Actually Existing Socialism

In this episode, Charles Xu of the Qiao Collective (a diaspora Chinese media collective challenging U.S. aggression) joins to walk us through the long history of solidarity between China and Palestine. We do this through discussing "The Gates of the Great Continent: Palestine, China, and the War for Humanity’s Future" which is Charles' recent article published on the Qiao Collective website. We’re going to be talking about the origins and basis of this revolutionary solidarity between the people of China and Palestine, how this relationship has changed over the years, China’s stance today on Palestinian resistance and how this revolutionary history manifests in the present. If you found this episode useful - Charles and I had an extended discussion on the state of China’s support for other global south countries in general which is accessible via Patreon. www.patreon.com/aesthepodcast www.twitter.com/aesthepodcast The Gates of the Great Continent: Palestine, China, and the War for Humanity’s Future Qiao Collective Twitter

This episode features Dominique Petit-Wagner discussing her masters thesis entitled: "Briefing the Ambassador: Joseph Davies and the U.S. Press Corps in Moscow, 1936-1938." Our discussion focuses on American Ambassador Joseph E. Davies and a few American journalists who bought into the socialist realist presentation of the Soviet Union during the tumoulotus 1930s. We talk about what socialist realism was, why and how these eminent Americans supported the Soviet Union, and what this tells us about modernization during the Stalin period. Dominique Petit-Wagner is a PhD Candidate in History at the University of Ottawa, specializing in Soviet, Canadian, and intellectual history. Whereas her MA thesis explored American perceptions of the Soviet Union and their controversial immersion in socialist realist culture in the late 1930s, her doctoral research seeks to contrast and compare these findings against the experiences of Canadians touring the USSR in the interwar period. Link to Dominique's paper: https://ruor.uottawa.ca/server/api/core/bitstreams/175e024b-31d4-478f-8453-39578212230e/content To support the show you can join the patreon at patreon.com/aesthepodcast You can follow the show on twitter @aesthepodcast

This episode features sociologist Dr. Agata Zysiak talking about her recent work "Limiting Privilege: Upward Mobility Within Higher Education in Socialist Poland" (2023), which examines first-generation students' struggles with reluctant academia in a developing socialist world that was looking for equality. We talk about the successes and failures of this ambitious socialist program, its similarities and differences to race based affirmative action in North America, and what this tells us about social reproduction and the zombie impact of social systems even in the face of dramatic social revolution. Agata Zysiak, PhD, is a historical sociologist working at Vienna University in Austria and the University of Łódź in Poland. You can get 30% off Limiting Privilege: Upward Mobility Within Higher Education in Socialist Poland and any other Purdue University Press book by ordering from their website and using the code PURDUE30 at checkout.

This episode features Zoe Stephens (@Zoediscoversnk), an experienced tour guide to North Korea (DPRK). Using her own experience, knowledge, footage and education - Zoe’s goal is to present a image of North Korea that aims to humanize the people of the DPRK in ways that are rarely seen in the West. She tells us what is required to visit on a guided tour, what to expect, what are some common misconceptions, and even the fascinating opportunity to stay for a few days with a North Korean family outside of Pyongyang. This episode was recorded in 2023 - before the re-opening of the border for tourism - so while we speak to the expectation of re-opening it has now happened as of early 2024. Link to all of Zoe's social media/project pages: https://linktr.ee/zoediscovers

Iskolat, a Latvian communist, returns to teach us more about the shrouded history of Latvia, which was a part of the Soviet Union, officially known as the Latvian Soviet Socialist Republic continuously from 1944 to 1990. In this second and final part we’ll be discussing the post-World War II era of building socialism in Latvia and the Baltics at large. We cover the successes of socialist construction, its weaknesses, and ultimately the downfall of soviet system in Latvia in the early 1990s and how that played out. Iskolat also delves into present day realities of Latvia that don’t always make international news. www.patreon.com/aesthepodcast Isoklat twitter: twitter.com/iskolat Workers' Struggle (English/Latvian/multilang): https://t.me/StradniekuCina BalticSSRs (Reddit): https://reddit.com/r/BalticSSRs/ Riga History Group (Russian): https://t.me/RigaHistoryGroup… School of Scientific Communism/Ruslan Dzugov Channel (Russian section): https://t.me/rusdzugov Dictatorship of the Proletariat (YT channel of the Russian section of the Political School): https://youtube.com/@user-xk6xj4xm4n Anna Louise Strong's The New Lithuania: https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=wu.89017381948&seq=5 The Baltic Riddle by Greg Meiksins: https://archive.org/details/TheBalticRiddle

Iskolat, a Latvian communist, joins to show to teach us about the shrouded history of Latvia, which was a part of the Soviet Union (officially known as the Latvian Soviet Socialist Republic) continuously from 1944 to 1990. In this first part we’ll be discussing the pre-history of the socialist republic by delving into the conditions of what would become Latvia in the early 20th century to the eventual socialist revolution of the early 1940s. When I say the history covered here from the Communist POV is almost impossible to find in English, I am not exaggerating, I hope you find this discussion as informative and enlightening as I have. Isoklat twitter: twitter.com/Iskolat BalticSSRs (Reddit): https://reddit.com/r/BalticSSRs/ Telegram: Workers' Struggle (English/Latvian/multilang): https://t.me/StradniekuCina Telegram: Riga History Group (Russian): https://t.me/RigaHistoryGroup… Telegram: School of Scientific Communism/Ruslan Dzugov Channel (Russian section): https://t.me/rusdzugov Telegram: Dictatorship of the Proletariat (YT channel of the Russian section of the Political School): https://youtube.com/@user-xk6xj4xm4n

Carlos Martinez (@agent_of_change) joins the show to talk about his excellent book "The East Is Still Red: Chinese Socialism in the 21st Century". In this final part of a three part discussion we’ll be discussing the propaganda war against China and the socialist developments all leftists should be following. Carlos Martinez is an author and political activist from London, Britain. His first book, The End of the Beginning: Lessons of the Soviet Collapse, was published in 2019 by LeftWord Books. He is a co-editor of Friends of Socialist China, a co-founder of No Cold War, and a coordinating committee member of the International Manifesto Group. He writes regularly in the Morning Star, Global Times, China Daily and CGTN. Carlos' website: https://invent-the-future.org/ Carlos' youtube: https://www.youtube.com/inventthefuture Support this podcast at www.patreon.com/aesthepodcast Podcast twitter @aesthepodcast Intro/Outro Music: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AUPx2jKjkwE

Carlos Martinez (@agent_of_change) joins the show to talk about his excellent book "The East Is Still Red: Chinese Socialism in the 21st Century". In this second part of a three part discussion we’ll be delving into how China operates as a socialist democracy. We'll be answering what that means, talk about some accomplishments as well how it differs from Western liberal democracies. Carlos Martinez is an author and political activist from London, Britain. His first book, The End of the Beginning: Lessons of the Soviet Collapse, was published in 2019 by LeftWord Books. He is a co-editor of Friends of Socialist China, a co-founder of No Cold War, and a coordinating committee member of the International Manifesto Group. He writes regularly in the Morning Star, Global Times, China Daily and CGTN. Carlos' website: https://invent-the-future.org/ Carlos' youtube: https://www.youtube.com/inventthefuture Support this podcast at www.patreon.com/aesthepodcast Podcast twitter @aesthepodcast Intro/Outro Music: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MbBBnNW6EMA

Carlos Martinez (@agent_of_change) joins the show to talk about his excellent book "The East Is Still Red: Chinese Socialism in the 21st Century". In this first part of this three part discussion on China we’ll be delving into why socialist China remains but the USSR doesnt. We'll be tackling this question through the lens of how these two communist juggernauts approached the necessity of controversial political and economic reforms in the 1970s in China under Deng Xiaoping and in the USSR under Mikhail Gorbachev in the 1980s. Next episodes in this series will look at Chinese socialist democracy, and the propaganda war against it! Carlos Martinez is an author and political activist from London, Britain. His first book, The End of the Beginning: Lessons of the Soviet Collapse, was published in 2019 by LeftWord Books. He is a co-editor of Friends of Socialist China, a co-founder of No Cold War, and a coordinating committee member of the International Manifesto Group. He writes regularly in the Morning Star, Global Times, China Daily and CGTN. Carlos' website: https://invent-the-future.org/ Carlos' youtube: https://www.youtube.com/inventthefuture Support this podcast at www.patreon.com/aesthepodcast Podcast twitter @aesthepodcast Intro/Outro Music: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4jP5r2b7hew

Monica Macias joins the show to discuss her book "Black Girl From Pyongyang: In Search of My Identity" which covers the harrowing tale of her life journey from post-colonial Equatorial Guinea ,where she was born, to finding herself under the guardianship of Kim Il Sung - the revolutionary founding father of the Democratic Peoples Republic of Korea (DPRK) also known as North Korea. This is a preview of a patreon-only exclusive. Listen to the full episode by supporting the show at www.patreon.com/aesthepodcast

In this episode we’ll be discussing the subject of Julia Mead's (@JuliaKMead) PHD research on an often forgotten socialist nation: the nation formerly known as the Czechoslovak Socialist Republic. Julia covers for us the pre-history, emergence of the communist state, political struggles as well as socialist successes and failures. She also gives us some insight as to why this socialist nation often falls to the wayside in popular Western imagination. Julia Mead is an environmental historian of modern Eastern Europe, with a particular focus on energy, gender, and labor. Her dissertation, “Socialist Rust Belt: Energy, Masculinity, and the End of Czechoslovak Socialism,” traces the rise and fall of the Czechoslovak coal economy from 1948 to 2004, and its relationship to changing norms of masculinity. She shows how coal miners in socialist Czechoslovakia achieved an elite social status, and how they lost it almost overnight during the transition to capitalism. Follow Julia at https://twitter.com/JuliaKMead and https://juliamead.squarespace.com/ Support the show at www.patreon.com/aesthepodcast

Henry Hakamäki (@huck1995), host of Guerrilla History podcast (@guerrilla_pod) and Professor Salvatore Engel-Di Mauro join the show to talk about their recent english translation of historian Domenico Losurdo's "Stalin: History and Critique of a Black Legend". This episode is the second and final part of a longer discussion. In this part we move into the specifics of the often airbrushed history of anti-racist and anti-colonial policies under Stalin’s Soviet Union and even ponder whether Stalin’s impact on these material objectives was more substantive than that of civil rights figure and fellow socialist - Martin Luther King Jr. We also discuss the equally airbrushed links between liberal democracies and nazi fascism. In the spirit of Domenico Lusurdo we continue to deconstruct, evaluate, and critique the black legends attributed to Stalin. You can access a free (yes, free!) copy of the PDF and/or order a physical copy at https://www.iskrabooks.org/stalin-history-and-critique Henry and Salvatore have talked at length about the process of translation and who Domeinco Lusurdo is in the discussion linked below. https://guerrillahistory.libsyn.com/stalin-history-critique-of-a-black-legend-w-salvatore-engel-di-mauro-david-peat https://www.patreon.com/aesthepodcast

Henry Hakamäki (@huck1995), host of Guerrilla History podcast (@guerrilla_pod) and Professor Salvatore Engel Di-Mauro join the show to talk about their recent english translation of historian Domenico Losurdo's "Stalin: History and Critique of a Black Legend". This episode is the first part of a longer discussion. In this part we talk about what a black legend even is, the general thesis behind Domenico Losurdo’s controversial book, what academic consensus has to say about the realities and myths surrounding historical presentations of Stalin, and how his often distorted legacy impacts left wing movements to this day. And that just gets us started! You can access a free (yes, free!) copy of the PDF and/or order a physical copy at https://www.iskrabooks.org/stalin-history-and-critique Henry and Salvatore have talked at length about the process of translation and who Domeinco Lusurdo is in the discussion linked below. https://guerrillahistory.libsyn.com/stalin-history-critique-of-a-black-legend-w-salvatore-engel-di-mauro-david-peat You can always support the show at www.patreon.com/aesthepodcast and don't forget to follow on twitter @aesthepodcast.

Ben Weston (@BenWestonDPRK), host of the popular "DPRK Explained" youtube channel, joins the show to discuss his insightful experiences visiting North Korea (also known as the DPRK) multiple times as a tour guide. We cover his channel, do some myth-busting about the Democratic Republic of Korea, get a short intro to socialist Mongolia and more! https://www.youtube.com/c/DPRKExplained

In this episode we discuss Alice Malone's essay entitled “Concessions” which contains a well sourced and foundational explanation regarding 20th century history that every socialist should be aware of! Alice illustrates how the gains and progressive feats won by workers of the Soviet Union challenged capitalist elites in the West to concede social reforms in their own countries. Reforms such as desegregation, home ownership, investment in education, public health care and more! We cover some of these concessions as well as how they have been noticeably negatively impacted by the dissolution of the Soviet Union in the early 1990s. Alice's article: https://redsails.org/concessions/ Alice's app on word frequency's in Marxist texts: https://alicirce.shinyapps.io/mlds/ Intro/Outro Music: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=itA4uQvnhyc

Robert Thurston, historian of Soviet history, joins the show to talk about his extensive archival research focused on the infamous “Great Terror” or mass arrests of 1937-1938. In doing so Robert rebuts the perrenial anti-communist argument - the claim that the Soviet Union under Stalin was totalitarian! We also discuss the impact his research had on his career, the role CIA, MI5 and other capitalist intelligence services played in the manufacturing of soviet history for western audiences and much more! Robert's Blog: https://thurstrw.wordpress.com/ Robert's Coffee Bussiness: https://www.oxfordcoffee.com/

Calla Walsh and Aeron join the show to talk about the absurd imperialist rationales and devestating impacts of Cuba's placement on the US State Departments State Sponsor of Terror list. Calla is a co-chair of the National Network on Cuba (https://twitter.com/NNOCuba). Aeron is a member of the Michigan General Defense Committee (https://www.instagram.com/michigangdc/). Help support the show by signing up to our patreon, where you also will get bonus content: https://www.patreon.com/aesthepodcast

Calla Walsh and Aeron join the show to talk about ways we can all stand in solidarity with Cuba and why engaging in internationalism is a necessary path to socialism both at home and abroad. Calla is a co-chair of the National Network on Cuba (https://twitter.com/NNOCuba). Aeron is a member of the Michigan General Defense Committee (https://www.instagram.com/michigangdc/). Help support the show by signing up to our patreon, where you also will get bonus content: https://www.patreon.com/aesthepodcast

Michael Jabara Carley joins the show to talk about his extensive and decades long archival research into Soviet international relations. He focuses particularly on the attempts by Joseph Stalin (in the 6 years leading up to World War II) to build a grand alliance with Britain, France and other European nations against Nazi Germany. This was a call to maintain peace which ultimately was left unheeded leading to the devastating outbreak of World War II. In Western memory this attempted alliance has become overshadowed by the infamous and often decontextualized signing of Molotov-Ribbentrop Non Agression Pact between Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union in 1939. We get into the details of this complex and important history in this episode. More info about what we covered in this episode can be freely found at: COMING SOON Episode Credits Opening Interlude Music/Outro Music: Metro Boomin - Superhero (Heroes & Villains) [Instrumental] Opening Interlude Voiceover: Bob Rae's Parliamentary Resolution on Totalitarian Nazism and Communism Opening Music: Time - Inception by Hans Zimmer (Cello Cover)

Nana Osei-Opare joins the show to discuss his extensive academic work on Kwame Nkrumah, Ghana’s socialist period, and Ghana's relationship with the Soviet Union during the Cold War. In this episode’s discussion we examine why anti-colonial figures in Africa favored an alliance with the Soviet Union over the capitalist West. We assess Ghana’s socialist period and Kwame Nkrumah's socialist program which began in 1957 right after independence and ran until1966 when it was ended by a military coup. We uncover the truth of the relationship between Ghana and the Soviet Union during the Cold War which ties directly into the sucesses and failures of Soviet Anti-Racism. Also Nana picks apart a popular modern portrayal of Kwame Nkrumah as seen in the Netflix miniseries the Crown. And more! More info about what we covered in this episode can be freely found at: https://www.patreon.com/posts/79917448 Episode Credits Opening Interlude Music: Metro Boomin - Creepin [Instrumental] Opening Interlude Voiceover: Kwame Nkrumah - Address at Conference of African Freedom Fighters - Accra Outro Music: ArrDee - Loser (Instrumental)