Category Archives: Movements, History, Economic Power and Transformation: A Conversation with Gar Alperovitz

In this second segment, I examine the history of the idea of “socialism,” tracing out how the ideal of an egalitarian society has animated religious as well as secular movements for change. I also discuss the relationship of “socialism” to the state, and how the caricatured understanding of this relationship—where socialism is synonymous with ‘Big Government’—gets in the way of imagining a bottom-up, 21st century socialism. At the same time, I emphasize the pitfalls of isolated experiments without a framework for engaging politically with the larger economic context.

Interview shot and produced by Jordan Karr-Morse from Softbox Digital.

View part one of this interview here.