Beyond Your News Feed: Understanding Contemporary Politics

Host William Hudson is joined by Professor Andrea McDonnell, Associate Professor of Political Science and Director of PC’s Communication Program to discuss her new research. Dr. McDonnell has been a guest on this podcast previously to discuss the decline of local news and her 2023 book A Gossip Politic. In today’s podcast she discusses her more recent work on what she calls "discursive self-cleaving," a rhetorical strategy celebrities employ to counter accusations of sexual misconduct. In a forthcoming book, she takes an in depth look at the way three celebrities have deployed this strategy to protect themselves from such accusations. Among the three is former president Donald Trump, a master of discursive self-cleaving, who will be the focus of our conversation. Our conversation shows how various developments in communications in the 21st century, a post-truth information eco-system, bullshitting, and public gaslighting, have enabled this strategy. We conclude with comments on how Trump has expanded discursive self-cleaving from being a response to allegations of sexual misconduct to a routine tool in campaign image making.

Although most of us associate the People’s Republic of China (the PRC) with its officially sanctioned atheism, the government tolerates a variety of religious practice within the country. Regulating and controlling religious practice to assure that it does not pose a threat to the dominance of either the Chinese state or the ruling Chinese Communist Party is an on-going challenge to both party and state. Professor Susan McCarthy, the PC political science department’s China expert and a leading authority on ethnic and religious minorities in China, has returned to Beyond Your News Feed to discuss recent developments in the PRC’s efforts to regulate religious practice. Our discussion centers around two of Dr. McCarthy’s recent papers on the topic: “Liberating Party Animals: Cultural Governance and ‘Life Release’ Rituals in China” published in July 2022 in The China Journal and a yet unpublished paper: “Sinicizing China’s World Muslim City: Spatial Politics, National Narratives, and Ethno-Religious Assimilation in the PRC”.

This episode features, Zachariah Wheeler, Visiting Assistant Professor of Political Science at Providence College. We discuss his research on the evolution in coalitions within the Democratic Party, how elite discourse about class, race, climate change, and other issues have shaped those coalitions, and the way these changes reflect the impact neo-liberal ideology and globalization has had on American politics and culture. A main focus of our conversation is his recent paper entitled “The ‘Emerging Democratic Majority’, New Class Divisions, and the Meritocratic Left.”

This episode features Gizem Zencirci, Associate Professor of Political Science and her new book: The Muslim Social: Neoliberalism, Charity, and Poverty in Turkey published by Syracuse University Press. In this book, she explains how Turkey’s ruling party and other Turkish actors have melded modern neo-liberal reforms and traditional understandings of Islamic charity to create a form of public welfare provision that she calls the “Muslim social.” We discuss her new book and its intriguing argument.

Professors Joe Cammarano and Adam Myers join Beyond Your News Feed host William Hudson for a wide-ranging conversation about the 2024 presidential election campaigns. We examine the challenges both the Biden and Trump campaigns will face in earning the votes of Americans. Our analysis includes an assessment of what is at stake for the future of American democracy in this election.

Host William Hudson discusses the current Israeli-Palestinian crisis with two political science colleagues who are experts on Israel and its long conflict with the Palestinians. We focus on how Americans have reacted to the conflict, particularly the American Jewish community.

Professor Adam Myers joins host William Hudson to discuss federalism’s impact on American democracy. Jacob M. Grumbach’s recent book: Laboratories against Democracy: How National Parties Transformed State Politics offers the touchstone for this discussion. Grumbach addresses a perennial issue in the analysis of American politics – whether the federal system advances or undermines democratic values. Our discussion examines and critiques Grumbach’s thesis as well as looking at recent arguments claiming federalism can advance progressive values.

This episode features a conversation with the Providence College Political Science Department’s Chinese politics expert, Professor Susan McCarthy. For several months, now, China has been in the news a lot whether in reports on the Chinese regime’s response to COVID, authoritarian crackdowns on political dissidents and ethnic minorities, the recent Party Congress that extended President Xi’s term in office, worsening tension, both diplomatic and military, between the US and China, and, finally, the infamous Chinese balloon caper. Our conversation brings Professor McCarthy expertise to bear on media coverage of these issues.

For this episode, we were pleased to welcome to Beyond Your News Feed the newest member of the PC Political Science faculty Assistant Professor Sara Hassani. Dr. Hassani joined the faculty last fall after completing her PH.D. at the New School for Social Research. She as a joint appointment in Political Science and Women’s Studies. In our conversation we talked about the courses she has taught so far and her experience so far at PC. We delved deeply into her fascinating research on female self-immolation as a form of political protest in the “Persian Belt”. We also discuss her insights into the current on-going protests in Iran.

Podcast host, William Hudson, invites back to the podcast the Providence College Political Science Departments expert on all this Israeli, Professor Ruth Ben-Artzi, to discuss recent events in Israel and Palestine. Our wide ranging conversation covers the electoral turmoil of the past four years that produced four elections, the reemergence of Benyamin Netanyahu as Prime Minister after last November’s election, the extreme right-wing character of the government he heads, and the impact of all of this on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

This episode takes a deep dive into the results of the 2022 midterm elections. Professors Matt Guardino and Adam Myers join host, William Hudson, to discuss key national and state races. They focus particularly on why the expected "Red Wave"- overwhelming victories for the Republican Party- did not happen. The conversation does beyond the usual journalistic analysis of the election to offer insights based on political science research on American elections.

In September, Iran's morality police arrested a 22-year-old Iranian woman, Masha Amini, for violating rules regarding proper wearing of the hijab, a hair covering required of all women in public. A few days later, her family was informed that Ms. Amini had died in police custody, supposedly from a heart attack, although her family claimed she had died from blows to her head. In the weeks since, protests have erupted across Iran protesting Ms. Amini's death but also challenging the legitimacy of the Iranian regime. The protests have involved thousands of women, including high school and university students, and have expanded to include oil industry workers, medical workers, and lawyers. The Iranian regime seems to be under pressure greater than it has experienced since it came to power in 1979 This episode features a conversation with Providence College political science department's Middle East expert, Professor Gizem Zencirci, to help us understand what is going on in Iran and its wider significance for the Middle East.

This episode features our knowledgeable and insightful team of American politics experts, Professor Adam Myers and Professor Matt Guardino to discuss the state of American politics this summer of 2022. The last few weeks have produced a variety of interesting topics for us to talk about – all with implications for the upcoming midterm national elections this fall. Most directly, states across the nation have been holding primaries to select candidates for the fall elections, including candidates for Congress and for state offices. In recent weeks, the House Select Committee investigating the January 6, 2021, attack on the US Capitol has held several news making and fascinating public hearings. And if that were not enough, as its term ended, the US Supreme Court released several blockbuster decisions on guns, abortion, environmental regulation, and public prayer reflecting the muscle and ambition of the Courts solid conservative majority. Matt, Adam and podcast host, Bill Hudson, ruminate about these topics and their implications for American democracy.

America has often prided itself as a nation of immigrants. Apart from indigenous peoples, Americans generally are descended from someone who came to this country from somewhere else. Despite this history, in recent years, many Americans have shown growing hostility toward immigrants. Politicians like Donald Trump have fueled and capitalized on this hostility in their anti-immigrant rhetoric. Immigrants who engage in political action of some type or hold elective office are particular targets of hostile reactions. The guests on today’s episode are the principal investigators for a in a major national study: The Immigrant Visibility and Political Activism Research Collaborative a joint initiative of Providence College and the University of Massachusetts Boston funded by the Russell Sage Foundation and the Carnegie Corporation of New York. Their study seeks to understand xenophobic reactions to immigrants – in particular reactions toward those immigrants who engage in political action. They are with me today to provide an early look at their findings so far. Our guests are Jeff Pugh, associate professor of conflict resolution at the McCormack Graduate School of Policy and Global Studies at the University of Massachusetts Boston, and Matt Guardino associate professor of political science at Providence College.

On this episode of Beyond Your News Feed, Dr. Bill Hudson is joined by Associate Professor of Communication and Director of PC’s new Communication Program Professor Andrea McDonnell. She and Dr. Hudson Talk about the dissolution of the line between “celebrity” and “politician,” the prevalence of gossip as opposed to substantive information, and the role that the internet—particularly social media platforms—have in exacerbating these phenomenon.

Today’s guest on Beyond Your News Feed, Professor Casey Stevens, sits down with Dr. Bill Hudson to discuss the latest Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) conducted on April 1st. Stevens, whose expertise lies in environmental politics, discusses the report’s contents, its implications for combatting climate change, and the current political conditions as well as scientific findings that illuminate the likeliness of its success.

On this week's episode of Beyond Your News Feed, three Political Science seniors were asked to share their experiences with their capstone research seminars. Two of the seniors in attendance, Malik Alwani and Addison Wakelin, completed their respective seminars—Globalization and Economic Development and Climate Change—last semester. The third student (and podcast co-producer), Sienna Strickland, is currently in the process of completing her seminar on Black and Latinx Politics. We discuss the structure of these capstones, the students’ research processes and findings, and the challenges and rewards of taking such an advanced class—as well as share some words of advice for incoming capstone students.

This year Providence College is celebrating the fiftieth anniversary of the first class of women students at the college. Since 1971 when the college became coed, the Political Science department has had many terrific women students and our women graduates have gone on to distinguished careers in a wide variety of professions. Some have even pleased their political science professors immensely by going on to become political scientists themselves. This episode, in recognition of PC’s Year of the Women, is a conversation with two of our relatively recent graduates who have garnered PH.D. s in Political Science and are now political science teachers and researchers. We discuss their paths from the Political Science Department at PC to become professional political scientists. Our guests are: Professor Laura Bucci, PC class of 2010 and Professor Kelly Branham Smith, PC class of 2012.

Can political philosophy help us understand what ails American Democracy? Host Professor William Hudson explores this question with guest Assistant Professor of Political Science Justin Brophy. We examine the question with special attention to the ancient Greek philosopher Plato and the contemporary American political theorist the late Carey McWilliams – two thinkers who have greatly influenced Fr. Brophy’s ideas about democracy.

This episode explores the tension within American conservative thought between Traditional Burkean conservatism and classical liberalism. Host William Hudson discusses this tension with Providence College Visiting Assistant Professor of Political Science Savannah Johnston. Her recent scholarly work suggests that the “fusion” between these theoretical tendencies worked out in the National Review in the early 1960s may be unraveling. She argues that the fundamental contradictions between how each theoretical tradition views human nature, the purpose of government, the role of the individual – particularly as a source of morality, and the role of reason in organizing society make an on-going fusion untenable. Many contemporary conservatives seem to be shedding the classical liberal strand and turning to the more traditional “illiberal” conservatism.