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The Laura Flanders Show — Society & Culture
The Laura Flanders Show

Award winning host, author and journalist Laura Flanders interviews forward-thinking people from the world of politics, business, culture and social movements. The show explores actionable models for creating a better world by reporting on the people and movements driving systemic change. We spotlight the solutions of tomorrow, today. The show airs on PBS stations in over 80% of the US market, and airs on 40+ community radio stations, and is available on YouTube and as a podcast. Online subscribers receive lots of video and audio web exclusives. Recent specials include “Indigenous People’s Power”, “James Baldwin: Lessons for the US”, “Building Public Trust for Public Health”, “Countering the Coup From the Grassroots Up”. Recent special guests include Representative Karen Bass, environmental activist Jane Fonda, economist Robert Reich, author/activist Naomi Klein, agrarian reformer Shirley Sherrod, novelist Arundhati Roy, economist Michael Hudson and ’Next System” theorist Gar Alperovitz.

Latest Episodes:

May Day Report: 100+ Movements Go Beyond the Moment May 05, 2017

Show notes

A May Day Special Report from the Laura Flanders Show features the mass mobilization of the people on International Worker's Day! Before May Day 2017, we talk to organizers about what they imagine will come from this year's day of springtime resistance. People are rising up to call for transformative justice, and they are working towards it in new and creative ways. May Day urges us to dream bigger, to set aside conservative notions of what is feasible and focus instead on what is just. As always, we're forward-thinking media, looking to uplift solutions and solvers to a higher stage.

This episode follows organizers as they present their visions of a better world - and what they're doing to build it. They raise the question: how can we work together to build the future available to everyone, meaning trans people, immigrants, workers, indigenous people, veterans, people of color, and women? From the broad based #BeyondtheMoment coalition uniting movements under the banner of Black liberation and anti-militarism, to the Day without Immigrants, which paints a chilling portrait of what our communities could become, this day is about what we'll build to exist 200 hundred years from now. Featuring Thaís Marquis (Movemiento Coseche), UPROSE Brooklyn (Grassroots Global Justice Alliance), the New Sanctuary Coalition NYC, Agunda Okeyo (Hater Free NYC), Claude Copeland (Iraq Veterans Against the War), and more. #MayDay to #MemorialDay. For links go to our website. Or better yet, become a member!

After the Protests, Community Building and Sustainability Apr 28, 2017

Show notes

On this week's episode, a question of how we can use direct action to create and sustain long-range, inclusive and effective movements with guests L.A. Kauffman and Jesse Myerson and later in the show Looking for leadership towards a just transition? Community building tactics for survival resilience and peace? Don’t look up, Look Down for expertise, say two organizers and they’re upbeat! Esteban Kelly of the US Federation of Worker Owned Coops and Elizabeth Yampierre from UPROSE.

Check out the Laura Flanders TV Show for the full interview with L.A. Kauffman and Jesse Myerson and a featured video on the 2017 Climate March. Stay tuned throughout the month of May for more from Esteban Kelly and Elizabeth Yampierre during our membership drive kicking off May Day 2017.

Ireland's New Rising: An Exclusive Report from The Laura Flanders Show Apr 21, 2017

Show notes

With the news around Brexit, we revisit an episode filmed last year in Ireland and reflect upon the Easter Rising of 1916. The question of Irish sovereignty still looms large. New challenges face the Irish in the wake of the 2008 financial crisis, and slashes to public spending in the North have ignited fresh waves of resistance. In this special report, Laura Flanders returns to Ireland, 30 years after first reporting on the so-called "Troubles". With photographer Paula Allen she takes a fresh look at Irish nationalism through the stories of socialists, anti-imperialists, anti-austerity activists and several generations of republicans. With Fintan O'Toole of The Irish Times, Sinn Fein TD Eoin O'Broin, Clare Daly TD, and more. Made possible by the Pulitzer Center for Crisis Reporting #pulitzercenter.

Restore, Renew and Reparations: Adaku Utah and J Bob Alotta on Healing Justice Apr 14, 2017

Show notes

The chorus for radical action demands a versatile effort: it needs people power, initiative, and funding, but if we're caught between offense and defense, how do we take time to insure the well-being of our most vulnerable communities?

The Laura Flanders show this week features Adaku Utah, founder of healing collective Harriet's Apothecary, and J Bob Alotta, executive director of the Astraea Lesbian Foundation for Justice, which supports grassroots LGBTQ efforts across the globe. Utah and Alotta discuss what healing and healing justice would look like for communities under attack and in particular, for trans women of color and gender non conforming people. It's not enough to fund direct action or leadership training, say our guests; activist organizations have a responsibility to help their concerned communities heal from trauma, and to empower them towards fellowship and autonomy. Adaku Utah is a master herbalist, educator, and artist who is "armed with the legacies of a long line of healers, witches, priestesses and fearless women who refused to shut up." J Bob Alotta is a filmmaker, global activist, and one of the organizers of the Women's March on Washington.

Subscirbe to the weekly podcast, access the transcripts and to watch the TV show including the videos referenced in today's show go to: http://LauraFlanders.com

Sign up for the show's newsletter to find out about the upcoming May Day coverage.

Policy with a Conscience: Angela Glover Blackwell Apr 06, 2017

Show notes

This week, Angela Glover Blackwell, executive director of PolicyLink and former Obama advisor, has a long history of using policy for progressive, radical, change. Blackwell says this is a moment to protect and resist, certainly, but also a time to return to the roots that are our local neighborhoods, our cities, our suburbs and build something better with them. People must make demands of the system if the system is to change, says Blackwell.

Music featured in this weeks show included “Power to the People”_ by Basement Jaxx and “Revolution” by Afrolicious._

Cheat, Lie and Steal: Michael Hudson on the Capitalist Way Mar 31, 2017

Show notes

We’re living in a time of economic babble, where politicians and economists throw out words like “reform,” “privatize,” and “austerity” to prop up corrupt capitalist opportunists. So says our guest this week, economist Michael Hudson, author of J is for Junk Economics. Plus, a report from Diverse Filmmaker’s Alliance on the Yemeni bodega workers who went on strike in New York to protest the Muslim Ban.

And be sure to subscribe to Laura’s F-Word on why Donald Trump’s new budget isn’t about cuts -- it’s about conversions. The budget wants to convert public dollars into private funding for military research and spending, for the only government apparatus that never gets audited.

For more on junk, strikes, and capitalism go to our website. We get our support from viewers like you! www.LauraFlanders.com

Intersectionality & Movements. And Exploring the Alt Right Mar 24, 2017

Show notes

Laura is joined by celebrated academic, organizer, and advocate Professor Kimberlé Williams Crenshaw, who is perhaps best known for coining the term intersectionality. And later in the show Laura is joined by Tarso Ramos of Political Research Associates, a human rights think tank that studies threats to democracy coming from various right wing sources, to discuss what all of us need to know about the women’s agenda of the Alt Right, and what sets the alt-right apart from other conservative factions. The answer might surprise you.

Music featured in this weeks show includes "Human Family" by Maya Angelou from her final album "Caged Bird Songs released on Smooth Music inc; "Make It Better" by Raul Midon from his album entitled "Don't Hesitate" released on Mac Avenue Records; and "Jungle Fever" by Bacao Rhythm & Steel Band from their album "55" released on Brooklyn's Big Crown Records.

Women's Solidarity Strikes Back Mar 15, 2017

Show notes

When feminism has come so far, how do modern day strikes, marches, and protest reflect the evolving and complex aspects of the movement, as well as its radical herstory? Featuring Jodeen Olguín-Tayler (Demos), Sarah Leonard (The Nation) + Cinzia Arruzza (Women's Strike, New School) + Nelini Stamp (Working Families' Party)

Trumpism, Warfare and Fixing Fissures in the Left Mar 09, 2017

Show notes

Donald Trump's tweets and divisiveness on Capitol Hill tend to draw the money media in and hold them there, but if progressives and the Left focus only on the beltway and the binary party debate, we'll never escape.

In this episode, Laura interviews organizers about going beyond Trumpism and Trump, with Color of Change director, Rashad Robinson; immigrant rights advocate Kica Thomas, and anti-war activist Medea Benjamin. Why not paper over our differences, if it will result in unity? What's happened to the anti-war movement? Where's the more expansive vision of the Left? And what's it got to do with immigration, trade and sanctuary? Rashad Robinson is the executive director of Color of Change, the nation's largest online racial justice organization (also featured in Ava DuVernay's film "13th." ) Kica Matos is the Director of the Immigrant Rights & Racial Justice program at Center for Community Change | Medea Benjamin is the co-founder of Code Pink, an NGO for peace movement working to challenge militarism, end U.S. funded wars and occupations. Her book, "Behind the U.S.-Saudi Connection" is out now. The Laura Flanders Show brings you in-depth interviews with forward-thinking people, working to create radical change and shift power. Donate at www.lauraflanders.com/donate.

Making the Police Count Mar 02, 2017

Show notes

With the Trump administration embracing private prisons, and a crackdown on all crimes, how police departments operate will come under scrutiny. We treasure what we measure so why do police metrics count captures and kills but not conflicts resolved? Could a change in metrics change police practice? And is "progressive policing" an oxymoron with no place in a radical agenda?

Laura sits down with Brooklyn Borough President Eric Adams, NYCLU Executive Director Donna Lieberman, and Professor Emerita Judi Komaki to discuss lowered crime rates, a decline in Stop and Frisk policing, and changing practices around drug arrests. A model can exist where there are trusting relationships between the public and police, but it needs data, training, and a change in attitudes -- on both sides, say our guests.

After serving as an NYPD police officer and New York State Senator, Eric Adams became the first Africa-American man to be the Brooklyn Borough President in 2013. | Donna Lieberman has been the executive director of the NYCLU since December 2001, during which time the organization has been a vocal critic of Stop and Frisk. | Judi Komaki is a professor emerita of organizational behavior, whose work focuses on how good data can improve organizations' policies.

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