Episode Details

Recorded at Flourishing House, the Institute for Humane Studies' gathering at SXSW exploring what people and societies need to thrive, this episode finds host Aaron Ross Powell in conversation with Virginia Postrel — journalist, former Reason editor, and author of The Future and Its Enemies and The Fabric of Civilization. The 1990s now look like a golden age of optimism about the future — but at the time, critics were smashing computers on stage and running "Smash the Internet" cover stories. Powell and Postrel revisit her enduring distinction between dynamism and stasis nearly three decades on: why today's backlash against openness is less about pocketbook economics than discomfort with a diverse, experimental society; why every solution breeds fresh discontents, and why that's a feature rather than a bug; and how liberals can keep making the case for abundance through concrete, everyday stories — from YIMBY housing reform to the surprisingly contentious history of the toothbrush.

Further Reading

• The Future and Its Enemies: The Growing Conflict Over Creativity, Enterprise, and Progress — Virginia Postrel, Free Press
• The Fabric of Civilization: How Textiles Made the World — Virginia Postrel, Basic Books
• Abundance — Ezra Klein & Derek Thompson, Avid Reader Press
• Virginia Postrel's website — home for her columns and books; her new Everyday Abundance podcast with Charles C. Mann is forthcoming (June 2026)

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