Interviewer: RAFAEL KHACHATURIAN. The transition away from Apartheid in South Africa during the 1990s has been hailed as a double miracle of nation-building and the establishment of democracy, so much so that at the time it seemed to validate Francis Fukuyama’s declaration of the end of history. Political scientist CAROLYN E. HOLMES, in her political ethnography of contemporary South Africa, highlights the inherent tensions of the transition: between the “selective forgetting” required to join together as a nation and the continuing political salience of remembered wrongs in a competitive democracy; and between the looking forward of “rainbow nation” rhetoric and the necessary looking backward of truth and reconciliation. In her discussion with political theorist Rafael Khachaturian, she discusses how these tensions have shaped the current political landscape in South Africa, how history has remained important to how people feel about their nation, and how its experience can inform the analysis of other countries, including the U.S., divided by the legacy of painful pasts.

Interviewer: RAFAEL KHACHATURIAN. At a moment when its actions truly demand international scrutiny, Russia’s place at the center of Western attention seems only natural. That said, historian and SRB Podcast (https://srbpodcast.org/) host SEAN GUILLORY is engaged in multiple projects examining why Russia has loomed so large for so long in the imaginations of America and Western Europe. He argues that Russia provides a unique foil – European enough to potentially be “like us,” yet perpetually failing to conform to Western ideals – against which the West defines itself and its purpose. In his far-ranging discussion with political theorist Rafael Khachaturian, Guillory describes his podcast series on these themes: one on Lovett Fort-Whiteman, who imagined the Soviet Union as an escape from Jim Crow, but who died in the Gulag; and another on Teddy Roe, an American tourist whose perception of the USSR in 1968, even as he experienced it firsthand, was steeped in Cold War propaganda. They also discuss the invasion of Ukraine as reflecting not only how Russia’s leaders have long imagined its role in the world, but also a shift toward ethnic nationalism.

Interviewer: RAFAEL KHACHATURIAN. As our economy, political system, and society in general weather a number of immediate crises, from pandemics to inflation, economist RICHARD WOLFF argues that the real cause of our inability to grapple with them is being ignored. In his discussion with political theorist Rafael Khachaturian, Wolff contends that the power of capitalism as a governing ideology, and capitalists as a class, make it difficult to mobilize resources for anything other than profit maximization – especially as increasing levels of debt among all manner of borrowers hampers action. As the dynamic center of global capitalism moves east, Wolff argues that America, like many European countries, would benefit from revived socialist politics, either inside or outside the Democratic Party, to help reorganize our economic life around the needs of people, not the revenues of corporations.

Interviewer: MATTHEW BERKMAN. Especially since the national reckoning with race following the death of George Floyd, there has been a focus, in both academic and popular discourse, on the continuity of anti-Black racism in U.S. history. Distinguished political scientist ADOLPH REED contests the idea, however, that racism as an immutable force exerting a uniform influence from the era of slavery to the present day, or even that American inequality is chiefly defined by race. His new book, The South: Jim Crow and Its Afterlives, situates the racial hierarchy of the Jim Crow South in the political economy of the period and in the struggles and negotiations of everyday experience. In his discussion with political scientist Matthew Berkman, he relates his own personal recollections of growing up during that time and emphasizes the specificity of the era. He takes aim at anti-racist historiography and social analysis, including The 1619 Project and The New Jim Crow, arguing that they miss the distinctive concrete roles that “race relations” has played in different times and places to reinforce social inequality.

Interviewer: RAFAEL KHACHATURIAN. Over the course of decades, Neoliberalism has shifted from being an overt ideological position, explicitly arguing for the primacy of the market as a way to organize society, into a set of embedded assumptions and practices that govern much of our economy and politics. Political theorist WENDY BROWN has charted this process and the destruction left in its wake, as commitment to the social has given way to individualistic strategies for coping with market forces. In her discussion with fellow theorist Rafael Khachaturian, she describes the political disarray on both the right and left, even as Trumpism and its international equivalents seem resurgent, as well as the difficulty in general in exercising political control over the global financial system that neoliberalism built. But she also points to activism around the world that challenges entrenched power in its many forms and gives hope that a more equitable society, which achieves a more sustainable relationship with the natural world, is possible.

Interviewer: RAFAEL KHACHATURIAN. As he sparks an international crisis over a possible invasion of Ukraine, Vladimir Putin has seemingly consolidated his control in an increasingly autocratic regime. Scholar of international relations and Russian political economy ILYA MATVEEV argues, however, that Putin’s turn to greater repression is a sign that his base of power is narrowing. In his discussion with political theorist Rafael Khachaturian, Matveev points to the broadening class composition of opposition to Putin, the latent dissatisfaction of the billionaire class (despite its continued dependence on the regime), the failure of the Russian government’s COVID response, and Putin’s inability or unwillingness to rally supporters in the streets – all of which forces him to rely more heavily on pure state repression and heightened right-wing rhetoric invoking threats to ethnic Russians. Matveev is Associate Dean for International Relations at the North-Western Institute of Management in St. Petersburg.

Interviewer: MATTHEW BERKMAN. Many accounts of the Arab Spring of 2010-11 view it primarily through a political lens: whatever the underlying grievances, its goals centered around removing autocrats from power and replacing them with more responsive governments. Historian JOEL BEININ argues that in fact the Arab Spring protests, particularly in Egypt and Tunisia, were rooted in a worker’s movement that had, over decades, launched numerous protests against harsh economic conditions imposed by the so-called Washington Consensus. In his discussion with political scientist Matthew Berkman, Beinin outlines the evolution of economic policy in the Middle East, points to the sources of funding for the post-Arab Spring counter-revolution, and describes the network of business interests – far beyond a narrowly conceived “Israel lobby” – that have cemented Israel’s place in American foreign policy.

Interviewer: MATTHEW BERKMAN. The story of Palestine, as much as its territory, has been subsumed by Israel, its recent history typically told as a chronicle of the Jewish state’s establishment, development, and defense. In his new book, The Hundred Years’ War: A History of Settler Colonialism and Resistance, 1917-2017, acclaimed historian RASHID KHALIDI refocuses the narrative on the Palestinian experience. In his discussion with political scientist Matthew Berkman, Khalidi describes how this book is different from his previous work: while rigorously documented, it is also highly personal, as he draws upon his own family’s history of dispossession and survival. While he has little patience for the many pretexts, from across the political spectrum, for denying Palestinians their full rights, he argues that mutual accommodation is necessary to move forward from the last hundred years of colonial expansion and violent conflict.

Interviewer: RAFAEL KHACHATURIAN. Ever since Marx himself, Marxists have anticipated the day of capitalism’s comeuppance, when its crisis-inducing shortcomings would be laid squarely at its door and people would reject it for a system with more humane tradeoffs. Political economist and social theorist MARTIJN KONINGS cautions that that day has not yet arrived. Even “neoliberalism” – a general rubrick for the ideas and practices that have expanded the scope of the market while loosening the regulations that mitigate its failures – will not be banished anytime soon. In is discussion with political theorist Rafael Khachaturian, he describes the institutional changes that have entrenched neoliberal policies, but also its inherent political appeal as an ideology, with its promise of freedom from corrupt government control and its savvy way of blaming capitalism’s crises on the very measures taken to rescue it from collapse. This will allow it to survive the COVID pandemic largely intact, notwithstanding shifts in public opinion toward greater intervention in the economy.