Our Towns Civic Foundation: The Idea, and the Goals
What is the idea behind this site and the Our Towns Civic Foundation? And what are the goals? Here’s a brief summary.
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James Fallows
354 posts
James Fallows is a longtime correspondent for The Atlantic magazine. He has reported for the magazine from around the world since the late 1970s, including extended assignments in China, Japan, and Southeast Asia, and within the United States in Texas, Washington state, and California. He has written 12 books and won the American Book Award, the National Magazine Award, and a documentary Emmy. He has also done extensive commentary on National Public Radio.
‘On Such a Full Sea…’
Welcome to the Our Towns Civic Foundation site! The purpose of this note is to introduce a new film; to connect the news of the moment to the largest possibilities of the era; and to explain the ambitions of the project of which this site is part.
A Vibrant American Musical Career, far From America’s Cultural Capitals
What Larry Groce discovered by launching a national radio program from an out-of-the-way location
Three Guides to the Next America
This note is to kick off a resumed set of chronicles in the “Our Towns” series, after time away for a long Atlantic project on the origins of this era’s public-health and…
Local Efforts in a Time of Extreme Global Stress
The theme in this “Our Towns” space has been, and remains, the sources of vitality, practicality, generosity, and renewal in local-level America, despite bitter polarization in national-level politics. The series began almost…
The End of the Roman Empire Wasn’t That Bad Maybe the end of the American one won’t be either.
It’s time to think about the Roman empire again. But not the part of its history that usually commands attention in the United States: the long, sad path of Decline and…
When a Company Invests in an ‘Underdog City’
The story of how a company that started in one of these places is now involving people and businesses in another—and why that matters in the next stage of equitable American recovery.
Learning From the New Deal—For the Next Recovery
I was talking with the mayor of a "red state" city about how his community was weathering today's public-health and financial crises.
How Michael Jones Changed Our Daily Lives
"Everyone is an inventor; you need only ignore limits and preconceptions then ask yourself 'how should it be?' "
What Post-pandemic Repair Could Look Like
An update, following a report last month, on plans to repair the damage now being done.
How to Reconnect Rural and Urban America
Some recent items worth noticing
What Happens After the Election
What else is going on in the country, with less than two weeks in this consequential election season?
A ‘Climate Corps’ of California Volunteers
Designed to address both the causes and the effects of California's exposure to climate change.
The Sport That’s Like Playing in a Jazz Quartet
"Rowing is a sport, everything else is a game."
‘A Most Beautiful Thing’ in a Time of Racial Reckoning
This film's story would be surprising and engrossing at any time, but it has a current power and relevance its producers could not have foreseen when they began making it.
How a Small Brewery Can Survive COVID-19
A bellwether business category, figuring out how and whether it can survive.