36: Geoff Mann – It Was Not Supposed To End This Way

Global Governance Futures: Imperfect Utopias or Bust

Professor Geoff Mann is Distinguished Professor of Geography at Simon Fraser University, Vancouver BC. Geoff is an award-winning political economist and writer, known as a leading researcher on the historical development and future trajectory of economic governance set against the backdrop of the climate crisis. He is a senior fellow at the Institute for New Economic Thinking and a 2022 recipient of a Guggenheim Fellowship award for his contributions to his field. Among many publications, the book Climate Leviathan: A Political Theory of Our Planetary Future (Verso, 2018) (with Joel Wainwright) is a vital referent point for anyone interested in the radical political consequences of climate change. But it is the quite brilliant 2019 article in the Boston Review ‘It Was Not Supposed to End This Way’ and his intriguing claim that ‘the tragedy of liberalism is its inability to narrate the end progress’ which serves as the point of departure for our conversation. In this podcast we talk about the scale and depth of the challenge posed by the Anthropocene, the impossible ‘We’, the tragedy of liberalism, and where we might look for alternative stories to narrate the end of progress, and much, much more. Geoff can be found here: https://www.sfu.ca/geography/about/our-people/profiles/Geoff-Mann.html And tweets @GeoffPMann: https://twitter.com/GeoffPMann We discussed: ‘Markets Won’t Stop Fossil Fuels’, Dissent Magazine, Spring 2023: https://www.dissentmagazine.org/article/markets-wont-stop-fossil-fuels/ ‘It Was Not Supposed to End This Way’, Boston Review, 13 August 2019: https://www.bostonreview.net/articles/geoff-mann-it-was-not-supposed-end-way/ Climate Leviathan: A Political Theory of Our Planetary Future (Verso, 2018) (with Joel Wainwright): https://www.versobooks.com/en-gb/products/520-climate-leviathan