Locus on the Family
How neoliberals and social conservatives found common ground in the family.
Political scientist Melinda Cooper explains how decades of neoliberalism transformed the politics of the American family - from the realignment of (shrinking) welfare spending along familial lines, to a politically convenient yet contradictory relationship with social conservatism - and calls for the left to move beyond revolutionary spectacle and towards re-establishing points of institutional intervention, for the welfare of all citizens.
Melinda is author of Family Values: Between Neoliberalism and the new Social Conservatism from Zone Books.
Understanding the political realities of the international fight against climate change.
Live from Stockholm, Mikael Mikaelsson discusses the state of the global fight against climate change - from a practical analysis of the COP21 Paris Agreement framework, to the relationship between government targets and market trends - and explains why the left must work to depoliticize global warming and build a consensus around green energy.
Mikael really recommends getting out on the street for the People's Climate Movement March on April 29th.
Romania's anti-corruption protests reveal deep contradictions within the state.
Live from Bucharest, anthropologist Florin Poenaru examines the complicated nature of Romania's recent mass protests - a movement centered around anti-corruption, but one that exposes weaknesses the balance of power inside the country's executive branch, and more generally the vulnerability of democratic institutions within Romania.
Florin wrote the recent article What is at Stake in the Romanian Protests? for LeftEast.
The mask has slipped: On the possibility of freedom beyond liberalism.
Artist Raoul Martinez examines the limits of freedom as personal ethos and economic ideology in a time of spiraling inequality and political instability, and calls for a fundamental shift in the way we think of ourselves, our values and each other if humans are to achieve liberation and equality for all.
Raoul is author of Creating Freedom: The Lottery of Birth, the Illusion of Consent, and the Fight for Our Future from Pantheon.
Division of the believers: How Hezbollah embraced neoliberalism.
Author Joseph Daher situates the political economy of Hezbollah within the context of contemporary neoliberalism within Lebanon across the Middle East, and discusses both the party's relationship with the Assad regime, and the possibility of peace and democracy in Syria.
Joseph is author of Hezbollah: The Political Economy of Lebanon's Party of God from Pluto Press.
500 Years of Lying to Ourselves: An Apologetic History.
In a Moment of Truth, Jeff Dorchen boils down his discontent into 2 simple rules, about which he WILL NOT argue, then outlines 500 years of wilful, stupid cruelty on the part of humans, from the Spanish Inquisition to Indian enslavement to African enslavement to Clintonian fencepost diggery - and explains why we are less stupid than our barbaric times require us to believe, if only we believe it.
