The story so far, and upcoming...
Thank you for your interest in Metapolitics. Since we launched in April of this year, emails have gone out regularly to our subscribers with information about our latest podcast. We have now published 26 episodes, 12 of which have been conversations with guests (see list below), with the others mostly featuring Barry and Mustafa reflecting on the previous week’s conversation, though we have also looked at a few topics which we have not (yet) had a guest in to discuss. Our guests have been from different professional and academic backgrounds, and with various areas of interest. So we’ve covered a range of topics, and believe that the expertise of our guests, and our long form, in-depth approach, mean that all these episodes of Season One will be sources of insight with relevance to many daily headlines for some time to come.
We are taking a short autumnal break, and when we return in October will be starting Season Two, in which all episodes (apart from some occasional specials) will have a strong focus on how psychoanalytic understandings can provide distinctive and valuable insights into political forces and events. While hoping to build in the future on all the episodes of Season One, we want next to establish a body of accessible, conversational content around what we think is the richest and deepest psychological contribution to making sense of today’s global political environment of conflict and risk.
We will of course continue with our aims of being informed, thoughtful and open-minded, of promoting civility and avoiding esoteric language. We hope you will join us in some deep diving into the unconscious of politics.
Best wishes,
Barry and Mustafa
Season One guests
Professor Paul Hoggett on climate psychology
Dr Justin Frank on Donald Trump
Professor Maria Sobolewska on post-Brexit Britain
Professor Stuart Allan on the global future of news
Professor Demet Lukuslu on youth and polarisation in Turkish society
Professor Gary Chartier on Christianity and the nation-state
Professor Sasha Mudd on Trumpism, disconnected elites, and assisted dying
Dr Marc Palen on the meanings of free trade
Jessica Toale MP on the experience of Westminster
Dr Jeffrey Murer on Hungarian politics
Dr Lamprini Rori on Greek politics
In other episodes we discuss lone actor violence, the current convergence of authoritarian and libertarian tendencies, and the core question, ‘why is democracy so difficult?’