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.”

Commanding Heights Part 1 – The Battle of Ideas

“A global economy, energized by technological change and unprecedented flows of people and money, collapses in the wake of a terrorist attack …. The year is 1914.

Worldwide war results, exhausting the resources of the great powers and convincing many that the economic system itself is to blame. From the ashes of the catastrophe, an intellectual and political struggle ignites between the powers of government and the forces of the marketplace, each determined to reinvent the world’s economic order.

Two individuals emerge whose ideas, shaped by very different experiences, will inform this debate and carry it forward. One is a brilliant, unconventional Englishman named John Maynard Keynes. The other is an outspoken émigré from ravaged Austria, Friedrich von Hayek.

But a worldwide depression holds the capitalist nations in its grip. In opposition to both Keynes and Hayek stand not only Hitler’s Third Reich but Stalin’s Soviet Union, schooled in the communist ideologies of Marx and Lenin and bent on obliterating the capitalist system altogether.

For more than half a century the battle of ideas will rage. From the totalitarian socialist systems to the fascist states, from the independent nations of the developing world to the mixed economies of Europe and the regulated capitalism of the United States, government planning will gradually take over the commanding heights.

But in the 1970s, with Keynesian theory at its height and communism fully entrenched, economic stagnation sets in on all sides. When a British grocer’s daughter and a former Hollywood actor become heads of state, they join forces around the ideas of Hayek, and new political and economic policies begin to transform the world.”

Conversations – Economic Theory: Robert Ashford and Dr. Edward Wolff

From 2000, well after Bill Clinton declared the end of the Old Left. From the description:

The Guests talk about economic theory in a Paradigm sense. The raise the idea that it ultimatly is the basic source which informs all National & International Political decison making at a policy leval. They (particurly Ashford) strongly question the “Labor Theory of Value” which informs in a fundemental sense virutlaly all Economic Theory from from the far Left to the far Right as outdated in an era when economic production (and the trends therein) is increasingly the result of capital assets which are overwhelmingly owned by a very narrow owership class.

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

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.

Mao’s Bloody Revolution

via popperslist documentaries

From the description:

Revealed Series: Mao’s Bloody Revolution – Section 1 of 4 A documentary offering a portrait of Mao Tse-Tung, one of the 20th century’s most controversial leaders. Author and former BBC correspondent Philip Short looks at Mao’s life from his childhood and rise to power to his death in 1976. The programme examines the legacy of Mao’s rule of China and features exclusive interviews with some of Mao’s inner circle, as well as dramatic unseen footage from the period of the ‘cultural revolution‘.

Disbelief – 1999 Russia Bombings

From the description:

A fatal bomb blast in a Moscow apartment building ignites a fury of questions about terrorism, shadow politics, and post-Soviet intrigue in Disbelief; a film as much about the high art of political deception as it is about violence and human tragedy. The bombing on September 9, 1999, of a nine-story working-class apartment complex in Moscow was quickly blamed on Chechen terrorists. But was it their crime? Or did the Russian secret service deflect its own responsibility for the bombing on the Chechens to heighten national fear and hysteria and justify Russia’s subsequent military attack on the breakaway republic?

The Modern Racist Paradigm

From the description:

The documentary addresses many modern-day internalized racist psychological dispositions (subconscious forms of internalized racism) which are unknowingly passed down from generation to generation due to the globalization and pervasiveness of “Whiteness”; a cultural assimilation process of which, is directly derivative to historical European expansionism, colonialism, and imperialism.

I really like this anecdotal mash-up, although the focus of zionism seems a bit much. The effects that domestic and casual racism have in geopolitics (which is of course perpetuated by the media) is enormous because it lends itself to the views from two or three cultural sources remaining dominant.

Inner Trip – Reiyukai Buddhism

This documentary is an interesting event, especially when contrasted with the gunboat diplomacy of Matthew Perry and the Treaty of Kanagawa which allowed christianity to be spread in Japan, albeit pretty unsuccesfully.

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.

The Secret Government: The Constitution in Crisis, by Bill Moyers

Bill Moyers on PBS before the fear of being labelled partisan in a polarized domestic American scene forced the most bland neutrality on productions was incredible. Here, he covers every aspect of Iran-Contra scandal under Ronald Reagan with concise and appropriate anger.

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.

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.

Securing the International Oil Supply

From the comments:

It took me two days to get through this, but it was a really good watch. It was interesting to see different sides explained, but it is hard to deny the consequences that Mr Klare outlines.

Current Event – Korean Reunification

I personally feel like this picture sums up the efforts of Korean Reunification by these two leaders quite well, but for more depth and background, let’s do a “current event” update.

Roh Moo Hyun and Kim Jong Il met in Pyongyang and signed a vague accord, pledging to work towards peace. The ultimate goal of reunification is obviously a long ways away because of the enormous cultural differences and hardline opposition in the South. The Independent isn’t even sure if the two countries are working towards reunification at all. Koreans, or at least businessmen speculating on land near the DMZ, seem to think the country will reunite and that that’s profits to be had.

al Jazeera presents an in-depth look at the current situation between the two Koreas.

Part One:

Part Two:

Just a note: I really like these al Jazeera in-depth news coverages; a guest on the show is actually from the country in question and theres only one of the usual American partisan pundist. So from here-and-on, I’ll be trying to syndicate current event coverage, focusing on northeast Asia.

Conversations with History – Seyla Benhabib

Yale political theorist Seyla Benhabib is UC Berkeley’s Harry Kreisler’s guest in a discussion of how political theory can further our understanding of globalization and its impact on the struggle for human rights.