TALKING POLITICS

Latest Episodes:

Talking Politics: HISTORY OF IDEAS Apr 23, 2020

Show notes

A short trailer to introduce a brand new podcast called Talking Politics: HISTORY OF IDEAS. In each episode, David Runciman focuses on one writer and one piece of writing. The series of twelve will explore some of the most important thinkers and prominent ideas lying behind modern politics – from Hobbes to Gandhi, from democracy to patriarchy, from revolution to lock down. Plus David talks about the crises – revolutions, wars, depressions, pandemics – that generated these new ways of political thinking. To hear the whole series, please subscribe to Talking Politics: HISTORY OF IDEAS. From the team that brought you Talking Politics: a history of ideas to help make sense of what’s happening today.

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Lockdownonomics Apr 23, 2020

Show notes

David and Helen talk to the economist Diane Coyle about the long-term consequences of lockdown, for the economy, for society and for our well-being. How can we measure the costs? Who are likely to be the biggest losers? And what will it mean for how we structure our economies in future? Plus we discuss what will happen if we pull back from global supply chain and we ask whether inflation is on its way.

Talking Points:

The crisis is revealing weaknesses in the global economy.

Previous events flagged vulnerabilities of global supply chains but not to this extent.
And none of this seemed to be common knowledge in political circles.
It has also further revealed existing inequalities.

Will we have the data that allows us to track how we are doing as we come out of it?

Even collecting the normal data will be difficult. For example, is an employee on furlough employed or unemployed?
The Office of Budget Responsibility said that GDP might fall by a third, a generation of economic growth gone.
Diane is resistant to the idea that there is a tradeoff between health and the economy. We should focus on what this will do to people’s lifetime opportunities.

Research indicates that there is a scarring effect for people entering the economy in moments of crisis.

The young will likely be the biggest losers here.
What can policy do to mitigate this?

How should policymakers respond if the economy does come roaring back?

You might look to parallels such as the Weimar period. Or the financial crisis.
One of the striking things after ‘07/’08 was how little changed.
The mistake would be to carry on as before.

If globalization was an age in which consumer interests prevailed, this is going to be an age in which producer interests prevail.

This may allow for a different long-term economic approach to a number of issues over which there have been significant political issues in the last few decades.
Will we come out of this crisis with a better way to value things like care?

After the lockdown, will people go back to spending money?

Or will they think they need to increase their savings in the event of a future crisis?
What does productivity mean in an economy where ⅘ of activity is services?
There’s no real way to go back to the way things were—and there are already signs of change.

Mentioned in this Episode:

Further Learning:

And as ever, recommended reading curated by our friends at the LRB can be found here:

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Adam Tooze/Shockwave Apr 20, 2020

Show notes

David and Helen talk to Adam Tooze about what we know about the crisis that we didn't know a month ago, and what we still don't have much of a clue about. From fights inside the French government to the fate of the planet, from shale gas to corona bonds, we try to join up the dots. Plus a small update recorded after news of the oil price-drop. Read 'Shockwave' by Adam Tooze in the LRB https://www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v42/n08/adam-tooze/shockwave.

Talking Points:

The dominant reality is the scale of the unemployment rate, especially in the U.S.

Michigan’s unemployment rate soared to 25% in a single month.
We have often seen an extraordinary policy response.

The Fed’s initial policy response was a failure: they didn’t stabilize share and bond markets. But it has now, at least in part, succeeded.

It also seems to have stabilized dollar funding markets.
The Fed did in about 3 days what took roughly a year in ‘07/’08.
Will these actions make democratic politics more difficult in the medium term?

The Fed’s ability to act in certain ways has depended on congressional cooperation.

This could change if Biden were elected. Trump’s presidency enables the GOP to behave more pragmatically.
The shale industry is being bailed out—this is a tricky issue for the Democratic party.

Is data the new oil?

The tensions between Russia and Saudi crashed into the virus.
It’s hard to see how oil prices will recover any time soon.
Are we entering the oil endgame? If so, seizing market share immediately is much more important.
The oil and the financial elements of this crisis are closely connected.

Has anyone moved the dial on corona bonds?

The Germans didn’t want the question to be put, but the French went ahead and did it.
But Macron’s recent interview with the Financial Times was vague. How serious are they?
How does the Eurozone engage in common borrowing without engaging in common taxation?

Mentioned in this Episode:

Further Learning:

And as ever, recommended reading curated by our friends at the LRB can be found here: lrb.co.uk/talking

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

Nate Silver Apr 18, 2020

Show notes

David and Helen talk to 538's Nate Silver about how to read the pandemic data and what they mean for politics. What do we know now that we didn't know six weeks ago? How should we model the future trajectory of the disease? Where does it leave the election in November? A conversation about everything from death rates to spring breaks, and from Belgium to Biden.

Talking Points:

Are the COVID models we are using now better than they were before?

People don’t always understand the conditional predictions behind different models.
There is still a lot of uncertainty: almost every parameter of this disease remains unknown.
It looks like the downward tail of this disease might be less steep than the upward tail.

What is the true fatality rate?

We are still behind on testing—we don’t know how many cases are undiagnosed.
This number is important for making decisions about opening things up again.
The number of deaths as a share of the population probably tells you more than deaths as a share of cases.
A lot of deaths are still being missed.

Places that had cases earlier before there was consensus on social distancing will have worse outbreaks.

Factors such as age distribution and maybe even weather might also affect things.
It’s still hard to tease out the effect of different variables, but eventually we should be able to make some better inferences.

International coverage of the US doesn’t reflect how empowered state and local governments are. In some sense, they are the most important units.

Despite the lack of federal response, state and local responses have been fairly good—at least in a lot of places.
Most countries locked down at roughly the same point in the disease cycle. The country by country differences may be more felt in the recovery phase.

How will the pandemic affect the upcoming U.S. election?

Trump’s approval rating improved slightly, but only slightly. It’s a smaller ‘rally around the flag’ effect than in other countries.
Will the fall bring recovery or a second wave?
Will the contingencies or the fundamentals explain the outcome?

Mentioned in this Episode:

Further Learning:

And as ever, recommended reading curated by our friends at the LRB can be found here: lrb.co.uk/talking

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

British Politics: The Big Reset? Apr 16, 2020

Show notes

We discuss whether British politics is about to undergo a fundamental shift. Are we seeing a new role for the state? Have the lines between the parties started to blur? What will be the long-term consequences of the economic decisions taken in the last few weeks? Plus we explore whether the crisis points in the direction of more democracy, less democracy or a different kind of democracy. With Helen

Thompson and Tom McTague of the Atlantic.

Talking Points:

The government has taken on both new powers and new responsibilities. For now they are in tandem. But will that last?

The role of the state has come to the fore.
Some states can’t keep their citizens safe. Others can, but perhaps at the expense of privacy or other individual liberties.

The state has always had coercive power, but the state has not always acted as finance or employer of last resort.

Can the state retreat from this kind of economic responsibility?
This crisis means something different for those who have secure employment and those who do not, at least in Britain.
There will be a contested politics around who the state acted to protect economically.

Has this crisis scrambled the division between the UK political parties?

The Labour and Conservative bases are experiencing the crisis in different ways.
Labour’s base is younger and more urban.
Rural people are more insulated, but older people are more vulnerable.
Younger people are more comfortable with government intervention, but they also may need the government to open sooner.

Some people will want ‘normality’ back; others might not. But normality isn’t coming back.

What does it mean to live in the world with a significant threat of disease?
There are no good choices available politically.
Distributional economic questions will be at the fore.

How does Britain open up again?

Starmer is pressing for more parliamentary scrutiny.
Right now democracy is reduced to its bare bones: what comes next?
This crisis has featured authoritarian decision-making by executives, informed by experts. And these decisions have been broadly accepted.
Broadening out the executive decision making may also be important.
Boris is incredibly dominant over the Conservative Party and the cabinet. When he comes back, we’re likely to have a ‘foot-to-the-floor’ Johnson government.

Mentioned in this Episode:

Further Learning:

And as ever, recommended reading curated by our friends at the LRB can be found here: lrb.co.uk/talking

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

In Praise of Hilary Mantel Apr 12, 2020

Show notes

In an Easter special David and Helen discuss their love of Hilary Mantel's Thomas Cromwell trilogy, and in particular the final volume The Mirror and the Light. Kings, queens, power, patronage, ghosts, myths, geopolitics, dynasties, religion, sex, bureaucracy, cruelty, death and Machiavelli - it's all here and we try to bring it all together.

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

Can America Cope? Apr 09, 2020

Show notes

Michael Lewis Updated Apr 05, 2020

Show notes

Another chance to hear the prophetic interview we recorded with Michael Lewis late last year, when he warned about the risks to us all of what the Trump presidency was doing to the capacity of the American state to cope with a disaster. David and Helen reflect on how that warning looks today and what it means for the fate of Trump's presidency and for the future of American politics.

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

States of Emergency Apr 02, 2020

Show notes

David talks to Lea Ypi in Berlin and Helen Thompson in London about the various states of emergency that have been declared around the world. We discuss the theory and practice of emergency political powers: When are they justified? How can they be legitimated? When should they end? Plus we explore what the history of Roman dictatorship can teach us about the present crisis and we ask what it means when elections start getting cancelled.

Talking Points:

As COVID spreads, it is ushering in states of political emergency—everywhere.

Can we distinguish between legitimate and illegitimate emergency powers?
States of emergency are, by definition, outside of the rules.

Historically, emergencies were supposed to be compatible with some form of rule by the people.

A legitimate emergency needs to be a public, where the public is seen as non-factional.
There also needs to be an existential threat to the political community.
The nature of the regime is also important: the people need to authorize the emergency.
When it comes to legitimate emergency powers, there are two important criteria: time limits and proportionality.

The classical Roman dictatorship was designed to meet the above criteria.

A dictator was not the same as a tyrant.
Dictatorship facilitated speedy crisis response.
The dictator was supposed to abdicate power as soon as he could.
The dictator was an outsider. Today, emergency powers are being assumed by existing governments.

In this case, the emergency (and existential threat) concerns healthcare systems.

Once an emergency is called, the expansion of powers can be an emergency of its own.
In the Roman republic, the dictator could suspend laws; he couldn’t create new ones. Today, particularly on the economic side, the government can act in completely unprecedented ways.

The real danger for representative democracy in this crisis is if consensus breaks down over how to deal with the emergency.

Popular legitimation requires that politics are contestable.
Britain did suspend general elections during the war. But not during the Spanish flu.
The United States has never suspended national elections.
We are more invested in elections now because the franchise is much more expansive.

Does the emergency fade in and out as the disease comes and goes?

This might not be a one off thing.
The longer the emergency lasts, and the more we do things differently, the harder it becomes to connect our pre-emergency lives to our post-emergency lives.
Has this crisis blurred the lines between democracies and non-democracies? Or, perhaps, brought the blurring that already existed into sharper focus?

Mentioned in this Episode:

Further Learning:

Our episode with Tom Holland on the Roman Republic
Lea’s op ed for the Guardian
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Tara Westover/Educated Mar 29, 2020

Show notes

We catch up with Tara to reflect on what her experience of being educated without going to school means for a world where so many kids are being kept out of school. Should we be trying to replicate the education they are missing or should we be trying something new? And will the current crisis bridge or deepen existing political divides in the US? Plus another chance to hear the interview we recorded with Tara in February 2018 about her extraordinary book Educated.

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

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