English
Interviewed by Azeem Azhar (Harvard Business Review) on tech, economics, and the future of democracy – audio
, 27/12/2021
In this podcast, I join Azeem Azhar EXPONENTIAL VIEW to discuss my novel Another Now (click here for the English and here for the US versions). [Click here to listen on their site and here for Spotify) We discuss the book’s vision of a world where mass organization, technological progress, and an overhaul of companies and markets have made […]
The Economic Model of ANOTHER NOW, by AFTER THE OLIGARCHY: Video plus interview
, 27/12/2021
In my novel ANOTHER NOW (click here for the English and here for the US versions) I put forward a blueprint for a socialist, decentralised, market society in which the profit-wage nexus, share markets and commercial banks have become extinct. AFTER THE OLIGARCHY were kind enough to produce a 40′ video explaining the economic model of ANOTHER NOW […]
Russell Brand interrogates me on my novel ANOTHER NOW. Sparks fly and fun is had as we discuss what we can replace technofeudal capitalism with
, 27/12/2021
Can the system ever change or are we stuck? Are we condemned to live as modern peasants in a technofeudal order? Or can we create a postcapitalist system that utilises technology to revive socialism as a realistic, attractive, freedom-enhancing prospect? Is my novel ANOTHER NOW (click here for the English and here for the US […]
Why Croatia should NOT adopt the euro PLUS European politics, technofeudalism, US & China – Interviewed by Vecernji List
, 27/12/2021
In an exclusive interview by Nataša Vlašić Smrekar for Croatian media Vecernji List, I explained why it would be a grave error for non-eurozone EU member-states, like Croatia, to adopt the euro. We also talked extensively about European politics, Technofeudalism, my novel Another Now, and the US-China stand-off. Here is the original English language version […]
Defining wealth in 65 words for SPEARS magazine
, 27/12/2021
Spears asked me, and three others, to define WEALTH in fewer than 70 words. Their rationale was that, at the time of Spear’s founding, in 2006, there were fewer than 1,000 billionaires world-wide; their combined net worth a little under $3 trillion. Today, there are 2,755 billionaires, according to Forbes, and they have a collective […]
How should self-managed enterprises work in a postcapitalist setting? Follow the ongoing M. Albert-Y. Varoufakis debate
, 24/12/2021
Tragically, most people take bosses for granted. Capitalist firms have them by construction, by design. But, what of cooperative enterprises that are owned by everyone working within them? Do they also need bosses? A managerial class that tells the rest what to do? Or can we envisage boss-less firms? If so, how do things that […]
Julian’s extradition marks a Dark Day for British Justice
, 10/12/2021
With its decision to extradite Julian Assange to the United States, Britain’s High Court wasted a precious opportunity to save what is left of the honour of Britain’s courts after so many years of their complicity in the slow murder of a man whose only crime was to reveal our governments’ crimes against humanity. From […]
With Phillip Adams on Late Night Live (ABC RN) talking about the hollow promise of 2021, Merkel, Zuckerberg, DiEM25 and… my dad
, 06/12/2021
End of the year, yes, a perfect time to look back to 2021 and its betrayed, hollow promises. Here, on ABC Radio National’s Late Night Live, I am chatting with Phillip Adams (DiEM25’s honorary member) the motivated fiasco that was Cop26, Angela Merkel’s peculiar failure, China, Zuckerberg and, yes, my… dad. Thanks Phillip
The West’s Wasted Year – Project Syndicate
, 06/12/2021
A year that began hopefully is ending grimly. Western political elites, unable (and perhaps unwilling) to turn a deadly pandemic and climate crisis into a life-preserving opportunity, have only themselves to blame. ATHENS – The silver lining in the gloomy cloud of the pandemic was the opportunity it gave the West to mend its ways. […]
A Progressive Monetary Policy Is the Only Alternative – Project Syndicate
, 06/12/2021
Torn between inflationary jitters and fear of deflation, central bankers in the major advanced economies are taking a potentially costly wait-and-see approach. Only a progressive rethink of their tools and aims can help them play a socially useful post-pandemic role. ATHENS – As the coronavirus pandemic recedes in the advanced economies, their central banks increasingly […]
DiEM25 is radicalising, seizing the moment, upping our game. Join us?
, 22/11/2021
A message for DiEM25 members: We are on the cusp for our paneuropean movement’s second, more radical, terribly necessary phase. Are you in? DiEM25 is your movement. Existing members, please go to https://diem25.org/YESlets to let us know that you’re in. Everyone else, you can get a full membership at https://internal.diem25.org/users/sig…
Visionary realism : Chatting with Noam Chomsky & Ann Pettifor on a green future beyond capitalism
, 17/11/2021
The context is the fraud and fiasco also known as Cop26. The frame is DiEM25’s COP-OFF video chats. And the purpose is to discuss whether there was ever a possibility of Cop26 yielding a significant prospect for a timely green transition. In this discussion Noam, Ann and I agree: Yes, the Green New Deal is […]
LA STAMPA interview on the Italian edition of ANOTHER NOW: From Marinnetti & the Sex Pistols to Hephaestus & favourite books
, 17/11/2021
On the occasion of the publication of my ANOTHER NOW in Italian (Un Altro Presente), La Stampa put to me some quirky and irreverent questions. Just in case you wanted to read them, and my answers, in the English original, here they are. Have fun! Marinetti and the Sex Pistols are milestones for Costa: is […]
Talking to the Bunker about ANOTHER NOW
, 16/11/2021
Renowned economist, politician, and author Yanis Varoufakis stopped by the Bunker to talk about his latest book, Another Now, which is an alternate history in which our world developed into a post-capitalist world after the economic crash in 2008. Yanis shared the story of how he was politicized early after the Greek civil war and his father’s imprisonment, […]
What’s behind the Cop26 fraud? – The Guardian
, 16/11/2021
There are three reasons Cop26 proved such a spectacular debacle: A planet-wide collective action problem over “free-riding”. A global coordination failure. And… capitalism! “Make no mistake, the money is here, if the world wants to use it,” said Mark Carney, the former Bank of England Governor who today serves as UN climate envoy while also representing […]
Assessing the Biden Presidency one year after his election – Rick Wolf & Yanis Varoufakis
, 06/11/2021
In this edition of THE INTERNATIONALIST, following news from the global struggle against reactionaries, Rick Wolf and I discuss the US situation (from the 8th minute onwards). Yes, it has been one year since Joe Biden came into office. While he is at COP26 making weak and unconvincing commitments on the climate, the global crisis […]
Explaining to friend & comrade Slavoj Zizek that which why I didn’t get a chance to tell my father: why I think capitalism has evolved into technofeudalism
, 06/11/2021
I must have been no older than five or six when my dad introduced me to the idea that technological progress forces the pace of history. I remember him explaining how written records coincided with humanity’s ability to smelt copper tools. Of how history accelerated when ancient smiths progressed from copper to forging iron tools […]
Can capitalism be fixed? An Intelligence Squared debate between Gillian Tett (Yes!) and Yanis Varoufakis (No!)
, 06/11/2021
Gillian Tett, the Financial Times Chair of the Editorial Board & Editor-at-large, believes that capitalism can be fixed, through copious regulation and institutional interventions. I, on the other hand, not only think that capitalism cannot be fixed but, additionally, that capitalism has made itself irrelevant through a surreptitious transformation into a new version of the […]
Star Trek vs The Matrix: Chatting with Briahna Joy Gray about my ANOTHER NOW on BAD FAITH
, 06/11/2021
Truly enjoyed this chat with Briahna Joy Gray which began with a discussion of my novel ANOTHER NOW, and the question of what a non-capitalist world could look like in the here and now, and drifted nicely to our favourite show, Star Trek – the ultimate depiction of a liberal communism worth working towards; which […]
What’s behind our #yourNHSneedsYou campaign: DiEM25 ushering in a new way of doing progressive politics – The New Statesman
, 06/11/2021
A new campaign to save the NHS from privatisation-from-within (#yourNHSneedsYou) is going from strength to strength in the UK. In this New Statesman article, Yanis Varoufakis, Nathalie Bennett and John McDonnell explain why and how the NHS is being eaten up from within by Big Tech, Big Pharma and Big Business more generally. What makes […]
ANOTHER NOW: Socialist Alternatives to Capitalism Explored in New Novel – On Democracy Now!, with Amy Goodman
, 11/10/2021
In an extended interview with Yanis Varoufakis, member of the Greek Parliament and former finance minister of Greece, we discuss his new novel, “Another Now,” and why he chose to write fiction after years of nonfiction. “All my life as a lefty, I had to find ways of escaping the poignant question: ‘If you don’t like […]
On Merkel’s Legacy, European Politics & the “Sordid Arms Race” on the Seas – On Democracy Now, with Amy Goodman
, 11/10/2021
The centre-left Social Democratic Party in Germany has narrowly claimed victory in an election that marks an end to the 16-year era of Angela Merkel’s conservative chancellorship. We look at what this means for Europe and the world with Yanis Varoufakis, a member of the Greek Parliament and the former finance minister of Greece. The […]
George Varoufakis (1925-2021)
, 30/09/2021
Shortly after midnight, on 29th September, George Varoufakis died. He was born in Cairo, Egypt in June 1925 where he finished his high school studies at the Ambetio School. After graduating, he worked at a branch of a Greek bank in Cairo before coming to Athens in 1946 to enrol in the Department of Chemistry […]