Local Community

The thought experiment also shows how important it is for local organizers and businesses to find different idioms than “loneliness” for framing their social projects. “Solving loneliness” is like “solving mental health:” a fool’s errand. It’s counterproductive to think this way. In my experience, it is the positive content of a social group that... See more

Donnelly and Schrantz are arguing for a major shift: “a long-overdue scaled investment in community organizing around the country.” I agree 100%, especially because I concur with them that how we do politics now, as a purely transactional process of extracting votes from people, has contributed to the crisis of democracy and the allure of... See more

So yes, Americans are materially wealthy and unfulfilled, and the primary problem is cultural—we’ve sacrificed community and meaning to emphasize an archetype built on acquiring as much stuff as possible, but then we have made that unnecessarily hard to do. When you give your citizens a cultural script, built on the material, that promises hard... See more

Beginning the work of civic renewal in localities rather than at the national level is an easier lift in part because Americans have more trust in democracy the closer it is to them. Sixty-six percent of respondents in a 2022 Pew survey reported a favorable view of their local government, and 54 percent did of their state government, compared to... See more

Again, to reference myself, while I do believe in individual agency, I also believe societies come with strong forces that shape expectations and even shape people’s understanding of a ‘good life.’ That is, society provides citizens playbooks that they are urged to follow which are supposed to end in happily ever after, and ours is that you can... See more

For me, what we’ve got to do now is hunker down. The units of survival are going to be local communities, so I’m urging local communities to get together. Finland is offering a great example because the Finnish government has sent a letter to all of their citizens warning of future emergencies, whether they’re earthquakes, floods, droughts, or... See more