Join us for An Afternoon with Yanis Varoufakis and Friends, featuring Yanis Varoufakis, Dr Bob Brown, Professor Clare Wright, Hannah Ferguson and Dominic Guerrera.

In his most personal book yet, Raise Your Soul: A Personal History of Resistance, Yanis Varoufakis tells the engrossing story of his political awakening. This captivating portrait is told through the extraordinary lives of five women, and the West’s tumultuous history from 1924 to the present.

In his chapter in A Time for Bravery: What happens when Australians choose courage?, he tells the story of Piero, a political refugee from Chile, using his story to urge governments to return to a time where we recognised the importance of taking in refugees.

In What’s the Big Idea:32 Ideas for a Better Australia, Yanis explains why Australia must shed the fear of a larger state. Bob Brown discusses the ‘price of extinction’, how monetising the environment won’t save it, the corporate capture of democracy and the failure of the major parties to truly protect the environment.

Yanis Varoufakis will be joined by award-winning historian, author, broadcaster, podcaster and public commentator Professor Clare Wright for a panel discussion, hosted by the Australia Institute’s Director of International & Security Affairs, Dr Emma Shortis.

This will be preceded by a panel discussing culture, community, and the stories we tell, featuring environmentalist, doctor, campaigner, and former Parliamentary Leader of the Australian Greens, Dr Bob Brown. Bob is the founder of the Bob Brown Foundation, a not-for-profit organisation that works to protect nature through direct action, legal defence, and science. He will be joined by Hannah Ferguson, co-founder and Chief Executive Officer of Cheek Media Co., and Dominic Guerrera, Ngarrindjeri and Kaurna poet, writer, artist and curator, recipient of the 2021 Oodgeroo Noonuccal Indigenous Poetry Prize and 2024 David Unaipon Prize. This panel will be hosted by the Australia Institute’s Director of Strategic Partnerships, Noah Schultz-Byard.

Books and publications from Australia Institute Press and the authors attending will be available for purchase at the venue. A book signing will follow the event.

SPEAKERS:

Yanis Varoufakis

Yanis Varoufakis is an economist, former finance minister of Greece and the author of numerous bestselling books: Technofuedalism: What Killed Capitalism; Talking to My Daughter: A Brief History of Capitalism; Adults in the Room, a memoir of his time as finance minister of Greece; an economic history of Europe, And The Weak Suffer What They Must?; and Another Now: Dispatches from An Alternative Present.

Born in Athens in 1961, he was for many years a professor of economics in Britain, Australia and the USA before he entered politics. He is co-founder of the international grassroots movement DiEM25 and a Professor of Economics at the University of Athens.

Professor Clare Wright

Professor Clare Wright is an award-winning historian, author, broadcaster, podcaster and public commentator who has worked in politics, academia and the media. Clare is currently Professor of History and Professor of Public Engagement at La Trobe University.

Dr Emma Shortis

Dr Emma Shortis is Director of the Australia Institute’s International & Security Affairs Program. Emma is a historian and writer, focused on the history and politics of the United States and its role in the world. She uses her expertise in history to interpret and explain what is happening in the world today, and what it means for Australia, in a compassionate and accessible way. Emma’s first book, Our Exceptional Friend: Australia’s Fatal Alliance with the United States, was published by Hardie Grant in 2021. She writes regularly for Australian and international outlets, and appears regularly on Australian radio and television.