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Outside In
Every week, two hosts break down the biggest global stories from a perspective Western media misses: the rest of the world's.
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Episodes
The archive
24 episodes, newest first.
- Congress Can't Touch Delhi's TariffAmericans voted on Tuesday, November 3, 2026, but the tariffs that matter to exporters in Delhi, Jakarta and Mexico City may not move with the result. Since the Supreme Court struck down the IEEPA tariffs, Section 301 duties are the legal basis that counts. The hosts walk through how the tariff sequence got here and what a Democratic Congress can and can't do against a presidential veto. They look at which exporters are hit: India and Indonesia face an additional 10%, and Vietnam an additional 12.5%. Reports of new executive tariffs on critical minerals and wind turbines get their own segment. The hosts also read the vote from Asia-Pacific and Latin America, including Mexico. Next week: what the White House does with its executive options once the votes are counted.
- Brasília Can Now Play Both SidesLula beat Flávio Bolsonaro 51.79% to 48.21% on October 25, and the first question is who gets Brazil's rare earths. The result reverses the first-round outcome and polls that had Flávio narrowly ahead. The episode covers how Beijing and Delhi read the win, including an ex-Indian foreign secretary's argument that it helps BRICS and India. It then turns to Serra Verde, where a US-backed buyer's deal meets a Brasília that wants more of the processing value. A short segment covers how Flávio Bolsonaro's non-concession story ended, and what Lula's 'nobody's backyard' line signals for Washington's minerals deals. The closer flags the next things to watch on Brazil's minerals policy. Next week: whether foreign-owned miners face tighter scrutiny, as Mining.com reports.
- Brazil's Rare Earths Wait for a WinnerBrazil votes October 25 in a runoff that polls call a near tie, with Flávio Bolsonaro slightly ahead, and the prize underneath is Brazil's rare earths: Washington's supply chain, Beijing, or a domestic industry. Outside In looks ahead to the vote and what Delhi's and Beijing's stakes suggest; Pretoria and Jakarta remain open questions, with no reactions in the evidence. A Brazilian Senate-passed minerals bill offers a 2 billion real guarantee fund and 5 billion reais in tax credits over five years for domestic processing. India and Brazil signed a critical minerals agreement in New Delhi on February 21, background on Delhi's stake. Chinese analysts expect trade to hold whoever wins, while political cooperation inside BRICS is the open question. The episode closes on what to watch after the count, including whether a new minerals law gets used to revisit a US company's takeover of Serra Verde.
- If Lula Loses, Who Blinks FirstFlávio Bolsonaro won Brazil's first round with 47.03% to Lula's 45.16%, and the October 25 runoff now tests whether the Global South's biggest swing state keeps its multi-alignment. Outside In reads the race from Delhi, Pretoria and Beijing rather than Washington. The first segment sets the polling picture and the thin margin behind the favorite label. Next, Flávio's filing to US trade officials on Pix, which proposed keeping it off settlement platforms of non-Western countries. Then BRICS, where Indian commentary expects the vote to matter and other reporting says Brazil may stay in. The fourth segment follows the trade numbers and rare earths, where analysts disagree on how much would change. The fifth looks at Mercosur and the question of multi-alignment versus realignment. The closer flags what to watch after October 25. Next week: the result and what governing looks like.
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- Brazil's Election Isn't Left vs RightBrazil heads into an October 4 vote that Washington helped turn into a referendum on US-China leverage, not a simple left-right fight. Grant and Miles trace how Flávio Bolsonaro's White House meeting led to a US terrorist designation for Brazilian gangs the PCC and Comando Vermelho, and how a separate US push to get Brasília to follow suit at home got rejected outright. They unpack Lula's BRICS-and-Beijing platform against Flávio's pledge to repair US ties, cite a Pew survey showing trade alignment as a live voter issue, and flag the October 25 runoff as the moment this all gets decided. Next week: how either winner actually governs a country still hedging between two great powers.
- Who Actually Runs Caracas NowEight months after US forces captured Nicolás Maduro, Venezuela's National Assembly has quietly handed Washington access to seventeen oilfields — about a fifth of the country's reserves — with Chevron and Italy's Eni already signing deals in Caracas. Grant and Miles trace the story from the January raid through the March embassy reopening to August's Panama talks, where opposition leader María Corina Machado, still governing from exile, refused to sit down with interim president Delcy Rodríguez's government. They ask whether this is the liberation Washington describes or a de facto receivership, with Rodríguez managing Chavista holdovers while US Southern Command keeps striking targets in the Caribbean. Next week: what happens to the oil contract terms opposition lawmakers say they still haven't seen.
- Bangkok Isn't MarrakeshThe IMF and World Bank return to Asia for the first time since 1991, holding their 2026 Annual Meetings in Bangkok from October 12-18 — but Grant and Miles find the venue is the only thing that changed. The 17th quota review, meant to give the Global South more voting power, isn't due to finish until 2028, even as emerging economies hold 60% of world GDP and only 40% of the vote. Debt relief through the G20 Common Framework is still, per civil society groups on the ground, too slow to stop austerity. And the same broken-promise math shows up in the loss-and-damage fund, where only 55% of the original $820 million COP28 pledge has actually been delivered. The hosts trace one institutional pattern across three multilateral tracks, then flag what's next: BRICS de-dollarization mechanics and Chinese bilateral debt restructuring, largely absent from the Washington press pool's Bangkok coverage.
- The UN's Loss-and-Damage Fund Is Already BrokeThe Fund for Responding to Loss and Damage has already allocated more than a third of its pledges and one recent estimate puts it at $431 million against at least $724 billion in annual need — and that's the real story of UNGA81, not the General Debate speeches. Grant and Miles open on official development aid's steepest drop on record, then track Bangladesh's Khalilur Rahman presiding as the first Asia-Pacific president in years over a polycrisis agenda that squeezes smaller states out of the room. They dig into a July 2026 Manila board meeting where the Loss and Damage Fund faced a $2.8 billion ask against $250 million on hand, Nepal's push for an emergency meeting after $2.56 billion in flood damage, and the Global South-led UN tax convention fight that Western coverage treats as a footnote. Next week: whether that tax convention text survives to 2027.
- The Junta That Called MoscowWhen mutinous soldiers seized Base 101 in Niamey, the junta that expelled France and the US to reclaim sovereignty didn't call its own reserves first — it turned to Russia's Africa Corps to get the base back. Grant and Miles trace the mutiny from the Niamey base itself outward, through the Bravia Hotel where Russian and Alliance of Sahel States personnel were staying, to the ambassador's own confirmation that Niger's authorities asked Russian soldiers for help. They dig into AP reporting on 1,700 to 2,000 Russian mercenaries now spread across Niger, Mali and Burkina Faso, and why this was Africa Corps' second regime-saving intervention this year. They close on state TV blaming France with no evidence, and what an unraveling junta means for the wider Alliance of Sahel States going into next week.
- Sudan's War Has a Russian AccentSudan's allied Joint Force says it smashed an RSF convoy near the Libyan border, seizing drone batteries and detaining dozens of fighters, but the bigger story is who's supplying that convoy. Grant and Miles trace a mercenary and weapons pipeline running from Colombian recruits flown through a UAE-linked airbase in Bosaso to Russia's rebranded Africa Corps allegedly moving UAE-origin arms through the Central African Republic. Then the turn: Sudanese army drones have now struck more than 100km inside Chadian territory, and Chad is accusing Khartoum's rivals of routing supplies through its own airports. The hosts widen the lens to Africa Corps activity in Mali before closing on what Critical Threats' Africa File is tracking next as RSF counters recent army gains.
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What the show is
Trade wars, tech regulation, military conflicts, climate policy. When the US or Europe makes a move, billions of people feel the consequences long before CNN books a panel about it. Outside In covers what happened, who it affects, and how it looks from Lagos, Jakarta, São Paulo, and Delhi. Built for globally curious listeners who are tired of hearing about the world through a single lens.
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