Unreported World – Turkey

Unreported World travels to eastern Turkey, where Europe and Asia meet, to report on the rekindling of a largely forgotten and ignored war that threatens the stability of the region and the European Union’s expansion plans.

Reporter Matthew McAllester journeys from Diyarbakir, the centre of the Kurdish heartland, deep into Kurdish Turkey and on to the border with Iran, home to thousands of Kurdish PKK fighters, before meeting one of the group’s leaders in Iraq.

The Prize – Empires of Oil

“Witness capitalism on a grand scale: how Shell Oil and Royal Dutch merged, then challenged the supremacy of Rockefeller’s Standard Oil. A compelling tale of how oil transformed everyday life in the farthest corners of the globe, made Russia a great oil power, and helped the Allies win World War I.”

Sartre – The Road to Freedom.

Sartre has had an enormous effect on geopolitics, although as an American I would never know. His theories on revolution influenced revolutionaries in Algeria, Iran and Egypt, where they were merged with Islam in order to fight repressive governments.

Unreported World – Zimbabwe

More from the BBC’s Unreported World series, this time focusing on Mugabe. Of course, I’d be wary watching a show produced in England about Zimbabwe, but the on-the-ground interviews are solid. From the description:

Reporter Evan Williams and Director Siobhan Sinnerton reveal startling claims that the Mugabe Government is using the supply of AIDS drugs and food aid to gerrymander upcoming elections

Parts two and three when you click the video.

The Marshall Plan

From the description :

The Marshall Plan (from its enactment, officially the European Recovery Program [ERP]) was the primary plan of the United States for rebuilding and creating a stronger foundation for the allied countries of Europe, and repelling communism after World War II. The initiative was named for United States Secretary of State George Marshall and was largely the creation of State Department officials, especially William L. Clayton and George F. Kennan.

More at Google Video.

Unreported World – Somalia

A 2006 look at Somalia on the Al Jazeera English program, Unreported World. Somalia is one of the most interesting places on the map today, and certainly one of the most tumultuous. Somalia is particularily interesting because it is a country defined by the borders of neighbors and not by anytype of sovereignty, making it perhaps the only and definitely the largest territory that never adopted the Westphalian system. Al Qaeda seems to want to open a “third front” in Somalia, but the fighting there has been intermittent and the rampant lawlessness and lack of major geopolitical importance negates attention.

Meet the Stans : Uzbekistan

This video is part three of a CBC four-part special about Central Asia, focusing on Uzbekistan. I’ll probably post the other parts later.

Cracking the Myths : Russian Geopolitics

From the description:

Cracking the Myths: Geopolitics
There are fears that Russia is still an aggressive state. Its image abroad is that Russia is the country with big geopolitical ambitions, a potential invader that wants to rule the world. But how many countries has it invaded in the last 20 years? Mark Ames is looking for answers to this and many other geopolitical questions in the new installment of the Cracking the Myths documentary series.

Presented by Russia Today, another international English-language media company (this one is state-owned) in a growing and neccesary field.

Cities of Light – The Rise and Fall of Islamic Spain

I’ve actually seen a couple of better tv shows about the same subject, but this is the longest. Al-Andalus is an interesting challenge to the notions of east vs. west.

Black Power – Pandora’s Box

With a fairly interesting premise for an educational show, this episode of Pandora’s Box focuses on Kwame Nkrumah’s plans for Ghana after colonialism. From the description:

A look at how former Ghanaian leader Kwame Nkrumah set Africa ablaze with his vision of a new industrial and scientific age. At the heart of his dream was to be the huge Volta dam, generating enough power to transform West Africa into an advanced utopia. But as his grand experiment took shape, it brought with it dangerous forces Nkrumah couldn’t control, and he slowly watched his metropolis of science sink into corruption and debt.”

I especially enjoyed the hindsight from active participants of both sides; the businessmen from the West betray profit-motivated decisions, i.e. importing raw materials for the Akosombo Dam instead of building the infrastructure for fear of nationalization, and the former government officials provide a glimpse into the dissapointment of not realizing a quick African rising.

Liberty and Economics – Ludwig von Mises

Ludwig von Mises has had a major influence on libertarian ideas and (according to his foundation’s website) is the “uncontested dean of the Austrian School of economists”.

This video, unfortunately, suffers from having been produced by the institute who took his name; as a result, a lot of the narration and interview clips are simplistic and biased. This video does, however, provide a decent overview of von Mises ideas.

The Life of the Buddha

The Life of the Buddha.

The Lost Temples of South India

The Lost Temples of South India

I guess the people who name educational shows think the people who watch them like to find lost things while watching.

Namibia – Genocide and the Second Reich

This excellant program looks at genoicde in Namibia at the hands of the Germans around the turn of the 20th century.

The Lost Treasures of the Ancient World – China

Unreported World – Brazil Slum Warfare

An interesting corollary with the Paulo Lins novel and fillm adaptation, City of God.

Channel 4’s remarkable series captures the angst and danger of one of Rio’s most notorious favelas, Manguinhos. Harrowing TV.

The Mongol Invasion of Japan

A British educational television show focusing on the research of Kezno Hayashida, an archaeologist, on the failed Mongol invasion of Japan and the infamous ‘kamikaze’ that saved Japan.

A Day in the Life of North Korea

Apparently filmed by a Dutch crew, and presented by Al Jazeera.

via Smashing Telly

Burma’s Secret War

An hour long British television program on the repressive military junta in Myanmar, known also under it’s colonial name of Burma.