Part reflection on Occupy Wall Street, and part journey through the questions and tensions surrounding an admittedly difficult concept, David Graeber's The Democracy Project: A History, A Crisis, A Movement is a welcome inquiry from an intriguing public intellectual. In the following interview, he discusses some of the major themes of the book.
Interviews
in media
“I found myself turning into an idiot!”: David Graeber explains the life-sapping reality of bureaucratic life
Salon spoke with David Graeber to discuss 'Debt: The First 5000 Years' and his views on the bureaucratic phenomenon. Their conversation also touches on why Graeber thinks it was a mistake for the left to abandon a more thorough critique of bureaucracy, how bureaucracy can be a response to a deep-seated, psychological need, and why it is that it so often makes us both act and feel "stupid."
“This is what democracy looks like”: A conversation with Direct Action Network Activists David Graeber , Brooke Lehman, Jose Lugo, and Jeremy Varon
Direct Action Network activists Brooke Lehman, David Graeber, Jeremy Varon, and Jose Lugo met with Francesca Polletta over pizza and beer one evening in March 2001 to talk about DAN's experiments with direct democracy. All four have been with the group since near its beginning and have had varying levels of involvement since then.
An Interview with David Graeber (2016) by Rachael Kiddey
In 2016, Rachael Kiddey interviewed David Graeber about the concept of ‘discovery’ and about his research.This interview between Rachael Kiddey and David Graeber was conducted in 2016 and was originally published in issue X of the ISRF Bulletin.
Anarchism, work and bureaucracy: An interview with David Graeber
‘On a deep, cultural level, people actually believe that if you don’t do something that at least mildly frustrates you, then your work is not valuable.’ Anthropologist, activist and bestselling anarchist David Graeber on the police state, bullshit jobs and why people need no telling that capitalism is bad.
ANOTHER WORLD: MICHELLE KUO TALKS WITH DAVID GRAEBER
Here, Graeber talks to Artforum editor Michelle Kuo about the uses and abuses of social and economic theory in the realm of culture—and the possibilities these disciplinary crossings may still hold for changing how we see and how we relate.
Anthropologist David Graeber Explains Why Dead-End Jobs Exist
David Whelan interviewed David Graeber about his book, 'The Utopia of Rules', useless jobs, the rules we live by, and why Christopher Nolan’s Batman is just a big fat bureaucrat in a cape.
ARTICLE: FREEDOM AND ANARCHY: AN INTERVIEW WITH DAVID GRAEBER
This interview with David Graber, by Peterson Roberto da Silva, took place in London, at David’s office, on the 10th March 2020.
Basic Income ; Meaningless Jobs: David Graeber interview
A short 2016 interview on basic income and meaningless jobs.
Bullshit jobs and the yoke of managerial feudalism
A brief interview around the idea of "Bullshit jobs" and its implications on the psychological well being of workers but also an analysis of the concentration of such jobs in clerical, administrative, managerial, and supervisory areas.
Cities made differently
A conversation between Nika Dubrovsky and Vera Mey about (re)thinking cities.
In the following interview, Vera Mey and Nika Dubrovsky discuss their shared experiences as part of the conference series “Challenging Capitalist Modernity,” in which Dubrovsky had taken part on behalf of her organization, Anthropology for Kids.