Tony Smith – A Pact with the Devil

Tony Smith at the New America Foundation, discussing some large changes in the way policy is made. The sound quality is pretty bad, you’d think the NAF could get it right. From the description:

Many liberals as well as conservatives supported the U.S. invasion and occupation of Iraq. In his provocative new book A Pact with the Devil: Washington’s Bid for World Supremacy, Tony Smith, professor of political science at Tufts University, criticizes liberal hawks as well as neocons for sharing a common project of American world supremacy.

Mao’s Revolution – What Remains?

These talks at UCBerkley presented online are great (second place goes to the University of Chicago). From the description:\

China expert and Harvard political scientist Roderick MacFarquhar joins UC Berkeley’s Graduate School of Journalism Dean Orville Schell for a lecture and discussion of the lasting impact of Chairman Mao’s Communist Revolution in China

Reese Erlich: The US and Iran – The Real Story

Don’t worry, that annoying intro music goes away after about thirty seconds.

From the description:

Foreign correspondent Reese Erlich, author of the soon-to-be-published book, “The Iran Agenda: The Real Story of US Policy and the Middle East Crisis,” speaks about his recent trips to Iran researching his book.

Qing Culturalism and Manchu Identity

A really fascinating lecture on Qing culturalism and Manchu identity by Frederic Wakeman in a series of lectures of China at the turn of the 20th century, entitled “Transitions from Culture to Nation.”

Jared Diamond – How Societies Fail-And Sometimes Succeed – Long Now Foundation

Jared Diamon is a captivating and articulate speaker whose are ideas are a type of common sense that just makes sense, even without the countless hours of research. From the description:

Jared Diamond articulately spelled out how his best-selling book, COLLAPSE, took shape.

America Unbound: The Bush Revolution in Foreign Policy

James M. Lindsay, Director of Studies at the Council on Foreign Relations (which has great site -> www.cfr.org), on the foreign policy of the Bush administration. According to Mr. Lindsay, the Bush foreign policy embraces Wilsonian interventionism while disregarding Wilsonian international institutions and focusing instead on national power.

Robert Reich: Why a Massachusetts Liberal Will Be the Next President

Former U.S. Secretary of Labor Robert Reich will offer his predictions about this fall’s historic civic exercise. His Distinguished Lecture in Public Policy is provocatively titled “Why a Massachusetts Liberal Will Be the Next President (and Other Amazing Prophesies)”.

Perfectly self-effacing for some predictions.

The Changing Dynamics of U.S. and Japan Relations

The Japan Studies Program at the University of Washington presents the third Atsuhiko and Ina Goodwin Tateuchi Lecture. Mr. Toyoo Gyohten, president, Institute of International Monetary Affairs and senior advisor, The Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi UFJ, Ltd., is the featured speaker. In his talk, entitled ‘The Changing Dynamics of US-Japan Relations: Stability During Turbulent Global Economic Change,’ Mr. Gyohten discusses his views on how the US-Japan relationship is critical to global stability at a time when countries such as China and India are becoming stronger global economic powers

Identity and Violence – Amartya Sen

Amartya Sen is a definitive voice on developmental economics and a winner of the Nobel Prize for economics in 1998. In this lecture at UC Berkley, he talks about a convergence of a identity and violence.

The Myth of the Clash of Civilizations – Edward Said

At this lecture at the University of Massachussets at Amherst, the late Edward Said refutes the thesis and the material of the book and essay “Clash of Civilizations” by Samuel Huntington. For me, Edward Said is an incredibly lucid speaker and consistently tears down a certain western tendency to categorize and organize ‘the mysterious east’.

Distorted Morality – Noam Chomsky

An hour long lecture from Noam Chomsky which is at times engaging and funny and at other times infuriating. I’ve linked to the wikipedia (as a jumping off point only) entry of several of the events he mentions.

Iran Air Flight 655
1982 Lebanon War
Nicaragua v. United States