Feudal Future Podcast

On this episode of Feudal Future Marshall Toplansky moderates a panel discussion of the global future with Richard Florida, Joel Kotkin, Bheki Mahlobo, Li Sun, and Laure Mandeville.

Learn more about the Feudal Future podcast.
Learn more about Marshall Toplansky.
Learn more about Joel Kotkin.

Join the Beyond Feudalism Facebook group.
Read the Beyond Feudalism report.
Learn about Joel’s book, The Coming of Neo-Feudalism.

Richard Florida is one of the world’s leading urbanists. He is a researcher and professor, serving as University Professor at the University of Toronto’s School of Cities and Rotman School of Management, and a Faculty Chair at NYU’s Schack School of Real Estate. He is a writer and journalist, having penned several global bestsellers, including the award-winning The Rise of the Creative Class and his most recent book, The New Urban Crisis. He is co-founder of CityLab, the leading publication devoted to cities and urbanism. He is an entrepreneur, as the founder of the Creative Class Group which works closely with companies and governments worldwide.

Laure Mandeville is a Senior Reporter at the French newspaper le Figaro, where she covers American and European Affairs as well as intellectual debates around the world. She joined the foreign desk of Le Figaro in 1989 to cover the end of communism and spent twenty years covering the post- Soviet world. She was the Russia bureau chief in Moscow from 1997 to 2000 and then US bureau chief in Washington from December 2008 to August 2016. She also covered Islam in Europe from 2000 to 2008. She is the co-founder of the Tocqueville Conversations, an annual Conference on the Future of our democracies and a member of the Board of the Tocqueville Foundation. Laure Mandeville holds a BA in Slavic languages from the University of Toulouse and graduated from L’Institut d’Etudes politiques de Paris, in International affairs. She also holds a postgraduate degree in Political Science from Science Po and was visiting scholar at Harvard University, as a Fulbright and Arthur Sachs fellow.

She is the author of “Who is Donald Trump” (2016, Les Equateurs/Le Figaro), “The Russian Reconquest” (Grasset, 2008), and “The Russian Army: A Power in Tatters” (1994, Ed n°01). She contributes to Politique Internationale and The American Purpose. She is a regular guest on the TV Show C’est Dans L’air, LCI, and France 24.

Dr. Li Sun is a lecturer in Sociology and Social Policy at the University of Leeds. Prior to the UK, she worked in universities in Germany, the Netherlands, the US, and China. Besides academic positions, Dr. Sun also serves as a consultant to the UN, World Bank, and OECD, as well as various government offices in the UK, the Netherlands, and China. Her main research interest is urbanization and governance in China including rural-urban migration, social policies, land, and housing issue. Her publications appear in leading journals of relevant fields such as Cities, Social Policy & Administration, Land Use Policy. Her book entitled Rural Urban Migration and Policy Intervention in China was published by Palgrave Macmillan in 2019.

Bheki Mahlobo is an analyst and economic researcher at the center for risk Analysis (CRA), Johannesburg. He is primarily involved in writing chapters for the Socio-Economic Survey of South Africa, an annual publication that provides information and data on major trends in various social and economic fields. The Centre For Risk Analysis (CRA) is one of the top think tanks in South Africa that provides analysis and advice on scenario planning and macro-economic strategic advice on South African risks, as well as global trends for corporate and individual clients.

Joel Kotkin is the Roger Hobbs Presidential Fellow in Urban Futures at Chapman University in Orange, California and Executive Director of the Houston-based Urban Reform Institute. He is Senior Advisor to the Kem C. Gardner Policy Institute. He is Executive Editor of the widely read website www.newgeography.com and a regular contributor to the City Journal, Daily Beast, Quillette, American Affairs and Real Clear Politics. Kotkin’s most recent book is titled The Coming of Neo-Feudalism.