KPFA - Against the Grain

We often are told there is no other way to organize society — that by our very nature, we’re destined to try to dominate each other. But are such assumptions merited? Primatologist Agustín Fuentes pulls apart the supposedly evolutionary case that humans are hardwired for war. And the late anthropologist David Graeber discusses the active cultivation of pessimism about our ability to organize society in a more egalitarian way.
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Photo by Egor Myznik on Unsplash
The post Fuentes on Aggression; Graeber on Egalitarianism appeared first on KPFA.

It’s widely recognized that vast amounts of wealth are now concentrated in the hands of the very few. But less well understood, scholar Ray Madoff argues, is how the U.S. tax code played a key role in that process. She delineates how progressive taxation and the estate tax — designed to tax the inherited wealth of the rich — have been eviscerated. And she also argues that philanthropy, perversely, has increased the wealth of the 1%.
Ray D. Madoff, The Second Estate: How the Tax Code Made an American Aristocracy University of Chicago Press, 2025
Photo by Alexander Grey on Unsplash
The post (Not) Taxing the Rich appeared first on KPFA.

Trump has not only threatened Iran’s civilian infrastructure, but the U.S. and Israel have systematically targeted it since the start of their attack. Historian Golnar Nikpour reflects on the human costs of the war.  And she discusses the Iranian state and prison system since the early 20th century and places recent mass protests — the largest in Iranian history — in the context of cycles of protest and repression in modern Iran.
Golnar Nikpour, The Incarcerated Modern: Prisons and Public Life in Iran Stanford University Press, 2024
Photo credit: Saeed Karimi
The post Infrastructures of War and Repression in Iran appeared first on KPFA.

Many in our society are struggling to provide care for their families or communities. Often they don’t have time to do it and can’t afford to pay for it. The right realizes this and has tried to woo women with a glorified vision of domestic life. Economist Nancy Folbre discusses the early fight for the recognition of unpaid care work as real work, while the economics profession has mainly ignored it, despite its crucial importance for capitalism.
Nancy Folbre, Making Care Work: Why Our Economy Should Put People First UC Press, 2026
Photo by Jill Brand on Unsplash
The post Counting Care Work appeared first on KPFA.

Capitalism has generated vast amounts of wealth by spreading around the world. But as Timothy Mitchell argues, profits are made not just across space but also time, by stealing from future generations, including through military spending. The political theorist and historian of the Middle East reflects on the ways that capitalism consumes the future.
Timothy Mitchell, The Alibi of Capital: How We Broke the Earth to Steal the Future on the Promise of a Better Tomorrow Verso, 2026
Photo by Curioso Photography on Unsplash
The post Consuming the Future appeared first on KPFA.