Colleague, News, and Opinion Links for the Week of February 23, 2025
Newsletter #325 - February 24, 2025
Reader Suggested Links
Highlighting links suggested by our readers. Please send us links to things that you find useful.
US Politics
A Democrat Who Is Thinking Differently — An interview with Democratic Representative Jake Auchincloss -- another leader who is trying to craft a broadly attractive alternative to President Trump's policies.Superpower Conflict
Trump wants Greenland and Gaza. That might embolden China on Taiwan. — Thoughts on the way in which President Trump's comments regarding Panama and Greenland are contributing to the further erosion of global taboos against aggression and conquest.Superpower Conflict
Dear Europe: Become a Great Power—or Get Carved Up by Them — Advice for Europe on how to protect its interests in a world that is increasingly being governed by raw economic and military power.Superpower Conflict
The Disrupter in Chief Can’t End a War Like This — A clear and succinct explanation of why so many people find President Trump's actions with respect to Ukraine so outrageous.Saving Democracy
Democracy is Fighting Back — More information about the rapidly evolving nature of efforts to push back against the Trump administration's radical changes.Race / Anti-Racism
Trump’s Colorblind Message Energizes Black Americans — A look at why some Blacks support a more conservative model for addressing racial inequities.US Politics
Venting at Democrats and Fearing Trump, Liberal Donors Pull Back Cash — An update on funding problems being faced by those who seek to offer an alternative to President's Trump unfolding policies.
Colleague Activities
Highlighting things that our conflict and peacebuilding colleagues are doing that contribute to efforts to address the hyper-polarization problem.
Race / Anti-Racism
Illustrations of Civil Rights Peacemaking & Conflict Resolution — The Divided Community Project in collaboration with Stanford Law School and NAFCM is hosting a webinar on Feb. 26 illustrating effective civil rights peacemaking and conflict resolution strategies .Media Reform
The news is polarizing us. Can Tangle News help? — A talk with journalist Isaac Saul, founder of Tangle News (readtangle.com), which shares takes on current events from across the political spectrum.Media Reform
Can recognizing and reducing bias in news help with polarization? with Vanessa Otero — Vanessa Otero is the creator of a popular and well respected media bias chart that ranks the bias of many news outlets. Here she talks about the morass of media bias and how to tell what is and what isn't.Constructive Communication
What We Get Wrong About Each Other: Perception Gaps — More in Common's Research Manager writes about the ubiquity of "perception gaps" and how they hurt us.Race / Anti-Racism
Dr. King’s Call to Justice: A Universal Beacon in Troubled Times — January 20, 2025 was the day President Trump was inaugurated as President in the U.S. and it was also the day we celebrated the life and ideas of Martin Luther King. This coincidence invites a reflection on King's enduring ideas.Theories of Change
Philanthropy's Fork in the Road — The Trump Administration is hellbent on "deconstructing the administrative state" and consolidating power. This is blowing up the strategies of many big grant makers. How should they respond?De-Escalation Strategies
“Why Is It on Us to Take the High Road?”: Opposed Views on Our Divides — Two letters, one from a Trump supporter, the other from a Trump opponent are compared, with a goal of helping both sides better understand where the other is coming from.Massively Parallel Peacebuilding
Reducing Political Divides Must – and Can – Occur at Massive Scale — In terms of America’s democratic stability, the most pressing need for these efforts comes from dramatic misperceptions of the threat posed by everyday Americans from the other political party.Developing a Unifying Vision
Shared Rights as the Foundation of Pluralism — Reflections on what makes pluralism work and what holds it back from three conferences all focusing on ways to navigate deep difference.Theories of Change
Joy as Reparative Rehumanization — Reparative rehumanization restores dignity and cultural identity through art, dance, and music, so we can reclaim our humanity and rebuild bonds that trauma has fractured.US Politics
Jay's Notes: From Peak Woke to Peak DOGE — From the E.D. of More in Common, Jason Mangone, this piece points out four ways that wokeism and DOGEism are similar projects, and points to what that might mean for a way ahead.Social Complexity
We Live in Times of Multiple Entwined Crises – But Our Policy Responses Aren’t Keeping Up — Existing policies to tackle environmental challenges fail to take into account that biodiversity loss, climate change and pollution are intertwined crises and produce compounding and intensifying impacts.Effective Problem-Solving
Citizens’ Assemblies Inspire Love & Truth in Our Politics — An introduction to citizens assemblies and the role that they might be able to play in building a democracy that is truly "of the people, by the people, and for the people."
News and Opinion
From around the web, more insight into the nature of our conflict problems, limits of business-as-usual thinking, and things people are doing to try to make things better. (Formerly, Beyond Intractability in Context.)
US Politics
Trump’s honeymoon is over — Amid President Trump's unprecedented effort to radically transform the full range of governmental institutions and policies, news that public support for this effort maybe starting to erode.Effective Problem-Solving
Why the government built only 58 EV charging stations in three years — An in-depth look at the good (and not so good) reasons why the government takes so long to get anything done. This case study looks at efforts to expand the number of EV charging stations.US Politics
There's No Substitute For Public Opinion — Helpful reflections on what democracy's defenders can learn from the United States' first populist presidency – that of Andrew Jackson.Peacebuilding
How Much the U.S. Spent on Foreign Aid—and Where It Went — An in-depth statistical profile of what USAID used to do that tells us a lot about what we may be losing.Class Inequity
America Doesn’t Just Have a Housing Crisis. It Has a Moving Crisis — An examination of the complex factors surrounding the sharp decline in the geographic mobility the US population (and reflections of how that contributes to social tensions and inequities).Race / Anti-Racism
Reforming the DEI Reforms — A promising proposal for reforming DEI to focus on MEI: Merit, Economics, and Ingenuity (and build the support needed for real positive change).Superpower Conflict
The New American Imperialism — An exploration of the complex ramifications surrounding President Trump's aggressive, expansionist, and imperialistic rhetoric surrounding Greenland, Panama, and even Canada.Race / Anti-Racism
Trump and the DEI Counter-Revolution — An informative and comprehensive review of the history of DEI programs, their expansion, the growing backlash, and now the counter-revolution.Education
A New Kind of Crisis for American Universities — An analysis of the complex ramifications of the way in which Trump is directly attacking the economic model underlying the modern research university.Terror
Islamophobia is making a dangerous comeback. — Controversial, but important, reflections on the distinction between the irrational and unfounded Islamophobia and legitimate concerns about Islamic terrorism.US Politics
The Alternative to Trump Cannot Be a Defense of Institutions as They Are — A promising essay by Representative Ro Khanna (D-CA) outlining a way forward for Democrats that broadens the party's base of support by acknowledging and correcting past mistakes.US Politics
Humpty Dumpty Had a Great Fall — From Yascha Mounk, reflections on just how radically the world (and the US) has changed, why past solutions will no longer work, and why we need a new vision better adapted to contemporary realities.US Politics
This Progressive Has a Plan to Win Trump’s Base. Steve Bannon Calls It ‘Brilliant.’ — An additional perspective on Ro Khanna's plans for building his party's base of support by extending its appeal to include the many Trump voters the Democrats had previously left behind.US Politics
Can We Please Stop Calling These People Populists? — From David Brooks, an appeal to distinguish President Trump's populist supporters from the very different class of people he is appointing to key positions within the government.Israel / Hamas War
How Israelis and Palestinians View Their Own Children — Culture matters and our collective belief systems do much to determine our future. This article looks at the differing ways in which Israelis and Palestinians view their children.Freedom of Speech
Snitch hotlines for ‘offensive’ speech were a nightmare on campus — and now they’re coming to a neighborhood near you — For those concerned about freedom of speech and big brother-style efforts to control our thoughts and behavior, a critical look at the rise of "bias reporting systems."Social Complexity
How Progressives Broke the Government — From Marc Dunkelman (the author of "Why Nothing Works") a summary of his principal argument (which does much to explain the collapse of trust in governmental institutions).US Politics
Democrats Fear They Are Missing the Moment to Remake the Party — An overview of the big conflict within the Democratic Party over what lessons to learn from last fall's electoral defeat and the Trump presidency.Saving Democracy
The Dilemmas of Democracy — A thoughtful exploration of the complex relationship between democratic self-rule, public opinion, and genuine expertise.Israel / Hamas War
The Egyptian Plan for Gaza Takes Shape — While President Trump's threat to seize and redevelop Gaza may be a political nonstarter, there is some hope that it is pushing Egypt and Jordan to offer a more realistic alternative.Superpower Conflict
The End of the Postwar World — From Anne Applebaum, another quite perceptive analysis of the radical changes that are now transforming the planet.US Politics
One Simple Question for Democrats — Simple advice for Democrats looking for a way of evaluating competing proposals for rebuilding their base of support -- think about how working-class voters are likely to respond.Israel / Hamas War
Israel's Impossible Plight — Reflections on the terrible choices that Israel is being forced to make (and a look at why the many conflicts surrounding Israel are so intractable).Artificial Intelligence
Is it okay? — Reflections on the moral questions involved in our personal decisions about when and how to make use of artificial intelligence-based technologies.Authoritarianism
There’s a Term for What Trump and Musk Are Doing -- How regime change happens in America — From Anne Applebaum, an expert on authoritarianism and, especially, it's new 21st-century variant, an analysis of how Trump is radically reshaping our society.
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About the MBI Newsletters
Two or three times a week, Guy and Heidi Burgess, the BI Directors, share some of our thoughts on political hyper-polarization and related topics. We also share essays from our colleagues and other contributors, and every week or so, we devote one newsletter to annotated links to outside readings that we found particularly useful relating to U.S. hyper-polarization, threats to peace (and actual violence) in other countries, and related topics of interest. Each Newsletter is posted on BI, and sent out by email through Substack to subscribers. You can sign up to receive your copy here and find the latest newsletter here or on our BI Newsletter page, which also provides access to all the past newsletters, going back to 2017.
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