Jacobin Radio

On this edition of Jacobin Radio with Suzi Weissman, guest co-hosts Alan Minsky and Mel Figueroa present another installment of The People's Game, a quadrennial series that looks at the economic and political subtexts of the world’s most popular sport. They are joined by Ryan McKnight, a doctoral researcher at Manchester Met University in the UK who is researching the impact of neoliberalism on what he calls “the opportunity of football fandom.” According to Ryan, football fandom is one of the last remaining forms of large-scale collectivism in the UK, offering a unique window into the nature of society. Next, Alan Minsky speaks to former Congressman Jamaal Bowman to get his thoughts on the World Cup, the victory of his hometown Knicks, and how both are being experienced in Mayor Mamdani’s NYC.

Jacobin Radio with Suzi Weissman features conversations with leading thinkers and activists, with a focus on labor, the economy, and protest movements.

Donald Trump has made the issue of immigration a key battleground in US politics. But with public opinion swinging against the brutal ICE raids and deportations over the past year, how should the Left respond?

On the latest episode of Confronting Capitalism, Vivek Chibber and Melissa Naschek are joined by Catalyst board member Suzy Lee. Suzy has written extensively on the political economy and politics of American immigration and migration more broadly. Together, they look at how Trump capitalized on the post-COVID surge in immigration and offer an alternative vision around immigrant rights and border politics.

Read Suzy Lee’s recent essay here: https://catalyst-journal.com/2026/04/the-logic-of-mass-deportation

The latest issue of Catalyst is out, and you can subscribe for just $20 using the code CONFRONTINGCAPITALISM: https://catalyst-journal.com/subscribe/?code=CONFRONTINGCAPITALISM

Have a question for us? Write to us by email: [email protected]

Confronting Capitalism with Vivek Chibber is produced by Catalyst: A Journal of Theory and Strategy and published by Jacobin. Music by Zonkey.

Stuart Schrader, author of Blue Power, explains how the political heft of cops allows them to get away with murder. Angela Jones, author of Sex in Public, looks at the social and political factors shaping our sexual lives.

Behind the News, hosted by Doug Henwood, covers the worlds of economics and politics and their complex interactions, from the local to the global.

Elon Musk became the world’s first trillionaire last week after the record-breaking IPO of his company SpaceX. Musk presents the firm’s economic take off as the necessary means to a wider end for humanity, to become a multi-planetary species.

“That’s what SpaceX is all about,” Musk recently said at the company’s headquarters. “To take the fiction out of science fiction.”

While Musk was looking to the stars, the people of Belfast were still reeling from several days of racist violence. The Belfast pogrom drew strength from the far-right ecosystem that Musk has nurtured with the money from SpaceX, Tesla, and other companies. Musk himself repeatedly called for anti-immigrant protests and boosted the messaging of Britain’s neofascist right. His social-media platform generated the atmosphere of a frenzied lynch mob.

Over two episodes, Long Reads will explore the two sides of Elon Musk and his impact on the world. Our guests are Quinn Slobodian and Ben Tarnoff, authors of Muskism: A Guide for the Perplexed. This interview was conducted a few days before the SpaceX IPO.

Read Jacobin’s reviews of Muskism here: https://jacobin.com/2026/03/muskism-futurism-fordism-sovereignty-technology

And here: https://jacobin.com/2026/03/musk-slobodian-tarnoff-neoliberalism-right

Long Reads is a Jacobin podcast looking in-depth at political topics and thinkers, both contemporary and historical, with the magazine’s writers. Hosted by features editor Daniel Finn. Produced by Conor Gillies with music by Knxwledge.

The show’s co-producers Alan Minsky and Meleiza Figueroa fill in for Suzi with a special installment of their quadrennial podcast series, The People’s Game⁠, which covers the world's most popular spectacle from a socialist internationalist perspective.

Alan and Mel talk with their fellow People’s Game co-host Fernando Romero about, well, “everything” going on in the world. How surreal it feels to be passionate fans of the beloved global game when the political circumstances inside the World Cup’s primary host country are so fraught and dire for so many people inside and outside US borders.

Fernando Romero is beaming! We spoke with him on the eve of his journey to Mexico. First stop is Mexico City for the opening game, then onto Guadalajara and Monyterrey, all three World Cup cities in Mexico.

We then speak with Thomas Hanna from the Democracy Collaborative, a longtime fan and player, about the problems — and potential — for the people’s game as a vehicle for democracy rather than capitalism. As a fútbol fan, Thomas mirrors his work with the Democracy Collaborative, which advocates for worker ownership of businesses and industry, and assists worker-led efforts to own and control their workplaces. Thomas helps organize a growing global movement for fans to own their favorite clubs.

Jacobin Radio with Suzi Weissman features conversations with leading thinkers and activists, with a focus on labor, the economy, and protest movements.