How Cargo Ships Explain the World
On this episode of The Nation Podcast, Atossa Araxia Abrahamian talks about what one industry can teach us.
The Nation Podcasts
Here's where to find podcasts from The Nation. Political talk without the boring parts, featuring the writers, activists and artists who shape the news, from a progressive perspective.
How Cargo Ships Explain the World | The Nation Podcast
A hotel for Thatcher’s fallen soldiers in the Falkland Islands. A hospital for Rikers inmates. A home for workers in the offshore fossil fuel industry.
These are just a few of the past lives of “Jascon 27” – a Scandinavian ship that is the subject of writer Ian Kumekawa’s new book, Empty Vessel: The Story of the Global Economy in One Barge.
The Vessel is, of course, a ship that transports people and goods. But, as journalist Atossa Araxia Abrahamian notes, and Kumekawa’s book reveals, it is also a bellwether of political movements and economic shifts, and a symbol of “the whims and desires” of corporations, nations, and individuals alike.
Abrahamian wrote about Empty Vessel in the latest issue of The Nation. She’s an independent journalist who writes about the cracks within nation-states worldwide. She is also a former editor at The Nation and Al Jazeera America, and author of The Cosmoplites: The Coming of the Global Citizen and The Hidden Globe.
Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands
Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy
A cargo ship is loading and unloading foreign trade containers at Qingdao Port in Qingdao City, Shandong Province, China on June 16, 2025.
(CFOTO / Future Publishing via Getty Images)A hotel for Thatcher’s fallen soldiers in the Falkland Islands. A hospital for Rikers inmates. A home for workers in the offshore fossil fuel industry.
These are just a few of the past lives of “Jascon 27” – a Scandinavian ship that is the subject of writer Ian Kumekawa’s new book, Empty Vessel: The Story of the Global Economy in One Barge.
The Vessel is, of course, a ship that transports people and goods. But, as journalist Atossa Araxia Abrahamian notes, and Kumekawa’s book reveals, it is also a bellwether of political movements and economic shifts, and a symbol of “the whims and desires” of corporations, nations, and individuals alike.
Abrahamian wrote about Empty Vessel in the latest issue of The Nation. She’s an independent journalist who writes about the cracks within nation-states worldwide. She is also a former editor at The Nation and Al Jazeera America, and author of The Cosmoplites: The Coming of the Global Citizen and The Hidden Globe.
Subscribe to The Nation to support all of our podcasts: thenation.com/podcastsubscribe.
The Nation Podcasts
Here's where to find podcasts from The Nation. Political talk without the boring parts, featuring the writers, activists and artists who shape the news, from a progressive perspective.
The Transformation of the New York Waterfront w/ Karrie Jacobs | The Nation Podcast
In its heyday, the Bush Terminal industrial complex spanned several city blocks along Brooklyn’s waterfront and employed more than 35,000 people. Built by Irving Bush in the late nineteenth century, it was an "early intermodal shipping hub." Goods arrived by water and left by rail. Bananas, coffee, and cotton came in through doors on one side of the warehouses and were loaded onto trains on the other.
But after World War II, as trucks replaced rail and shipping patterns changed, the Terminal’s purpose faded and the vast complex slipped into disuse.
Today, Bush Terminal is again at the center of New York’s vision for urban reinvention— and a debate around development, displacement, and the future of work in the city.
Joining us on a deep dive into Bush Terminal is veteran architecture critic and writer Karrie Jacobs. Her essay, “On the Waterfront,” appears in our December issue of the Nation.
Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands
Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy
Search Results placeholder
Subscribe to The Nation to Support all of our podcasts
Support The Nation’s June Fundraising Campaign
With the midterm elections now firmly upon us, the question is whether Democratic candidates will do more than merely occupy ballot lines as mild alternatives to the red-hot crisis that is Donald Trump.
As Trump spends over $1 billion a day on a globally destabilizing war on Iran and admits that he doesn’t “think about Americans’ financial situation,” millions across the country are struggling with the surging costs of essentials. Democrats must seize this moment and advance bold, small-“d” populist ideas—not settle for cynical caution that once again snatches defeat from the jaws of victory.
The Nation elevates progressive ideas, movements, and elected officials achieving real change across the country into the national conversation. At the same time, our journalists are exposing how crypto and AI-funded super PACs are spending hundreds of millions of dollars to knock out candidates they oppose, reporting on the devastating impact of the Supreme Court’s evisceration of the Voting Rights Act, and sounding the alarm on attempts by red states to quickly redraw electoral maps, disenfranchising Southern Black voters.
We can play this critical role because of support from readers like you. This June, we’re raising $20,000 to power The Nation’s independent journalism in the run-up to November’s immensely consequential elections.
It’s in our power to build a more just society, and your support at this critical moment brings us closer to that bold vision. I hope you’ll donate today.
Onward,
Katrina vanden Huevel
Editor and Publisher, The Nation
