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by Adam Walsh
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- 4 days ago1h 1m
Episode 536: American Imperialism
The period from 1877 to 1912 saw America transform from an agrarian, second-tier power, to one of the more dominant nations in the world. This is that story. SUPPORT THE SHOW
- 6 days ago44 min
When Companies Run The Courts
Today I sit down with Brendan Ballou and discuss a book EVERYONE should read: When The Companies Run The Courts. America has a hidden justice system. There, decisions are made in secret, and “judges” are paid for by the companies and abusers who are being sued. Victims usually lose. But when they do, they cannot appeal, and they cannot turn to real courts for help.They are trapped in this system, and quite likely, so are you. You joined it when you accepted the Terms and Conditions on a website, opened a new credit card, or started a new job. When you did, you agreed to be trapped in this secret justice system called “forced arbitration.” Through its secrecy and corruption, forced arbitration helps companies cheat their workers, helps banks deceive their customers, and helps predators act with impunity. If companies and the very powerful often seem beyond the reach of the law, it’s because they are, and forced arbitration is the reason.Yet despite the fact that forced arbitration profoundly shapes our lives, almost nothing has been written about it. Brendan Ballou’s When Companies Run the Courts changes that. It shows how forced arbitration came to be, how it makes your life worse, and how we might escape it. Buy The Book HERE.Support Western Civ
- 1 weeks ago58 min
Athens and Sparta: The Rivalry That Shaped Ancient Greece
Today I am proud to welcome back renowned historian, Adrian Goldsworthy, to discuss his latest book: Athens and Sparta: The Rivalry That Shaped Ancient Greece. No period has more profoundly influenced the Western world than classical Greece, and at its center stood two cities: Athens and Sparta. Side by side, they beat the Persians, the only superpower of that age. Yet later, they spread conflict and destruction throughout the eastern Mediterranean, culminating in the horrors of the Peloponnesian War. Athens and Sparta tells the definitive history of the relationship between brutal, militaristic Sparta and brash, radically democratic Athens. Eminent historian Adrian Goldsworthy narrates their incredible rise to prominence and how they became allies, rivals, and enemies. Ultimately, Goldsworthy shows that Athens and Sparta were more than competitors vying for power. They were polar opposites in ideology and culture, both driven by the Greek longing to excel, who led radically different experiments in how to run a state. A remarkable account of ancient Greece at its height, this is the tale of the two cities that helped build it—before almost tearing it apart. Buy The BookSupport Western Civ
- 1 weeks ago43 min
Episode 535: I won't be Reconstructed...
The era we call Reconstruction is one of the most hopeful, and ultimately, heartbreaking of American history. The passage of the Reconstruction Amendments provided legal rights to thousands of people. But the bargain of 1877 and the corruption of the Gilded Age ultimately prove too much weight for the promise of equality to bear. Western Civ 2.0
- 2 weeks ago34 min
Episode 534: European Supernova
In the second half of the 19th Century, Europe goes nuclear and expands across the globe. The "Scramble for Africa" and press for colonies drove the European states to compete with one another in ways that will have disasterous consequences. Western Civ 2.0
- 2 weeks ago45 min
Europe: A New History
In this bonus, author interview, I sit down with historian Roderick Beaton and discuss his latest book, Europe: A New History. What do we talk about when we talk about Europe? Is it defined by geography? Or is it politics, or shared culture? In Europe, award-winning historian Roderick Beaton tells the story of Europe as never before—as the history of an idea, and a collective identity. Since its dramatic birth in ancient Greece, “Europe” has been defined, and redefined, by its people. Through this powerful lens, and with the narrative drive and scope of a novelist, Beaton deftly surveys Europe’s major historical developments: the rise and fall of Rome; the explosion of Christianity; the intellectual ferment of the Renaissance and the Enlightenment; the arrival of Europeans in the Americas; the violent upheavals of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries; and the uncertainties of the present. Throughout, original sources allow the voices of the past, from Tacitus to Thatcher, to speak for themselves. Grappling with the multilayered identities that have always come with being European, Europe places the Europe of today in a long arc of history stretching back more than 2,500 years.BUY THE BOOKSupport Western Civ
- 3 weeks ago1h 25m
Episode 533: Blood and Iron
In the span of a decade, Bismarck does the unthinkable. He unites Germany, changing the history of western civilization forever. Western Civ 2.0
- Apr 17, 20261h 0m
Episode 532: Italy
Over a period of thirty years, Italy goes from a fragmentation of independent, kind of, states and kingdoms and into a unified, kind of, nation.Western Civ 2.0 Free Trial
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About Western Civ
A fast-moving history of the western world from the ancient world to the present day. Examine how the emergence of the western world as a global dominant power was not something that should ever have been taken for granted. This podcast traces the development of western civilization starting in the ancient Near East, through Greece and Rome, past the collapse of the Western Roman Empire into the Dark Ages, and then follows European and, ultimately, American history as the western world moved into a dominant world position.
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