logo
episode-header-image
Oct 2024
1h 29m

Where is the working class' power? An in...

Cosmonaut Magazine
About this episode

Peter Olney is a labor organizer of over half a century, long-time organizing director at the ILWU, and researcher on labor strategy. John Womack is a Harvard historian of the labor movement and the Mexican Revolution. In this episode they sit down with Ira and Rudy to discuss Peter and John's 2023 book Labor, Power, and Strategy. They discuss the controversial approach of organizing workers in the choke points of production, what it will take to rebuild the labor movement, and new opportunities for working class internationalism.

Up next
Nov 20
Modern Industry and Prospects for Socialism
<div class="news-page-hero__description">Dónal Ó Coisdealbha analyzes the history and results of the management and production system (TPS) developed by the Toyota Motor Corporation, arguing that the cooperative effects the TPS had on Toyota's internal labor relations contain the ... Show More
40m 35s
Nov 10
The Border is a Mirror: Europe and the politics of migration with Iker Suarez
In this episode, Rudy joins Iker Suárez, author of The Migrant Genocide: Toward a Third World Analysis of European Class Struggle, to delve into the politics of migration and borders in Europe, examining how imperialism, class, and race intersect in what our guest describes as a ... Show More
1h 11m
Oct 6
What Is Missing From Your Understanding of Revolutionary Democratic Centralism
Steve Bloom ruminates on the meaning and practice of democratic centralism, arguing that respect for minority positions is key to building a truly disciplined revolutionary formation. Reading: Felix Bauer 
29m 42s
Recommended Episodes
Sep 2024
Inside Labour Together: the project behind Keir Starmer
The red half of Westminster will shortly decamp to Liverpool for the first Labour conference since the party's general election landslide. Host Sascha O'Sullivan looks at a group which played a key role in that victory — the left-wing think-tank Labour Together. Sascha pieces tog ... Show More
55m 22s
Apr 2024
Working People Deserve Bread and Roses—and Musicals (w/ Gene Bruskin)
<p><span style="color: #000000;">Gene Bruskin was born to a Jewish working-class family in South Philadelphia and has been a life-long social justice activist, union organizer, poet, and playwright. Since retiring from the labor movement, Gene wrote his first play in 2016, a musi ... Show More
38m 33s
Jul 2024
Dispatch from Labor Notes & Railroad Workers United Conferences (Chicago, 2024)
<p><span style="color: #000000;">Two months ago, from April 17-21, workers and labor organizers of all stripes convened in Chicago for the bi-annual Labor Notes conference, which overlapped with the Railroad Workers United convention. As the registration website rightly noted, "L ... Show More
1h 29m
Mar 2025
Andrea Wright, "Unruly Labor: A History of Oil in the Arabian Sea" (Stanford UP, 2024)
Unruly Labor: A History of Oil in the Arabian Sea (Stanford UP, 2024) by Andrea Wright offers a critical and nuanced examination of the labor regimes that sustain the oil economies of the Arabian Peninsula. Challenging dominant narratives centered on state-building, elite wealth, ... Show More
30 m
Sep 2023
Christian O. Paiz, "The Strikers of Coachella: A Rank-And-File History of the UFW Movement" (UNC Press, 2023)
The past decades have borne witness to the United Farm Workers' (UFW) tenacious hold on the country's imagination. Since 2008, the UFW has lent its rallying cry to a presidential campaign and been the subject of no less than nine books, two documentaries, and one motion picture. ... Show More
1h 10m
Sep 2024
Revolutionary Strategy and the Industrial Proletariat
Chase from the Maoist Communist Union (MCU) joins Breht to discuss revolutionary strategy, both historically and presently, and the specific role of the industrual proletariat in that strategy. Together, they discuss communist organizing, different class stratas and their revolut ... Show More
2h 16m
Jul 2024
HR People Pod – Ep 3: A new UK Government and a ‘New Deal for Working People’
The Labour Party will form a new government in the United Kingdom. But what can employers expect from its proposed ‘New Deal for Working People’? CIPD Director of Profession David D’Souza hosts former Labour MP Iain Wright, Firstsource Senior VP HR Europe and Global Head of Inclu ... Show More
36 m
May 2025
[BEST OF] "The 18th Brumaire of Louis Bonaparte" by Karl Marx
<p class="date"><em><strong>ORIGINALLY RELEASED Mar 19, 2024</strong></em></p> <p>Alyson and Breht explain and explore Karl Marx's classic work "The 18th Brumaire of Louis Bonaparte." Together, they discuss Marx's incisive analysis of Louis Bonaparte's rise to power, the complex ... Show More
1h 37m
Mar 2024
The Tudor Dixon Podcast: Why Dems Have Turned Their Backs on the Working Class
<p>In this episode, Tudor interviews Batya Ungar-Sargon, the opinion editor of Newsweek and author of 'Bad News: How Woke Media is Undermining Democracy.' They discuss the political division in the country and the misconception that Americans are more divided than united. They de ... Show More
32m 59s
Aug 21
The missing piece in the story of migration | Sonia Shah and Zeke Hernandez
<p>Headlines often reduce migration to crisis and controversy, leaving out the bigger picture that movement is a natural, even necessary part of who we are. As borders tighten and debates intensify, journalist Sonia Shah and professor Zeke Hernandez unravel our historical underst ... Show More
59m 49s