Bungacast

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/417/ Has India passed peak Modi? ft. Achin Vanaik Jun 11, 2024

Show notes

On India's election and a blow for the BJP.

Esteemed writer and social activist Achin Vanaik is back on Bungacast to unpick India's monumental, seven-week-long electoral process in which over 600m people took part.

How did the ruling Hindu nationalist BJP lose its majority?
Is there really a cult of personality around Modi?
How does the BJP differ in important ways from Western 'national conservatives'?
Does the BJP losing seats reflect a loss of support for Hindutva ideology?
Modi claims India will reach developed economy status by 2047. Is this true?
How bad are problems of under- and un-employment, especially for the youth?
What is the nature of India's "crony oligarchy"?
How does the National Population Register threaten to divest people of citizenship?
How does the BJP see Israel as an example for itself?

Links:

/198/ Universal India ft. Achin Vanaik
In State Repression and Its Justification, India and Israel Have Much in Common, Achin Vanaik, The Wire
Narendra Modi Is Preparing New Attacks on Democratic Rights, Achin Vanaik, Jacobin

/416/ Aufhebonus Bonus (sample) Jun 06, 2024

Show notes

On your questions & criticism regarding pro-Palestine protests. [Patreon Exclusive] In this episode we focus on the discussion generated by our episode that came out in early May on the protests on US campuses. We discuss the issues along a few axes:

How do ideas of victimhood relate to the material reality of international politics?
What really are the aims of the protesters and how likely are they to achieve them?
Are we cynical in our approach or conclusions?
How do the protests relate to populism and the end of the End of History?
What is the proper basis of nationhood?
How do these protests relate to the millennial Left?

We also deal with your points on Civil War, the state funding of culture, and whether Joe Rogan is a good male role model. Readings:

Vulnerability as Ideology, Peter Ramsay, Northern Star
The victimological imagination, Matthew B. Crawford, Substack

/415/ Left-Populism That Works? (II) ft. Juan David Rojas Jun 04, 2024

Show notes

On MORENA and Claudia Sheinbaum's huge victory.

Mexico has elected its first woman president, tasked with extending the hugely popular AMLO'S legacy. What are her prospects and challenges? We ask:

What was the effect of NAFTA on Mexico, and particularly manufacturing?
How is US-China competition playing out in Mexico?
Why did Trump and leftist AMLO get along? What about Scheinbaum and Trump?
How does the politics of migration play out in Mexico?
How come there is no hardline Mexican right, especially given the problems of crime and drug trafficking?
Can other countries follow MORENA's example of centre-left success?

Links:

Mexico’s Political Revolution, Juan David Rojas, Compact
AMLO and Mexico’s Fourth Transformation, Juan David Rojas, American Affairs
Lessons of the AMLO-Trump Bromance, Juan David Rojas, Compact
/413/ Left-Populism That Works? (I) ft. Roger Lancaster

/414/ Zone of Banality or the Authority of Evil? May 31, 2024

Show notes

On Zone of Interest and Holocaust film. [Patreon Exclusive] We discuss the winner of the Oscar for Best International Feature Film – one that split opinion, among critics and on the pod too!

How does the film fit in the pantheon of Holocaust films? Is it a Holocaust film?
How well does it deal with its obvious subject matter: the banality of evil?
Is the film neutral and detached or preachy, condescending, moralising?
What to make of the commentary around the film, including director Jonathan Glazer's statements? How does it relate to Israel/Palestine?
What to make of present-day Auschwitz? Should it be preserved?

Link:

The Zone of Interest is an extreme form of 'Holokitsch', Richard Brody, New Yorker
Is The Zone of Interest simply uninteresting? Toby Marshall, Substack
The Zone of Interest is about the danger of ignoring atrocities – including in Gaza, Naomi Klein, The Guardian
The Zone of Interest Reminds Us How Easy It Is to Ignore a Genocide on Your Doorstep, Juliet Jacques, Novara
The Banality of Evil is No Longer Banal, Maren Thom, Café americain
One-star review of Zone of Interest

/413/ Left-Populism That Works? (I) ft. Roger Lancaster May 30, 2024

Show notes

On Mexico's elections. [Full episode at patreon.com/bungacast] Mexico goes to the polls this Sunday with the ruling centre-left MORENA party holding a commanding lead. Anthropologist Roger Lancaster joins us to preview the election and look at outgoing President AMLO's record.

What are the stakes in this election?
Has Mexico bucked the trend of class realignment? Where is the 'Brahmin Left'?
What is "republican austerity" and has this actually combatted corruption?
What do make of AMLO's use of the military? Militarising public life or domesticating the military?
What has AMLO done for the working class? And what might it do for itself?
What is AMLO's populism and has he rekindled class consciousness?

Links:

The AMLO Project, Edwin Ackerman, Sidecar
The Mexican Question, Ramon Centeno, Sidecar
The Struggle to Be Gay—in Mexico, for Example, Roger Lancaster

/412/ No Future But Future Music ft. Simon Reynolds May 28, 2024

Show notes

On Futuromania and closing and opening of musical horizons. We talk to renowned music critic Simon Reynolds about his new book. A counterpart of sorts to his famous Retromania (2011), Futuromania looks at the exciting futuristic music of the past and present. We discuss its themes to try understand whether the culture is still about to throw up something new.

Is talk about popular music stuck between the poles of “rockism” and “poptimism”?
How did Donna Summer and Giorgio Moroder invent "electronic dance music"?
Why is "future music" good? What are its pitfalls?
How did Daft Punk run out of futurity?
Why is Auto-Tune actually not the worst invention?
How are genres like trap technically exciting but thematically glum?
Is there any way of bringing the future back?

Links:

Futuromania: Electronic Dreams, Desiring Machines, and Tomorrow's Music Today, Simon Reynolds
blissblog, Simon Reynolds blog
Futuromania companion playlist with Reynolds' introductions, on NTS: https://www.nts.live/shows/guests/episodes/simon-reynolds-9th-april-2024
Futuromania companion playlist on Spotify
No Bells music blog

/411/ What Kind of American Are You? May 16, 2024

Show notes

On Alex Garland’s new film, Civil War. [Patreon Exclusive] The boys discuss a film that seems designed to say something in the context of a US election year. But what? We ask:

What kind of film is this: a dystopian fantasy, a war movie, a road movie?
Why the focus on the media? Does the film celebrate or satirise journalists?
Does Garland’s dystopia tell us anything about the landscape of US politics today?
Why is political polarisation between liberals and populists seen in terms of civil war?
What would a civil war look like in geopolitical terms, along the lines Garland suggests?
What side would you choose?

Links:

Where will America's Civil War be fought?, Michael Lind, UnHerd
The Civil War Will Not Be Mediated, Nina Power, Compact
Civil War is a terrifying film, but Trump: The Sequel will be a real-life horror show, Simon Tisdall, The Guardian

/410/ Reading Club: Deutscher's Stalin May 14, 2024

Show notes

On Isaac Deutscher's classic Stalin: A Political Biography. [Patreon Tier III & IV Exclusive] We start off dealing with your questions from the first two Reading Clubs of the year, before Phil takes us through the famous biography of the Soviet leader. We discuss:

Deutscher's work in historical context
Stalin’s parents' experience as serfs and the significance of his boyhood education in an Orthodox seminary
How the oppression of the Russian Empire and the promises of Soviet industrialisation shaped young Stalin's lifecourse
Whether, compared to other Bolshevik leaders, Stalin would have succeeded anytime, anywhere
Was Stalin honest in his commitment to the revolution? Was Trotsky right that Stalin was just a cynic?
How did Stalin compare to the other leaders at Yalta, such as the aristocratic Churchill?
How do we compare Stalin to Cromwell or Napoleon?
And what's behind cheeky internet Stalinism today?

Links:

Message of the Non-Jewish Jew, Isaac Deutscher, Marxists.org
On Orwell: 1984 - The Mysticism of Cruelty, Isaac Deutscher, Marxists.org
I must start completely alone: Gonzalo Pozo on Isaac Deutscher’s wartime years in London, LRB

/409/ Palestine, Protest, Repression: The Wider Context May 07, 2024

Show notes

On US campus protest, the brutalisation of Gaza, and whether this is an age of war. Join us: patreon.com/bungacast Bunga boys Alex, George and Phil debate the matter of the day. We ask:

Is the police repression and associated censorship (the anti-semitism bill) a reflection of the fact the content of the protest unsettles the establishment? Why?
Why is the Left breaking with Biden and the Dems over this and not before?
How do these student protests compare to BLM? And how do they compare to those of the late 60s and Vietnam?
What should those in Western countries do in response to Israel’s war?
Is the Palestinian struggle dead?
What are the risks of regional war? And does Israel's assault on Gaza presage a new era of warfare?

Links:

The Triumph of American Idealism, Alex Hochuli, Damage
Like it or not, the politics of war is upon us, David Jamieson, Conter
Express Train to Nowhere: Class and the Crisis of the Modern Jewish Soul, Samuel Biagetti, American Affairs
Is this How We Can STOP Genocide Joe?, Doug Lain interviews Dr. Elektra Kostopoulos & Dave Fox, Sublation Media
The Left Cannot Make Use of the Gaza War, Benjamin Studebaker, Sublation Media
Meet the new Left, who think Hamas are good and that Swastikas are woke, Ryan Zickgraf, Telegraph
Their Fight, Not Ours, Alex Gourevitch, The Northern Star

/408/ Was It Raining When You Fled Paris? ft. Peter Gourevitch Apr 30, 2024

Show notes

On the earth-shaking events of the 20th century, through a personal lens. Regular contributor Alex Gourevitch sits down with political scientist Peter Gourevitch to talk about their shared family history.

Why did their grandparents/great-grandparents become Mensheviks?
How did one half of the family leave the USSR and the other half remain?
What was life like in exile in Berlin before the Nazis took power? And how did the family know to flee?
What was distinctive about fascism and the terroristic assault on democracy?
How was the escape from Paris just like the film Casablanca?
What happened to those who remained in the Soviet Union and how did one member meet death via torture?
What is the legacy of Menshevism – and what is the relationship between socialism and democracy?

Links:

Who Lived, Who Died? My Family's Struggle with Stalin and Hitler, Peter Gourevitch, Dio Press

Full episode for subscribers only. Go to patreon.com/bungacast. Members who sign up for $7/mo get 4 original paywalled episodes a month and a free subscription to Damage magazine.

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