Uploaded July 2026 | Updated September 2026, 2 weeks ago
In the latest episode of Always at War, Courtney and Alex sit down with Almut Rochowanski, a non-resident fellow at the Quincy Institute and longtime grassroots activist who spent nearly two decades working with civil society organizers across Russia, Ukraine, and the former Soviet Union.
Almut walks Courtney and Alex through the "NGO-industrial complex": how grant cycles, donor priorities, and Western funding structures can sometimes conspire to hollow out genuine grassroots possibilities and replace them with a top-down relationship between funders and "beneficiaries." To tell this story, Almut takes us back to the suffragists and anti-militarist reformers of the nineteenth century, whose organic, mass-membership movements look almost nothing like parts of the professionalized, donor-dependent NGO sectors of today. Along the way, the conversation explores both the real possibilities and promises of foreign aid and why some funding, however well-intentioned, is structurally corrosive. The episode closes with an excellent look at why, in her view, no country has a monopoly on militarism — it's a story that's played out across empires throughout history, and right now America is the one with its hand on the rudder.
CHECK OUT ALMUT'S SUBSTACK, DISCOMFORT ZONE: discomfortzone.substack.com
SUPPORT QI'S FIRST AMENDMENT FUND: givingtools.com/give/939
CHAPTERS
0:00 – Intro
4:47 – Meet Almut Rochowanski
5:26 – Growing up under the shadow of Cold War militarism
8:38 – The women who built the modern peace movement
15:54 – How foreign aid grants actually work
24:22 – Money as "the purest distillate of power"
29:03 – The suffragette comparison
33:13 – Donors as a "black box"
41:18 – Why is the West cutting foreign aid?
52:57 – Why donors want NGOs to push legislation
56:29 – Is American militarism exceptional?
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Why is America seemingly always at war? Join the Quincy Institute’s Courtney Rawlings and Alex Jordan as they expose the monied interests, outdated ideologies, and entrenched powers that have driven the U.S. to wage nearly 400 wars and interventions.
They’ll be joined by journalists, advocates, and experts to uncover who profits from America’s endless conflicts, and to imagine how we can build a better, more peaceful U.S. foreign policy.
Learn more about the Quincy Institute: quincyinst.org
Contact the show: alwaysatwar@quincyinst.org
Show art by Justin Hantz
###
Quincy Institute is an independent, nonprofit think tank.
Help fund our research: quincyinst.org/donations
Read our reporting: ResponsibleStatecraft.org
Twitter: https://x.com/QuincyInst
TikTok: tiktok.com/quincyinst
Facebook: facebook.com/quincyinst
Instagram: instagram.com//quincyinst
Website: quincyinst.org
In the latest episode of Always at War, Courtney and Alex sit down with Almut Rochowanski, a non-resident fellow at the Quincy Institute and longtime grassroots activist who spent nearly two decades working with civil society organizers across Russia, Ukraine, and the former Soviet Union.
Almut walks Courtney and Alex through the "NGO-industrial complex": how grant cycles, donor priorities, and Western funding structures can sometimes conspire to hollow out genuine grassroots possibilities and replace them with a top-down relationship between funders and "beneficiaries." To tell this story, Almut takes us back to the suffragists and anti-militarist reformers of the nineteenth century, whose organic, mass-membership movements look almost nothing like parts of the professionalized, donor-dependent NGO sectors of today. Along the way, the conversation explores both the real possibilities and promises of foreign aid and why some funding, however well-intentioned, is structurally corrosive. The episode closes with an excellent look at why, in her view, no country has a monopoly on militarism — it's a story that's played out across empires throughout history, and right now America is the one with its hand on the rudder.
CHECK OUT ALMUT'S SUBSTACK, DISCOMFORT ZONE: discomfortzone.substack.com
SUPPORT QI'S FIRST AMENDMENT FUND: givingtools.com/give/939
CHAPTERS
0:00 – Intro
4:47 – Meet Almut Rochowanski
5:26 – Growing up under the shadow of Cold War militarism
8:38 – The women who built the modern peace movement
15:54 – How foreign aid grants actually work
24:22 – Money as "the purest distillate of power"
29:03 – The suffragette comparison
33:13 – Donors as a "black box"
41:18 – Why is the West cutting foreign aid?
52:57 – Why donors want NGOs to push legislation
56:29 – Is American militarism exceptional?
###
Why is America seemingly always at war? Join the Quincy Institute’s Courtney Rawlings and Alex Jordan as they expose the monied interests, outdated ideologies, and entrenched powers that have driven the U.S. to wage nearly 400 wars and interventions.
They’ll be joined by journalists, advocates, and experts to uncover who profits from America’s endless conflicts, and to imagine how we can build a better, more peaceful U.S. foreign policy.
Learn more about the Quincy Institute: quincyinst.org
Contact the show: alwaysatwar@quincyinst.org
Show art by Justin Hantz
###
Quincy Institute is an independent, nonprofit think tank.
Help fund our research: quincyinst.org/donations
Read our reporting: ResponsibleStatecraft.org
Twitter: https://x.com/QuincyInst
TikTok: tiktok.com/quincyinst
Facebook: facebook.com/quincyinst
Instagram: instagram.com//quincyinst
Website: quincyinst.org
