The Chatterbox

Only a few years ago, European elites were patting themselves on the back for fending off the

tide of right-wing anti-system parties (often styled as populists). But recent polls in France,

Germany and the United Kingdom show that that the far right is once again gaining traction,

thanks in no small part centrist governments that have demoralized the population and

legitimized xenophobia. David Broder, author of Mussolini's Grandchildren and European editor

of Jacobin, wrote a wide-ranging essay on this for The New York Times. I spoke to David about

both the dismal decisions of mainstream parties and also possible alternatives.

Journalist Gil Duran’s newsletter “The Nerd Reich” documents the latest developments in anti-democracy extremism within Silicon Valley. These extreme views include calls for accelerationism: the idea that unregulated capitalism and unfettered technological advancement should accelerate as quickly as possible, in order to bring about a new world order. While this sounds conspiratorial, Duran says these views are promoted by some of the most influential voices in the tech sector. We’ll talk about the political implications of billionaire tech moguls’ actions in the Bay Area, the U.S. and the world — and how we can fight back.

Guests:

Gil Duran, journalist and author of the newsletter "The Nerd Reich"; author of the forthcoming book, “The Nerd Reich: Silicon Valley Fascism and the War on Democracy”

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If you think the American Dream is dead, then you probably don’t know the story of Lu Zhang. Born in Mongolia and educated in China, Zhang came to Stanford as a graduate student, struck it rich as a young tech entrepreneur and is now managing partner of her own early-stage venture fund. In our conversation, Zhang makes a compelling case for why Silicon Valley remains the world’s most important innovation ecosystem—even as she warns that restrictive immigration policies threaten to strangle the very talent pipeline that made her remarkable success possible. She’s bullish on AI, bearish on energy infrastructure, and refreshingly candid about the capital market bubble that everyone in tech pretends doesn’t exist. So does Zhang really exist or is she a bot designed to promote the American Dream? She says she’s real. I believe her. Do you?

• Wark, McKenzie. A Hacker Manifesto. Harvard University Press, 2004.
• Wark, McKenzie. Gamer Theory. Harvard University Press, 2007.
• Wark, McKenzie. Capital is Dead: Is This Something Worse?. Verso, 2019.
• Wark, McKenzie. Reverse Cowgirl. Semiotext(e), 2020.
• Wark, McKenzie. Raving. Duke University Press, 2023.
• Wark, McKenzie, and Kathy Acker. I'm Very Into You: Correspondence 1995–1996. Semiotext(e), 2015.

Who makes money out of football: broadcasters, clubs, players, or investment banks? Why are clubs selling their own assets to themselves? How do fans and players take collective action to resist the further financialisation of the sport? How important are local and foreign fans to the Premier League's boom? Is it inevitable that the Premier League will go bust?

Dr James Jackson is a Hallsworth Research Fellow in Politics at University of Manchester. He joins Dr Remi Edwards and Josh White to discuss his article 'A league made in the economy's image: destabilised stability and the English Premier League's Minsky moment' (2025) co-authored with Dr James Silverwood and published in British Politics journal. They discuss the basis of football's financialisation in Thatcherism, the enduring importance of fans in making and disrupting the 'product' of Premier League football, and what might cause the Premier League's bubble to burst.

Works cited in this episode include:

David Webber, ‘Playing on the break’: Karl Polanyi and the double-movement ‘Against Modern Football’ (2015)

Edwards & Jackson, The political economy of everyday life (2022)

Cox & Philippou, Measuring the resilience of English Premier league clubs to economic recessions (2022)

Kennedy & Kennedy, Towards a Marxist political economy of football supporters (2010)

'New Thinking in Political Economy' is a monthly podcast showcasing cutting-edge political economy research that helps us to understand the world around us.

This episode is produced by the SPERI Presents… committee, including Remi Edwards, Chris Saltmarsh, Josh White, Frank Maracchione, and Andrew Hindmoor. This episode was edited by Remi Edwards, Josh White and Chris Saltmarsh. Music and audio by Andy_Gambino. Hosted on Acast. See https://acast.com/privacy for more information.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Max Pearson presents a collection of the week's Witness History interviews from the BBC World Service.

Our guest is literature lecturer Dr Hetta Howes on major literary hoaxes around the world.

We hear about Howard Hughes' fake autobiography, the Salt Cathedral of Zipaquirá in Colombia and how the Indian musician Ravi Shankar taught George Harrison the sitar.

Plus, the Indian woman who led her country's first delegation to the United Nations, the Premier League's first female photographer and how Toy Story revolutionised animation.

Contributors:

(Photo: Clifford Irving leaving the Chelsea Hotel in New York City, followed by news crews in 1972. Credit: Bettmann Archive / Getty Images)

This programme has been updated since the original broadcast, with concert dates and song writing credits corrected.

Tristan Hughes is joined by Dr. Cameron McNeil, Mesoamerican archaeologist, to explore cacao, in ancient Mesoamerican societies like the Maya, Aztecs, and Olmecs. They discuss how was used as food, drink, currency, and in ritualistic practices, and learn about its journey from South America to becoming a highly valued commodity in Mesoamerica.

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Origins of Beer

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Pyramid of the Sun

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Presented by Tristan Hughes. The audio editor and producer is Joseph Knight. The senior producer is Anne-Marie Luff.

All music courtesy of Epidemic Sounds

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Danny and Derek welcome to the show Molly Lambert, creator of the JENNAWORLD podcast, to talk about the rise of the modern porn industry and its roots in L.A.’s San Fernando Valley. They discuss the medium’s origins in underground stag films and the porno chic era; the shift to home video and the corporate studio model; breakout stars like Ginger Lynn Allen and Jenna Jameson; porn as an outsider industry mirroring Hollywood; gender, labor, and power in late-20th-century media; the relationship between pornography and evolving feminist politics; porn’s role in the VHS–Betamax war; and how the internet, OnlyFans, and content platforms have affected a formerly professionalized industry.

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Emotion, including fear, is an important part of us. What we fear and how we react can be shaped and influenced, though. On this episode, we talk with Ruth DeFoster of the University of Minnesota, co-author, with Natashia Swalve, of The Fear Knot: How Science, History, and Culture Shape Our Fears and How to Get Unstuck.