her newest book, Violence Against Women in Politics, which was published by Oxford University Press earlier this year. If you want to know more about Mona Lena Krook, you can check out her website at mlkrook.org or follow her on Twitter at @mlkrook. 

My guest today is Shannon Reid, an Associate Professor in the Department of Criminal Justice and Criminology at the University of North Carolina in Charlotte. She has published extensively on youth culture and gangs in the US and her latest book, co-authored with Matthew Valasik of Louisiana State University, is “Alt-Right Gangs: A Hazy Shade of White”, which has been published by the University of California Press. She tweets at at @MourningShannon.