Podcast Episodes

Book Review: Black Power and the American People

This week's book review is an excellent and incisive analysis of the cultural history of black power in America by Rafael Torrubia.

Explaining History helps you understand the 20th Century through cr…

Published on 8 years, 6 months ago

Public Opinion and International Relations 1890-1914

In the decades before the First World War, the role that public opinion and the press in forming the foreign policy of European powers became considerably more decisive. This podcast explores how and…

Published on 8 years, 6 months ago

Book Review: Battles for Freedom by Eric Foner

The monthly book review returns, with a review of Battles for Freedom - the essays of Eric Foner for the Nation magazine 1977-2015

Explaining History helps you understand the 20th Century through cri…

Published on 8 years, 6 months ago

1979 and the birth of neoliberalism

In the late 1970s, after a decade of economic stagnation, western economies, accompanied by China, began the first steps towards the abandonment of the Bretton Woods system and social democracy. They…

Published on 8 years, 6 months ago

IG Farben and the Holocaust

In 1947 the last of the Nuremberg trials began. The accused were German industrialists from the chemicals cartel IG Farben. Prosecutors charged them with using slave labour at their bunawerk factory …

Published on 8 years, 7 months ago

War and British National Identity in the 20th Century

The development of British national identity in the 20th Century is intimately connected with conflict. War has provided a unifying force that has held together an inherently fissile union throughout…

Published on 8 years, 7 months ago

Stalin and the Soviet Bomb 1945-49

Stalin and his chief henchman Lavrenti Beria poured resources from a devastated USSR into the creation of an atomic bomb from 1945 onwards. The development of the bomb rested on Soviet espionage and …

Published on 8 years, 8 months ago

Bretton Woods 1944-1971

In 1944 at Bretton Woods in the USA a new model of the world economy that would provide postwar stability and prosperity was devised. However, the compromises and plans of the USA meant that the syst…

Published on 8 years, 8 months ago

Mao, Khrushchev and the Great Leap Forward

Between 1958-1962 Mao's second five year plan, known as the Great Leap Forward, resulted in economic chaos and a famine that killed over 40 million people. It was in part inspired by Mao's attempts t…

Published on 8 years, 8 months ago

2017 Exams Special: Expert study advice with Lucy Parsons

In a slight change from our regular episodes, I've interviewed study specialist and coach Lucy Parsons to offer her knowledge on how to prepare for history exams and what skills are needed to excel a…

Published on 8 years, 8 months ago