Van Jackson

Not sure I’ve seen a movie whose politics are as relevant to now as Terminator 2. From the crisis of capital that leads to tech dystopia to the imperial boomerang to representations of the working class. Great to unpack with @jamiemerchant.bsky.social www.bangbangpod.com/p/terminator...

To misquote Mase: “Why I’m bombin’ things you can’t even pronounce? I’d do it to you cats for a large amount. And when the beef comes you know where to be found”

Do you work on some aspect of international political economy? Want to live by the ocean and driving distance from Peter Jackson, James Cameron, and those Flight of the Concords guys? Shoot your shot and come work with me! www.jobs.ac.uk/job/DTJ580/l...

Levels of bullshit here. NZ should not be enabling the Iran War, which is illegal under both domestic and international law, to say nothing of being against the interests of Kiwis www.rnz.co.nz/news/politic...

The MAGA-diplomat problem and much more in our latest drop! youtu.be/roZ9d-MEu3A?...

“Trump’s CIA wants 'PhDs who could win a bar fight.' Pangs of embarrassment hit me—less for the fool I had been than a vicarious embarrassment. I know how many young men without real prospects in life are ready to be the fools of the next generation.” www.un-diplomatic.com/p/a-phd-who-...

12/25 What if American power itself is part of the problem? @vanjackson.bsky.social challenges the assumption that U.S. security depends on military dominance and offers a different vision rooted in diplomacy, cooperation, and peace.

“Looting sets the price for goods at zero. That makes the riot an outlaw companion to the more respectable strike...Riot is a problem of circulation; strikes are a problem of production.” www.un-diplomatic.com/p/riots-of-r...

“Trump’s CIA wants 'PhDs who could win a bar fight.' Pangs of embarrassment hit me—less for the fool I had been than a vicarious embarrassment. I know how many young men without real prospects in life are ready to be the fools of the next generation.” www.un-diplomatic.com/p/a-phd-who-...

“the riot...is always a surplus population responding to its abjectness...an outlaw companion to the more respectable strike...Riot is a problem of circulation; strikes are a problem of production.” www.un-diplomatic.com/p/riots-of-r...

Locations of rallies if you want to come and stand in solidarity: teu-production.s3.amazonaws.com/documents/Te...

Tertiary Education Union—staff, services, and faculty—are on strike today for wages to keep up with inflation, to stop job cuts, and to improve the quality of learning environments for students. 1:15pm walkout!

“The riot is an early stage of revolution. The riot puts the powerful on the back foot. The riot forces the comfortable in a crouched corner…France’s riot is in full swing.” open.substack.com/pub/undiplom...

The 2027 OCIS Call for Proposals closes on 31 October 2026. We welcome proposals for papers, panels, roundtables, innovative sessions and pre-conference workshops from scholars, practitioners and researchers across Oceania and beyond. Submit your proposal: https://ocis.org.au/2027-call-for-papers/

A special message to everyone at #eisa2026: I’m sure Lisbon has been fun, but #ocis2027 in Suva, Fiji will be even better. Check out the call for papers, get in touch with any questions, and send us a submission: ocis.org.au

What a sunset 🌅

The people face a version of this dilemma in every country: “It is hard to say that things have got much better over the two decades [in which] Lula has been in power...And the right wing? They just want to come in here and shoot people.” www.ft.com/content/ae35...

“the riot...is always a surplus population responding to its abjectness...an outlaw companion to the more respectable strike...Riot is a problem of circulation; strikes are a problem of production.” www.un-diplomatic.com/p/riots-of-r...

On the riots in France as a war of maneuver, and why wars of maneuver without wars of position end up getting repressed by the state www.un-diplomatic.com/p/riots-of-r...

“The riot forces the comfortable in a crouched corner where they must choose between reflecting on how liberalism led to this or quietly hoping the state will repress the masses so that this nastiness goes away. France’s riot is in full swing.” open.substack.com/pub/undiplom...

The goal of statecraft should be to end great-power rivalry, not relocate it. As long as the root causes of inter-imperial conflict (👇) persist, shifting America’s military presence in Asia simply relocates the line of competition www.un-diplomatic.com/p/naval-impe...

The goal of statecraft should be to end great-power rivalry, not relocate it. As long as the root causes of inter-imperial conflict (👇) persist, shifting America’s military presence in Asia simply relocates the line of competition www.un-diplomatic.com/p/naval-impe...

“If US military power falls back to the second- or third-island chain, that would simply shift the line of inter-imperial competition, substituting a new Pacific-Island powder keg for an old East Asian powder keg.” www.un-diplomatic.com/p/naval-impe...

The most important books I’ve ever read

“If the Iran War teaches us anything it should be that bullshit wars are proliferating; and if they are possible, they are also inevitable. The only way to guard against bullshit wars...is to tie the hands of future presidents.” www.un-diplomatic.com/p/bernard-br...

“Who, in the age of MAGA counter-revolution and Democratic Party support for illegal war, thinks the US president should have push-button nuclear launch authority or options to ‘take decisive action against any target, anywhere, at any time?’” www.un-diplomatic.com/p/bernard-br...

“If the Iran War teaches us anything it should be that bullshit wars are proliferating; and if they are possible, they are also inevitable. The only way to guard against bullshit wars...is to tie the hands of future presidents.” www.un-diplomatic.com/p/bernard-br...

Hunting leg locks but end up with a triangle choke

I’ve always been oriented toward trying to win (and thinking about what to do with) state power. But knowing what I know about modern national security states in an oligarchic world, mutual aid and community worldmaking outside the state should’ve been a bigger priority all along

Inside Hegseth's counter-revolutionary future of war--the rationalists are out, and the fascists, freaks, and transphobes are in! www.youtube.com/watch?v=ayPR...

"Trump administration is [directing] more than $175m of the state department’s flagship human rights fund to.. advancing white Afrikaner rights in South Africa, a campaign against Brazil’s supreme court..Europe [groups] who protect “western civilizational norms” www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026...

NZ media keep publishing the “opinions” of people who profit off of the thing they advocate spending public money on. It’s so blatantly a conflict of interest (also poorly argued) www.thepost.co.nz/nz-news/3610...

Few things more satisfying than a reader sending proof that they’re REALLY reading your book

Understanding Trump’s Greater North America on fascist terms suggests the worst is yet to come. foreignpolicy.com/2026/09/28/t...

“Something that should arouse introspection is that the methods of fascist geopolitics are imperialist top to bottom—methods that the US has been intermittently deploying around the world for generations, and with growing frequency the past decade.” www.un-diplomatic.com/p/greater-no...

This by @vanjackson.bsky.social is very good on Trump’s neo-fascist regional politics. foreignpolicy.com/2026/09/28/t...

I have a new essay out in Foreign Policy raising alarm and introspection about the geopolitical concept of “Greater North America”: "Is fascist geopolitics somehow unique? How, if at all, does liberal imperialism differ from fascist imperialism?” www.un-diplomatic.com/p/greater-no...

I have a new essay out in Foreign Policy raising alarm and introspection about the geopolitical concept of “Greater North America”: "Is fascist geopolitics somehow unique? How, if at all, does liberal imperialism differ from fascist imperialism?” www.un-diplomatic.com/p/greater-no...

Trump may or may not declare martial law ahead of the mid-terms, but the election is already being made unfree and unfair in a dozen different ways

Lunchtime flying armbar

“We do to ourselves far worse than anything Osama bin Laden could have cooked up.” www.damemagazine.com/2026/07/15/w...

“the US is trying to preside over a global hegemonic order shorn of any obligations or reciprocal restraint. Classical theorists had a word for preponderant power minus obligation or restraint: Domination.” www.un-diplomatic.com/p/against-im...

“the US is trying to preside over a global hegemonic order shorn of any obligations or reciprocal restraint. Classical theorists had a word for preponderant power minus obligation or restraint: Domination.” www.un-diplomatic.com/p/against-im...

“Trump 2.0 has been extremely active fashioning imperialist multilateralism 1) between the global North and South but also 2) between the US and everyone else....groping toward a reactionary, anti-liberal, some might say fascist, global order.” www.un-diplomatic.com/p/against-im...