State of Power

Here at the State of power podcast we are interested in how power functions, how it mutates, and how it shapes the world around us. We believe that, if we are to understand the present, we need to put it in its proper historical context and try to understand the historical processes that have led us here. Our guest on the podcast today, Roger van Zwanenberg is the founder of Pluto books (https://www.plutobooks.com/) , an independent publisher of radical, left‐wing non­‐fiction books. He’s...

Here at the State of Power Podcast we are concerned with how power functions, how it mutates, and how it reproduces itself, and our guest on this episode deals explicitly with this. Nyasha Mboti is an Associate Professor at the University of the Free State in Bloemfontein South Africa, and is the founder of a new field of study that he terms ‘Apartheid Studies’. He is soon to publish the first of four volumes outlining the scope of the new field. He graciously agreed when we asked him to sit...

Chihiro Geuzenbroek and Anna Bissila are both climate activists, and the co-organizers for the expo: People-Powered Movements versus Shell. An exhibition that explores the fight for justice that has been fought from Indonesia to Nigeria, from Curaçao to South Africa, and from Alaska to Groningen. Through installations, audio-stories, photography and relics of activisms, the exhibition invites the public to learn from the people who have shown resistance and made calls for decolonial climate...

In this episode, Hamza Hamouchene discusses his report titled: Extractivism and Resistance in North Africa, which documents several cases of natural resource extraction which take the form of brutal "accumulation by dispossession," degrading environments and ecosystems through the privatisation and commodification of land and water. The report shows that these extractive activities have also been met with new waves of resistance and the entrance of new social actors onto the scene, demanding...

If we’re going to stop the climate catastrophe that is unfolding, we will need a radical overhaul of how many things work. Our financial system has played a big role in leading us to the brink of collapse, and must be completely overhauled if we are to stand a chance. What does a fair and responsible financial system look like? How can we shift power to democratically accountable public enterprises that will move us more rapidly towards a fossil free world? Further, in the wake of the...

The far right is on the rise. The rhetoric of anger and resentment is emanating from personalities like Donald Trump, Marine Le Pen, Rodrigo Duterte and Viktor Orban and is captivating and mobilizing large numbers of people. In an increasing number of countries, the extreme right has already captured the government or is on the threshold of power. While this swift turn of events has shocked or surprised many in the North, the extreme right’s seizure of power is not an uncommon event in the...

COVID-19 has become another touchstone for today’s deeply entrenched politics of militarised borders and anti-migrant racism. This webinar explored the trajectory and globalization of border militarization and anti-migrant racism across the world, the history, ideologies and actors that have shaped it, the pillars and policies that underpin the border industrial complex, the resistance of migrants, refugees and activists, and the shifting dynamics within this pandemic. Panellists: * Harsha...

A great global panel of activists, social movement leaders and thinkers discuss how to make this pandemic a turning point towards system change that we need not just to deliver social justice but increasingly to defend our very survival. The very insightful conversation examined what can we learn from previous major global mobilisations, how can we build cross-sectoral and intersectional movements and what strategies and tactics we need to confront entrenched corporate power and...

Prior to the pandemic, popular opposition to the power of Big Tech was growing. Yet, in the COVID-19 moment, Big Tech has emerged stronger than ever. Dependence on digital platforms has delivered record profits for the likes of Amazon (and Zoom on which this webinar relies), while states are rolling out new apps with corporate partners in the name of a health emergency with almost no consideration of privacy or human rights. A new digital economy opportunism is deepening faultlines of...

Ten years ago, the Arab uprisings were celebrated as world changing events. The emancipatory experience was so contagious that people were inspired all over the world. Occupiers from London to Wall Street and the Indignados were proud to “Walk like an Egyptian”. The revolutionary process that has swept North Africa and West Asia, driven by demands for bread, freedom, dignity and social justice, has seen ups and downs, gains and setbacks, which materialized in a liberal democratic transition...

The COVID-19 pandemic has led governments to release an unprecedented number of people from prison and curb new admissions to prevent deadly outbreaks in prisons and other detention centres. The pandemic has exposed the societal costs of mass incarceration, while the quick actions taken by governments casts doubt on the necessity of imprisonment for those released. This webinar looks at the drivers of mass incarceration worldwide, sharing analysis on the impact of COVID-19, the negative...

An inspiring global panel of feminist thinkers and activists discuss how we can collectively reorganise, shift power and pivot towards building transformative feminist realities that can get us out of the worsening health, climate and capitalist crises. This webinar explores feminist analyses of the crisis and the way the pandemic intersects with patriarchy, corporate power and a global division of labour that is both gendered and racialised. What can we learn from the feminist practices and...

Support for public services and limits on private profit is at an all-time high in the wake of the pandemic. How do we ensure this prioritisation of public needs and goods becomes permanent? What are the best models of democratic and participatory public services? This webinar shares some of the most visionary ideas and campaigns emerging across the world at local, state and national levels advancing a new vision of a public future. The speakers tackle the question: How can we build a broad...

As governments take action to fight the COVID-19 pandemic and prevent economic collapse, big law firms are watching the virus too. Yet, their concern is not to save lives or the economy. Instead, the lawyers are urging big business to challenge the social and economic emergency measures that governments around the world have taken to deal with the COVID-19 crisis. 2600 investment protection agreements worldwide have opened the door for transnational companies to sue States for billions of...

How do we ensure that the economic response to COVID-19 also addresses existing crises, most of all the unfolding climate crisis? How do we build a truly Global Green New Deal that delivers transformation and justice especially in the Global South? This webinar features leading international activists and thinkers, bringing fresh new perspectives on how to embed just transition into our response to the coronavirus pandemic. Panellists: * Richard Kozul-Wright, Director of the Division on...

With Sonia Shah, author of Pandemic: Tracking contagions from Cholera to Ebola and Beyond (2017) as well as experts on public health systems and activists on the frontlines responding to the crisis in the Global South. Images from Italy of the army unloading coffins, exhausted doctors and fearful citizens in ever more countries shocked the world and pushed even recalcitrant politicians into action. But the real health disaster could still be ahead of us as the pandemic spreads in countries...

What are the likely global impacts of the economic fallout from the Coronavirus pandemic? What would a peoples' agenda look like? How might we be better prepared than in the aftermath of the 2008 economic crisis to put forward progressive solutions that address the immediate crisis as well as existing crises of poverty, inequality and environmental destruction? Panellists: - Professor Jayati Ghosh, award-winning economist Jawaharlal Nehru University, India - Quinn Slobodian, associate...

A conversation between Rob Wallace, author of Big Farms Make Big Flu and agrarian justice activists from Myanmar, Palestine, Indonesia and Europe. This episode explores how globalised industrial food systems set the scene for the emergence of COVID-19 and the structural connections between industrial agriculture, pathogens and precarious working conditions. It also explores the different realities people face right now, and how these impact ongoing struggles for more just food systems and...

The COVID-19 pandemic has exposed like never before the perils of governments handing over our right to health and life to corporations. The privatisation of our health has made millions of people vulnerable to infectious diseases and undermined the integrated public systems needed to coordinate an effective response. This webinar brings healthcare experts together with activists at the forefront of struggles for equitable universal public healthcare from across the globe. Panelists speak...

This episode examines authoritarian and repressive state responses to the Coronavirus pandemic, featuring the UN Special Rapporteur on Protecting Human Rights and other global experts and activists. In response to an unprecedented global health emergency, many states are rolling out measures from deploying armies and drones to control public space, to expanding digital control through facial recognition technology and tracker apps. What if these measures become permanent once the pandemic...