Cosmopod

Donald, Christian, and Connor sit down to discuss the political economic conditions of the Soviet Union during the period of the New Economic Policy. Over the course of the episode, they cover War Communism, the intellectual currents and debates within the Party, the importance of the peasant question, the geopolitics of isolation, and the NEP’s long term viability.

References: R. C. Allen - Farm to Factory: A Reinterpretation of the Soviet Industrial Revolution

V. Barnett - The Revolutionary Russian Economy, 1890-1940 Ideas, Debates and Alternatives

V. Brovkin - Russia After Lenin: Politics, Culture and Society, 1921-1929

E. H. Carr and R. W. Davies – Foundations of a Planned Economy 1926-1929, Volume 1

R. W. Davies - From Tsarism to the New Economic Policy: Continuity and Change in the Economy of the U.S.S.R.

R. W. Davies - Soviet Economic Development from Lenin to Khrushchev

R. W. Davies - The Socialist Offensive: The Collectivisation of Soviet Agriculture, 1929-1930

R. B. Day - Leon Trotsky and the Politics of Economic Isolation

A. Ehrlich – The Soviet Industrialization Debate, 1924-1928

S. Fitzpatrick, A. Rabinowitz and R. Stites (eds.) - Russia in the Era of NEP: Explorations in Soviet Society and Culture

P. R. Gregory - Before Command: The Russian Economy from Emancipation to the First Five-Year Plan

J. B. Hatch - Labor and Politics in NEP Russia: Workers, Trade Unions, and the Communist Party in Moscow, 1921-1926

M. L. Hilton - Selling to the Masses: Retailing in Russia, 1880-1930

M. Reiman - The Birth of Stalinism: the USSR on The Eve of The Second Revolution

S. A. Resnick, R. D. Wolff - Class Theory and History: Capitalism and Communism in the USSR

O. Sanchez-Sibony - Red Globalization: The Political Economy of the Soviet Cold War from Stalin to Khrushchev.

D. Shearer - Industry, State, and Society in Stalin's Russia, 1926-1934

K. A. S. Siegel - Loans and Legitimacy: The Evolution of Soviet-American Relations, 1919-1933

L. H. Siegelbaum - Soviet State and Society Between Revolutions 1918-1929

D. R. Stone - Hammer and Rifle: The Militarization of the Soviet Union, 1926-1933

Isaac and Jack join Jarrod Shanahan, an activist, educator, and the author of Captives: How Rikers Island Took New York City Hostage, for a wide-ranging conversation. We cover the last 70 years of New York City's political history from the lens of the city's jails. We discuss the various actors fighting for control in the city: the politicians and bureaucrats responsible for the administration of jails, the repressive jailers and their corrupt labor union, the revolutionary social movements struggling for liberation inside and outside prison, the non-profits brought in to plug the budget holes and keep the peace, and the capitalists profiting from it all. After examining the shifts in political hegemony within New York City - from liberal "penal welfarism" to the neoliberal "war on crime" to a resurgent, reactionary "revanchism" - we reflect on how this history informs our current organizing in the abolitionist and public sector union movements. We end with a discussion on the 2024 elections and Jarrod's most recent article for Hard Crackers, “Iowa Bluffs,” focused on his experiences at a recent Trump rally in Dubuque, Iowa.

Ian, Nico, Matt, Chas and Rudy join for a general discussion on artificial intelligence. They cover the early origins of AI as a field, with the debates of the time, all the way up to the present state. They then discuss what to expect from AI in the near future, and give aspects where the prospects may be optimistic, pessimistic or neutral. They finish with a discussion on how Marxists should relate to AI in the present, trying to avoid overly pessimistic or uncritical attitudes.

Aliyah VanPelt and Cliff Connolly sit down with longtime organizer Gene Bruskin to get his advice and hear stories from his time in the movement, including with US Labor Against the War.

Rudy joins Martín Lallana for an introductory discussion on mining. We talk about the importance of mining to capitalism, the ecological impacts of different kind of mining, the way that the materials extracted have changed along history focusing on the materials needed for an energy transition and the way the Ukranian war has changed the needs of European countries before discussing the possibilities to have more just forms of mining and the potentialities of "urban mining"