The Mishal Husain Show7 Nov 2025

Julia Ioffe Wants You to Know Russia Is Bigger Than Putin

How do you tell the history of a whole country through its women? And what can it tell us about the world today? These are the questions Russian-American journalist Julia Ioffe set out to answer in her new book, Motherland: A Feminist History of Modern Russia, from Revolution to Autocracy.

Having reported from, and on, Russia for publications including The New Yorker and Foreign Policy for more than a decade, Ioffe says she has repeatedly been asked to explain the actions and motivations of one man: Vladimir Putin.

Motherland is, she says, partly a response to Putin, through her desire to show that Russia is much more than one person, let alone one man.

In this conversation Ioffe talks to Mishal about reclaiming Russia’s women, about Donald Trump’s hollowing out of American institutions and why Putinism will endure. (Note: This podcast contains a discussion of sexual violence that some listeners may find distressing.)

02:30 - “I was born in a country that no longer exists”
03:55 - The anti-feminist at Lenin’s side during the Revolution
06:55 - Reluctancy to write about Russian women
12:55 - What a “horrible boyfriend” Vladimir Putin was
16:50 - Return to Russia, oligarch hunters and ‘trad wives’
22:13 - Alexei Navalny, “the last shred of hope”
29:20 - Can Russia sustain the war in Ukraine?
32:32 - Trump’s assault on US institutions, faster than Putin
34:30 - American authoritarianism, risk of “one party state”

Watch this podcast: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLe4PRejZgr0Ns_wjGlmjlPz0cded0nTYS

You can find the written version of this interview with Mishal’s notes on Bloomberg Weekend: https://www.bloomberg.com/latest/weekend-interview

Contact The Mishal Husain Show mishalshow@bloomberg.net

Subscribe today on Apple Podcasts and Spotify.

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Denne episoden er hentet fra en åpen RSS-feed og er ikke publisert av Podme. Den kan derfor inneholde annonser.

Episoder(56)

Michael Palin on the Philippines, China and the Fish-Slapping Dance

Best known as a member of Monty Python, Michael Palin has been many things — sketch writer, comedian, actor, and for almost four decades, world traveler. In his latest series, “Michael Palin in the P...

16 Okt 43min

Melania, Soft Power & the Iran War with Writer Azadeh Moaveni

As US journalist Azadeh Moaveni was writing her latest book, ‘The East Wing’, a history of America's first ladies and their staff, President Donald Trump’s demolition of that very part of the White Ho...

9 Okt 38min

Even a 0.1% AI Risk Matters: Google’s James Manyika

Amid the furious debate over the pace and potential risks of AI development, top tech executives have publicly united around a call for their industry to be regulated. As Google's senior vice presiden...

2 Okt 41min

Caught in the Iran War: Qatar’s PM on the Middle East “Earthquake”

“Our region has experienced what I can only describe as an earthquake.” That was how Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani, Qatar’s prime minister, began remarks at a special UN General Assembly ed...

25 Sep 27min

Trump's 'Unreality Bubble’ Meets the Midterms: Maggie Haberman

Few journalists have watched Donald Trump as closely or for as long as Maggie Haberman. The New York Times reporter first encountered him as a tabloid fixture in the 1990s and has since chronicled his...

18 Sep 39min

Forget the Manosphere: Jon Ronson on Why Men Feel Lost

Author Jon Ronson has spent years focusing on the unusual people and societal undercurrents of our changing world. He has written a series of bestselling books featuring extremists, conspiracy theoris...

11 Sep 38min

US Versus China, Cheap AI & Human Love: AI Pioneer Kai-Fu Lee

Chinese artificial intelligence companies are rapidly closing the gap with their American rivals despite years of US restrictions on advanced chips. But the race between the world’s two AI superpowers...

4 Sep 44min

Colm Tóibín on 1970s Barcelona, Trump's America and Escaping into Art

The writer Colm Tóibín knows something about leaving home. As a young man living in Spain, he discovered a freedom he hadn’t known growing up in Ireland. Later, he would settle in America. Tóibín’s la...

28 Aug 40min