Our 4th season is coming to an end, which provides us with an opportunity to look back at some of the topics we have discussed in the past months and see how they have developed. Is there still war in Ukraine and Gaza? How close is Iran this time to the nuclear bomb? How can Labour win two-thirds of the seats in the UK elections with only one-third…

The US Supreme Court has been the talk of the town this week. There are plenty of impactful cases to look at from the past weeks. Donald Trump basically reveiving imunity from his actions as President, bribery being legalised and the courts centralising power around itself. Plenty of actions that are in line with a further decay of institutions in …

Can we blame the average voters for their votes for destructive policies? To what extend are they victims or the establishment? To what extend should voters see through false promises? Today we are discussing a disagreement between us to what extend individuals in the West can be held accountable for their decisions. This podcast is published with …

This June, US President Biden said that “Russia will not stop at Ukraine, and “All of Europe will be threataned”. Where is this fear of war coming from? Why is the West so afraid of it? How does this influence our foreign policy thinking? This podcast is published with the help of RAIA and edited by RAIA member Julia Ohm but is an individual projec…

The European Parliament Elections just took place and they took us for a ride. But unlike the European establishment we do not call anyone who voted for the extreme right idiots, but actually analyse what elements of the Western Bubble have created an environment in which more and more Europeans vote for right wing populist parties. This podcast is…

The third part of our three part episode series on institutional decline with today's focus of who still wants to come tonthe West? People who need money or flee violence, but is the West still the "shining light on a hill"? If not, why is this the case? Analyse this with us in this episode. This podcast is published with the help of RAIA and edite…

In our second part of our three parter on institutional decline in the West we focus on foreign policy. Continuity and the resulting accountability are key to any foreign policy! The West has been lacking that continuity since the end of the Cold War now ... with incredibly destructive consequences. This podcast is published with the help of RAIA a…

Universities all over the globe are experiencing encampments of students demanding action against Israel. This is representing an increasing trend of frustrations of the younger generations with institutions managing rather than leading society with its visions. This episode is the first part of a three part series on institutional decline. This po…

Over the weekend all of Europe went crazy over the European Song Contest - Eurovision. As a weekend full of scandals comes to an end, the biggest of which is "obviously" France not winning, we analyse Eurovision as a case study for the Western Bubble and particularly the role of Israel. Oh, and as you can imagine, Balder is "furious" that the Nethe…

Today we analyse the United Kingdom's agreement with Rwanda to fly asylum seekers and migrants to Rwanda to process them. We talk about how this is a perfect example of Western decay and also rant a little. Here is the video of Chris Philp https://youtu.be/Olk61SGPb-o?si=bmojFxSL_L0I0zYx This podcast is published with the help of RAIA and edited by…

Haiti is always in the news for negative reports, the country is governed by a failed state. Today we discuss failed states from the Western Bubble perspective and use Haiti as a case study of destructive Western behaviour. This podcast is published with the help of RAIA and edited by RAIA member Julia Ohm but is an individual project between the D…

Multinational corporations undermine and harm the West in various ways. But why does the West not do anything to control their power and influence? Because these MNCs are inherently Western and a Western product - find out how exactly in this episode! This podcast is published with the help of RAIA and edited by RAIA member Julia Ohm but is an indi…

To discuss the Easter-West or non-Nato Western Bubble we invited someone from the Eastern-West. In this episode, we are talking to Daniel Bloch from Australia about Australia and to what extend we can or cannot apply the concept of the Western Bubble to Australia. Oh, ... and we also discuss how big Australia actually is, very big. This podcast is …

As a special Easter-Ramadan-Purim Episode, we had an informal talk about religion. What's the role of religion in the Western Bubble? How do we personally see and interpret religion? What is the role of religion in societies? And is the Western Bubble a substitute religion for people living in the West? This podcast is published with the help of RA…

Almost six months after the 7th of October Attacks, Israel is largely isolated on the world stage and in the West - driving it further into the arms of the West. We examine why this is the case and to what extend the West is to blame? This podcast is published with the help of RAIA and edited by RAIA member Julia Ohm but is an individual project be…

What is the role of the military in the Western Bubble? Does it add to it? Does it intensify it? How come NATO has a military budget many times the ones of China or Russia? All questions we answer in this episode! This podcast is published with the help of RAIA and edited by RAIA member Julia Ohm but is an individual project between the Director of…

"Northern European arrogance vs Southern European ingratitude" ... Europeans have their stereotypes for each other. But what does this have to do with the Western Bubble and its origins? This podcast is published with the help of RAIA and edited by RAIA member Julia Ohm but is an individual project between the Director of RAIA Dario Hasenstab and B…

Two days after we recorded our episode on the second anniversary of the Russian invasion of Ukraine Denmark dropped its investigation into the Nordstream Bombing and Macron speculated sending troops to Ukraine. Oh, and Putin threatened to deploy nuclear weapons if NATO were to send troops. This podcast is published with the help of RAIA and edited …

Two years ago Russia invaded Ukraine, since then a lot has happened in the Western Bubble, but basically very little has changed on the battle fronts, except 500000 casualties. Is the West partially responsible for this suffering because it blocked negotiations in the summer of 2022? https://www.understandingwar.org/backgrounder/russian-offensive-c…

Donald Trump has very good chances to become US President once again. Today we analyse what the Foreign Policy of a second Trump term would look like, based on the concept of the Western Bubble. This podcast is published with the help of RAIA and edited by RAIA member Julia Ohm but is an individual project between the Director of RAIA Dario Hasenst…

The Republican Party in the US is a great case study of Western behaviour in the past decades. Particularly recently, the Party has provided us with many things to analyse. DISCLAIMER: Dario’s audio is a little messed up in this episode, we apologise for this. This podcast is published with the help of RAIA and edited by RAIA member Julia Ohm but i…

The International Court of Justice issued an emergency ruling on a case of South Africa brought forward against Israel over Israel's military actions in the Gaza Strip. Today we look at the relevance of international law for the Western Bubble and the world of international relations. Is it relevant at all? This podcast is published with the help o…

Today we discuss Cancel Culture! Where does it come from? And where is it going? Also, why is this unique to the Western World? Join us as we kick off our fourth season! This podcast is published with the help of RAIA and edited by RAIA member Julia Ohm but is an individual project between the Director of RAIA Dario Hasenstab and Balder Hageraats. …

It is the end of 2023 and we are awarding the bubble awards once again! Who will win the bubble blooper, bubble booster, bubble burster, bubble blower and the best bubble? - Biden, Putin, von der Leyen, many others or the fan favourite Liz Truss? This podcast is published with the help of RAIA and edited by RAIA member Julia Ohm but is an individua…

During the recording of our last episode, right-wing populism, Dario went on a rant about society’s treatment of the youth during the Covid-19 pandemic. It was too long to keep in the original episode, but also too honest and important to fully cut it. So we decided to upload it as an EXTRA Episode, enjoy! This podcast is published with the help of…

Geert Wilders, Javier Milei, Donald Trump, Boris Johnson! Crazy hair populists are on our minds and we want to understand why the West is so vulnerable to these right-wing populists. What aspects of the Western Bubble led to larger and larger parts of society voting right-wing populists parties? This podcast is published with the help of RAIA and e…

How many times per week do we think about the Roman Empire? Balder thinks about it twice a week, Dario prefers the Egyptians… But what does this mean for the Western Bubble? Well, the Romans are an essential part of the Western identity as we like to idealise them. This podcast is published with the help of RAIA and edited by RAIA member Usama Ghan…

David Cameron is back in the politics of the United Kingdom and so is our need to talk about the UK. The last time we did so was one year ago and the name of the Prime Minister was Liz Truss. This week we talk about the reasons that have led British party politics to be focused around individuals rather than ideas and whether the UK should be an ex…

Contrary to popular belief or media attention, the Israel-Hamas and the Russia-Ukraine conflicts are not the only ones in the world. Lives are also lost and destroyed in many other places in this world, some of which we highlight in this episode. What are the reasons we care so much about some conflicts, and so little about others. This podcast is …

After popular demand, we are back with this topic and the situation on the ground still has not improved. Since our last episode, the West has further isolated itself on this topic on the global stage after a vote in the UN General Assembly. And, we introduce a new category in our podcast: “International Relations Perspective” where we quickly anal…

For years now the West has put Venezuela in the naughty corner, only to realise that in the meantime the country has moved closer to Russia and China. Join us for this episode to observe Western efforts to reconnect with the country. As a little extra we will make fun of Jordan Goudreau who tried to take the Maduro government down with a total of 4…

What do the United States and China have in common with Adidas and Nike? According to Dario they are an analogy for global realignment, but you let us know if this works in light of the 10 year celebration of the Chinese Belt-Road-Initiative. This podcast is published with the help of RAIA and edited by RAIA member Usama Ghanem but is an individual…

One week later and the tragic situation in Israel and the Gaza Strip is still on everybody's mind. Since last week a lot of things have happened and a lot more actors with their own Western Bubble bias have entered the discussions. We analyse the three main groups forming the current conversation and have a particular look at the Western left. This…

The tragic situation in Israel and the Gaza Strip also needs to be analysed from the Western Bubble perspective. What lessons can be learned from our analysis of the past and applied here to de-escalate and decrease humanitarian suffering? IMPORTANT: We recorded this episode on October 8th at 10:30. This podcast is published with the help of RAIA a…

The news of Azerbaijan taking over the region of Nagorno-Karabakh primarily inhabited by ethnic Armenians sparked a debate about self-determination. We weigh in on this debate from the Western Bubble perspective and explain the dynamics of the IR version of rock-paper-scissors: self-determination-sovereignty-global politics. This podcast is publish…

This is our first interview episode of season three and we could not have started it with a better guest but our editor Usama Ghanem. We talk to him about his experiences in the West and with the Western. Listen to the episode to find out what obscure laws there are in the United Kingdom, the Arab Spring in Egypt and why Usama's name is spelled the…

With the BRICS and G20 summit taking place last week, Western countries and media are panicking over new members to the BRICS and interpreting China’s absence from the G20 summit as a difficult relationship with India. This podcast is published with the help of RAIA and edited by RAIA member Usama Ghanem but is an individual project between the Dir…

We are Balder Hageraats and Dario Hasenstab, a professor and his former student of international relations. Together we examine how Western countries are increasingly lost in their own delusions on the world stage, and what can be done to bring them back to reality. In this introduction episode, we discuss the beginning of this podcast and the main…

Today we analyse the United Nations Human Rights Council issuing a report on Quran Burnings in Sweden and Denmark. This shows how the West has lost control over its own invention and how the United Nations no longer exclusively displays Western interpretations of morality. This podcast is published with the help of RAIA and edited by RAIA member Us…

Today we analyse the coverage of a press team in Iraq that gives us hope that the Western Bubble is not impenetrable. As a basis of today's episodes serves a Foreign Affairs article written by John Walcott who wrote about his time at Knight Ridder, a former US media outlet, and their coverage of the build-up to the 2003 invasion of Iraq.https://www…

For the month of August, we decided to record four episodes that show signs of the Western Bubble bursting. And we are starting with the development surrounding the coup in Niger where it is becoming apparent how little influence the West still holds in this region. Here is the article we briefly discuss as an example of bubble thinking https://www…

It is inherently human to act and to try anything in our power to stop bad things from happening. But is that always the best option? In this episode, we analyse the Art of Doing Nothing and how the Western Bubble could really benefit from it in its foreign policy choices. The article by Susanne Klatt on American vs German firefighters: https://www…

In this episode, we analyse the concept of peace, in particular how it influences Western Bubble mentality. Typically Europeans and North Americans think of their societies as peaceful. This perception is often backed up by misleading statistics. Today we analyse one of these, namely the Global Peace Index. You can find the report we talk about her…

Today we analyse a specific article from Guardian writer Simon Tisdall, whom we discussed in this week’s regular episode. The article in question is “The world still needs a policeman. Let’s hope the US doesn’t quit the job” and offers insights into Simon Tisdall’s fantasies about a Western global order. This podcast is published with the help of R…

In this episode we analyse the Western bubble mentality of Guardian writer Simon Tisdall. Tisdall has been writing about foreign policy for 40 years now. Much of his analysis serves as a good case study of the Western delusions we discuss in our episodes.Here are the articles we quote from: China, Myanmar and now Darfur ... the horror of genocide i…

In this episode we analyse the impact of technology on political accountability and policy making. While preparing for the planned episode, we noticed a different perspective between us and so we decided to record the conversation we usually have preparing for the episodes instead.This podcast is published with the help of RAIA and edited by RAIA m…

Today we analyse the phenomenon of Jordan Peterson in the Western Bubble and why his prominence in the public discourse is a symptom of Western decay. In this episode we are commenting on three audio bites from Jordan Peterson. You can find the full videos here:Clip 1: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rUiG5_GcMyYClip 2: https://www.youtube.com/watch…

Today we analyse three developments in the West as a result of the Western Bubble. First, we look at Donald Trump on trial, second, we examine Boris Johnson stepping down as member of Parliament and, lastly, we are upset with the German police arresting a climate activist for wanting to protest. This podcast is published with the help of RAIA and e…

In this extra episode we briefly analyse the Western reaction to last week's events surrounding the Wagner Group in Russia. The palpable excitement and absurd hyperbole (such as "civil war" and claims about the "end of the Putin regime") reveals a Western audience that is not in touch with reality.

Today we analyse the West’s obsession with free speech and the dangers of overestimating its importance as well as underestimating its importance. Should it be illegal to deny the holocaust but legal to deny the Armenian genocide? Difficult questions in grey areas that society must have conversations about. This podcast is published with the help o…