What’s the role of a university in a democratic society? What responsibility do universities have to foster the public good, and what responsibilities does the public have to support centers of education and research?
These have become some of the most fraught and pressing questions in our current moment. But of course, they’re also timeless questions — ones that are as old as the United States itself.
On this episode, Mark explores these questions (and more) with literary scholar Kevin McLaughlin and historian Karin Wulf. In addition to having thought deeply on just these types of issues, Kevin and Karin are also the co-chairs of “Brown 2026,” an initiative marking the 250th anniversary of the U.S. and exploring the past and future role of universities in a democratic society.
Guests on this episode:
Kevin McLaughlin is a literary scholar and director of the John Nicholas Brown Center for Advanced Study at Brown.
Karin Wulf is a historian and director and librarian of the John Carter Brown Library.
The role of universities in a democratic society (a collaboration with “Brown 2026”)
00:34:18
Why the left keeps losing (or does it)?
00:47:56
Imagining the macroeconomy in interwar Poland
00:24:01
The puzzling politics of inequality
00:44:12
Why capitalism can’t solve the climate crisis
00:42:14
Why we think what we think, when we think about inflation
00:39:12
Why we ran out of everything during the pandemic, and why it had less to do with the pandemic and more to do with the corporations that made us much more vulnerable to it
00:41:44
The expulsion of politics? What the UK’s Office of Budget Responsibility tells us about the limits of technocracy
00:43:01
Money can’t buy happiness, but it can buy citizenship abroad
00:34:33
How asset managers came to own everything and you failed to notice
00:53:11
The business side of fighting climate change
00:33:26
An Immigrant Economist in the Land of Inequality: A Conversation with Sir Angus Deaton
00:32:28
The new politics of growth and stagnation (part 3): houses, micro states, finance, carbon
00:35:27
The new politics of growth and stagnation (part 2): growth models at scale
00:32:51
The new politics of growth and stagnation (part 1)
00:33:58
Does economics do more harm than good? And if it does, how would we know harm when we see it?
00:40:09
Nazi billionaires, capitalist ethics, and other notable contradictions
00:35:04
A wee podcast on the last 50 - and next 50 - years of the global world order
00:38:50
The ‘free market’ is a fever dream and Adam Smith wasn’t in it
00:34:23
State power in China: more "Parks and Rec" than command and control?
00:33:32
What Mark Blyth Got Wrong About Bidenomics and Climate Change
00:34:38
Why Undoing Globalization is Going to Be a Painful Affair
00:30:23
This Week in ‘Ask a Philosopher’: Is the ‘American Dream' Dead?
00:31:34
How Did We End Up with the Idea of a Growing Economy? ‘The Journey of Humanity’ with Oded Galor
00:45:31
What if I told you that international money is governed by no more than the beliefs of a handful of super-connected global elites…and yet there is no conspiracy. Would you be interested?
00:35:56
Can Social Media and Democracy Co-exist? A Conversation with Frances Haugen
00:24:51
The Global Roots of Neomercantilism
00:38:39
Fiona Hill on Deindustrialization, Despair and Demagoguery
00:32:17
The Past, Present, and Contested Future of Central Banks
00:36:33
‘How Efficiency Replaced Equality in US Policy” with Elizabeth Popp Berman
00:31:10
The Forgotten History of “The Labor Board Crew”: How Mediators at the US Labor Board Changed Organized Labor (and the World)
00:23:49
America Has Always Been a 'Credit Nation'
00:30:40
The Other Problem with Ratings Agencies
00:37:01
'Bidenomics': Policy Change or Paradigm Shift?
00:27:55
The Robots May Be Coming, But Probably Not for Your Job
00:28:06
How Precarity Puts Capitalism on Edge
00:33:20
Is Now the Time for a Federal Jobs Guarantee?
00:25:22
The Left, Divided Over the Extraction Economy
00:27:38
Austerity Myths and the Health of Nations: What Malawi Tells Us About the Construction of Scarcity
00:26:40
How Fraud Explains the Economy
00:33:51
Who Owns the Economy, and Who Pays for It?
00:25:38
Why Does the EU Have a Legitimacy Problem?
00:31:26
Do Deficits Matter? (MMT Explained)
00:42:03
The Fraught, Complex, and Important 'Economics of Belonging'
00:43:20
Populism, or 'Anti-System Politics'?
00:44:02
How US Hegemony Ends
00:43:20
Possibilities for a Post-Covid Economy
00:29:11
The First Globalist: Sandy Zipp Talks Wendell Willkie’s World
00:42:39
The Corona Oil Shock
00:45:37
State Capacity, Growth Models, and Coronavirus in Latin America
00:34:32
'Leftism Reinvented' with Stephanie Mudge
00:27:54
Experts and the National Interest: The Curious Case of China and the US
00:25:51
What’s Next? The Post-American Global Economy
00:33:38
Rethinking Economic Paternalism
00:28:05
The 'Code of Capital' with Katharina Pistor
00:21:02
Corporate Governance in the Digital Age
00:26:37
Economic Narratives and 'Uncertain Futures'
00:33:44
The 99% Economy with Paul Adler
00:28:49
A Progressive Case for Free Trade with Kimberly Clausing
00:34:34
Aidan Regan: Economic Ideas and Real Politics
00:34:33
Zsófia Barta: Understanding the Politics of Public Debt
00:24:07
Ling Chen: New Insights on the 'Made in China' Model
00:17:58
William Rhodes: Connecting the Dots, from Venezuela to China and Beyond
00:22:56
Marco Buti – Inclusive Multilateralism as a Response to Economic Nationalism?
00:16:47
Paul Tucker – Unelected Power: The Quest for Legitimacy in Central Banking and the Regulatory State
00:33:32
Dani Rodrik – From Globalization to Hyper-Globalization and Back
00:38:21
Rick Perlstein - Jimmy Carter and the Origins of the Democratic Party Cult of Austerity
00:28:01
Quinn Slobodian – Globalists: The End of Empire and the Birth of Neoliberalism
00:32:12
Ilene Grabel – When Things Don't Fall Apart
00:35:03
Bill Janeway – Doing Capitalism in the Innovation Economy
