Bungacast

Latest Episodes:

/116/ Mr Bunga Goes to Washington (1) ft. Nick Frayn Apr 07, 2020

Show notes

In the first of an occasional series of episodes on the US presidential election and the Left, we talk to Nick Frayn, a volunteer with the Bernie Sanders campaign in New England. How have things gone on the campaign trail? What is next for the Democratic primaries delayed by the corona outbreak? Can Bernie regain ground in the primaries against Joe Biden? How will the corona crisis impact the Democratic primaries?

Readings:

How the coronavirus pandemic is disrupting the US Democratic primary calendar, FT
Biden Wins Coronavirus Primary, The Atlantic
Joe Biden sweeps key primaries and moves closer to nomination, The Guardian

Excerpt: /115/ Singapore Shangri-La ft. Lee Jones Mar 31, 2020

Show notes

This is a sample. The full episode is available by subscribing at patreon.com/bungacast Singapore is held up as a free-market utopia: rich, orderly and clean. But the reality is quite different. Why does Singapore exert such a magnetism for neoliberals, when its reality strays from orthodox prescriptions? What and who made this model 'global city', and how does its communist and anti-colonial past lead to its hyper-capitalist present?

Excerpt: /114/ Reading Club: The Light That Failed Mar 27, 2020

Show notes

This episode is for our $10 and up patrons. Go to patreon.com/bungacast for access. On the end of the Age of Imitation.

We discuss Ivan Krastev and Stephen Holmes' The Light That Failed: A Reckoning and their arguments for why liberal democracy stopped being the model to follow - in Eastern Europe, Russia and even the USA.

Thanks for all the questions, they are addressed in the last third of the episode.

/113/ Globoville ft. Richard Williams Mar 24, 2020

Show notes

On global cities. Global cities flaunt themselves to global capital and are shaped by it. They are self-conscious and eager to transmit 'globalness'. But why? And how has the city under globalisation been reshaped? What is the role of money and power - not to mention sex and culture? And does the sameyness of global cities now mean that medium and small cities are where we should be looking for cultural and political change?

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Excerpt: /112/ Ideologies of the Near Future Mar 17, 2020

Show notes

On political conflict over the next decade

This is a subscriber-only show. Sign up at patreon.com/bungacast

We debate what ideological contestation is going to look like in the next 2/5/10 years. Will liberalism adopt Silicon Valley solutionism? Does the centre-right become fully nationalist? And the far right have a future if that happens? And where does the left go next?

/111/ Big Money Talk: The Case for MMT ft. Bill Mitchell Mar 10, 2020

Show notes

Modern Monetary Theory (MMT) has been hailed by some and scorned by others as offering a new framework to understand the financial system. But what is specifically 'modern' about MMT, and how does it differ from rival accounts of the financial economy? We talk to Bill Mitchell, one of the leading proponents of MMT, who gives us an introductory rundown, plus tells us why the Japanese economy is unfairly maligned and explains what the future has in store for MMT as its inexorably advances against orthodox rivals. -> Our earlier episode with Doug Henwood, a critic of MMT, can be found here: Episode 68 -> The episode with Bill Mitchell's co-author, Thomas Fazi, is here: Episode 38 Readings:

Reclaiming the State, Bill Mitchell and Thomas Fazi (book)
MMT Has Been Around for Decades. Here’s Why It Just Caught Fire, Ben Holland & Matthew Boesler, Bloomberg
An MMT response on what causes inflation, FT
What you need to know about modern monetary theory, Gavyn Davies, FT
MMT Is Already Helping, Pavlina R. Tcherneva, Jacobin

Excerpt: /110/ Three Articles: De-democratising Mar 03, 2020

Show notes

In this latest Three Articles, we discuss American democracy and those who pretend to save it or undermine it.

Readings:

It’s time to give the elites a bigger say in choosing the president, Julia Azari, WaPo
Michael Bloomberg: Smirking Id Of America’s Elites, Matt Purple, The American Conservative
Bernie Sanders Was Right to Talk About Wage Slavery. We Should Talk About It, Too., Alex Gourevitch, Jacobin

/109/ Bunga Goes Ballard ft. Simon Sellars Feb 25, 2020

Show notes

On Applied Ballardianism.

Is it J.G. Ballard's world? Bunga talks Ballard with Simon Sellars, author of a new book on the great British sci-fi novelist J.G. Ballard. Urban decay, social breakdown, consumerism as social control and the Interzone.

Opening passage is taken from Ballard's 2000 novel 'Super-Cannes'.

Reading:

Applied Ballardianism, Simon Sellars, Urbanomic

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/108/ Coronageddon? ft. Mark Honigsbaum / Lee Jones Feb 11, 2020

Show notes

On pandemics, panics, and China.

The 2019 Novel Coronavirus is yet another new epidemic to appear on the scene this century. What accounts for their increasing frequency, and who decides if an epidemic is classed as a pandemic? More importantly, what governs that choice? The WHO and the whole intergovernmental management of health has 'securitised' these questions. Are they privileging the free flow of capital over public health? And what of China's draconian response and lockdown of Wuhan - is it effective? And who will bear the blame if things go wrong? Might Coronavirus become a threat to Xi Jingping and the Chinese regime?

Readings:

‘Rumormonger’ Doctor Who Raised the Alarm Says He Has Coronavirus, Sixth Tone
'Hero who told the truth': Chinese rage over coronavirus death of whistleblower doctor, The Guardian
The Free Market Isn’t Up to the Coronavirus Challenge, Leigh Phillips, Jacobin
Locked-down Wuhan and why we always overplay the threat of the new, Kenan Malik, The Guardian
Coronavirus: nature fights back, Michael Roberts blog

Guests' books:

Mark Honigsbaum: The Pandemic Century: One Hundred Years of Panic, Hysteria and Hubris

Lee Jones (& Shahar Hameiri): Governing Borderless Threats: Non-Traditional Security and the Politics of State Transformation

Running order:

(00:44) Introduction
(06:21) Mark Honigsbaum
(38:48) Lee Jones

/107/ Ireland’s Return to History ft. Colin Coulter Feb 07, 2020

Show notes

On Ireland's elections.

With Sinn Fein riding high in the polls, are we looking at an upset? Is this a populist upsurge in Ireland, finally, more than a decade after the start of the crisis? We discuss what Ireland's 'end of history' was like and how the 'Celtic Tiger' economy sustained it; and look at how the country was the EU's "model prisoner" of austerity. Are there new stirrings? And what are the prospects for unification? Readings:

Mary Lou McDonald could take Sinn Féin into the political mainstream, Jason Walsh, The New European
This Month’s Elections in Ireland Are a Historic Opportunity, Michael Taft, Jacobin
The End of Irish History, Colin Coulter et al., Manchester UP (Edited book; pdf)

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