Danube Institute Podcast

In this episode of Reflections from Budapest, we asked Jeremy P. Barker, the Director of the Middle East Action Team for the Religious Freedom Institute, about his fieldwork in Iraq. By listening the discussion, we can get an overview of how the situation of the Christian communities in Iraq has changed in recent decades. Mr. Barker also expressed his opinion on the effectiveness of Hungary Helps.

In this episode of Reflections from Budapest, we asked Father Rifat Bader, director and editor-in-chief of the Jordan-based Catholic Center for Studies and Media, about Jordanian Christians' situation. Father Rifat has overseen research, journalism, and social media productions focusing on the Christian Arab experience in the Middle East, aiming to support and empower those of the Catholic or other Christian faiths in the region, as well as constructive and positive dialogue between political and religious groups therefore; he gave an insight how Jordan in the Middle East is a "safe house in the midst of a burning avenue". We also asked how the Israeli-Palestinian conflict affects Jordanians and how Christian women are treated in the country. To conclude, we asked how common the emigration of Jordanian Christians to Western countries is.

Has the Cultural Revolution that Mao Zedong headed – his attempt to suppress the “Four Olds” in China – shaped Westerners’ hostility to their own “old ideas, old culture, old customs, and old habits”? In this episode we talk with David Martin Jones, Director of Research at the Danube Institute and Visiting Professor at King's College London. For Martin Jones’s book on Maoism in the West, see here.

David P. Goldman (Spengler), strategist, economist and columnist known for analysis of Asia and China. He discusses why May 2020 may have marked Asia’s rise. He explains China’s use of infrastructure to extend influence. He explores Chinese exceptionalism, tech advances like AI and 5G, renminbi internationalization, and how Western strategy compares.

Can great powers have catastrophic blind spots? In this episode we talk with Edward Luttwak, a historian of grand strategy and a strategist who counts many governments among his clients. In his 2013 book The Rise of China vs. the Logic of Strategy, Dr. Luttwak coined the phrase “great state autism” to describe Russia, China, and the United States. For more of his analysis, see “Limitless Empire” in London Review of Books, and “The Clue China is Preparing for War” in Unherd.

Joanna Williams and Viv Regan join the podcast to discuss the current fashion for appealing to 'lived experience' in debate. They explain how a deference to identity allows an often privileged minority to present themselves as victims and silence opposition. In the media, universities and the workplace, hurt feelings routinely justify censorship, and those who cry loudest about their suffering can wield considerable power. How has this situation come about? And how can the importance of free speech be reasserted? Is it fair to brand a younger generation ‘snowflakes’? Is being offended really all that empowering?

Maria Engström joins the podcast to discuss Russia's 'dark conservatism': it's origins in 19th century European thought; its core tenets; and its relevance today, both in the context of the Ukraine war, and political trends in both Russia and the West.

In a special episode of Reflections from Budapest, dedicated to the remembrance of the Hungarian victims of the Holocaust, we asked László Bernát Veszprémy, a journalist and historian about his book titled Bereft of Council: The Jewish Leadership in Hungary and the Holocaust, 1944-1945 which was published this year. In our conversation, we talked about the Jewish leadership of Hungary during and after the Holocaust. To conclude, we discussed the present-day situation of the Hungarian Jewish community and different perceptions of anti-Semitism in Hungary.

In this special episode of Reflections from Budapest Sáron Sugár, a researcher at the Danube Institute asked her colleagues Prof. Jeffrey Kaplan distinguished research fellow, Logan West visiting fellow, and Virág Lőrincz researcher, about their findings and experiences of their two-week-long fieldwork trip in Iraqi Kurdistan. We talked about the current and past challenges of Christians in Iraqi Kurdistan, with a special emphasis on how the violence of ISIS affected Christian women and families and their current challenges in the post-ISIS era. We concluded with a discussion about the worrying future of Christians in Iraq. 

In this episode of Reflections from Budapest, we asked Jonathan Andrews, Middle East Monitor for the Persecution Intelligence Unit of Global Christian Relief and writer of several books dealing with the situation of Christians in the Middle East. In our conversation, we talked about the challenges of those Christians living in Middle Eastern countries who chose to convert from Islam to Christianity and the situation of Christian communities in Lebanon and Sudan. We concluded by discussing how the mass migration of Christians from the Middle East to Western countries affects the future of Christian communities who chose to remain in the region.