Monthly Archives: October 2014

Why Schools? The Middle Class “Fear of Falling”

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I’ve been thinking a lot about how the middle-class exercise school choice through real estate decisions, and what that does to the fabric of our cities. Recently I came across a dissertation by Jennifer Burns Stillman that has some interesting references. Here, for instance, she addresses Barbara Ehrenreich’s account of the middle-class mentality. Much as material conditions matter, I suspect there is something to this analysis:

“Ehrenreich (1990) would call this a ‘fear of falling,’ a ‘rational fear’ held by the middle-class that their children will not also be middle-class if they don’t instill them with the right education and work values. She argues that unlike the lower or upper classes, where class is simply transmitted through birth, middle-class professionals cannot simply pass down their middle-class status to their children. The steep educational barriers to enter middle-class professions–law, medicine, engineering, business, etc.– keep out those who lack discipline and a willingness to delay gratification, something parents can’t simply give to their children. The only thing middle-class parents can do “…is attempt, through careful molding and psychological pressure, to predispose each child to retrace the same long road they themselves once took. If they fail in this task, their children could fall down the social class ladder. A child’s school experience is key to this careful molding process, with peer pressure viewed by middle-class parents as equally important to parental pressure. Evidence from recent school integration research suggests that children from a high socio-economic status do not learn as much in schools dominated by children from low socio-economic backgrounds as they do in schools dominated by children from high-socio-economic backgrounds (Rumberger and Palardy 2005), lending credence to the reluctance of [gentrifying parents] to utilize their neighborhood school.”

It shows just how much of school competition is due to a perhaps-impossible task: to preserve a family’s middle-class status intergenerationally, even as the jobs that guarantee that life change. With enough money, you can make a child upper-class, and without any money you can virtually guarantee a child lower-class. But the middle-class is anxious because we can’t guarantee our children’s future. And that anxiety drives everything else: de facto segregation, massive real estate bubbles, and ultimately the equation of poverty and race, of blackness and danger.

falling manBut what’s really at work is adverse selection: chasing great schools, the middle class follow each other from the city to the suburbs and back again, and from neighborhood to neighborhood within the city.

Real estate prices surge and plunge in our wake; people are left in “failing” schools” or congratulated and then displaced from improving ones.

The power to move from place to place is a privilege: it’s a white privilege, generally (though middle-class African-Americans do the same thing). But here I think a class analysis helps: because it shows us the anxiety that makes that privilege so very stifling. It shows us the fear that turns an advantage into a burden.

A Challenge for Public Work

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I am generally in favor of the idea of public work – people co-creating communities through their work.

It’s a very romantic idea. Revaluing the workers, the creators, the doers who literally shape our world every day.

We may be accustomed to appropriately thinking of teachers as civic workers. But what about the architects who design our schools or the construction workers who build our schools? What about the custodial staff or others who work tirelessly to make the school run? Is their work civic, too? A lens of public work would say it is.

Perhaps what I find most alluring about the framework of Public Work is that it genuinely values the work that every person puts into an effort. It doesn’t so much matter what you bring to the table, but Public Work acknowledges that everyone brings something of value to the table.

But while I find Public Work appealing, I have a hard time appreciating what this ideal would really look like in practice.

For example, I attend a lot of civic events of various types. Sometimes I’m a guest, sometimes I’m a host, and sometimes I am staff.

I’ve noticed over the years that I participate in the work, the content of the event, very differently depending on my role. As a guest I enjoy and engage, as a host I make sure everyone’s having a good time, and as staff I’m focused on the logistics of three steps ahead.

I may be the same person in every mode, but my work is not equal nor, perhaps, equally valued.

I’ve generally attributed this to my own archaic view of social roles. I did, after all, spend much of my childhood in a Victorian-area historic park. So, as much as I am passionate about worker’s rights and respecting all types of workers, I have to admit there is a certain part of me which still defaults to Downton Abbey-type norms.

There’s a certain propriety about the class hierarchy. A certain seemliness which, as much as I may fight it in society, I tend embrace in myself. There’s just a certain way one ought to behave when you are The Help, I suppose.

But as I’ve noticed my own effortless transitions between different roles – an honored guest, a gracious host, a silent staffer – I started to wonder if there was a deeper challenge here.

Don’t get me wrong, class divides are a deep challenge and I fully recognized that not everyone has the same experience as me in this regard. After all, not everyone has the luxury of walking between these roles.

But there is a challenge even deeper than ingrained social roles.

When I am in a supporting role, my biggest challenge may not be that I don’t feel welcome to participate as a guest – it’s that I don’t have the capacity for it.

I am so caught up in the logistic details, so exhausted from the effort so far, and so focused on completing the last few miles that I honestly would rather not participate more fully.

Perhaps this is only a challenge for us introverts, but when I am working an event, I honestly don’t want a seat at the table. I want a seat in the back where I can have a moment of silence of and relax my smile.

If I attended a replica event in the role of a guest, I would have few qualms about chiming in or speaking up. But the very role of staffing – social norms aside – diminishes my capacity to engage in this way.

And this to me is the challenge for Public Work. It is great to say that everyone’s work is valued. It is great to say that everyone’s role is important. That’s the right ethic to strive for, and fully support that view.

But while every person might have the capacity to contribute equally to the work, every role does not. Every worker does not. Someone’s voice will be left out.

And I don’t know the solution to this challenge, because I’m not sure I want to attend an unstaffed event. Really. That would be chaos.

You need people who will make these event run, who will make them go. And those people contribute greatly and importantly – and essentially – to the work. You should, of course, thank them for their efforts, but the challenge remains -

They haven’t been able to contribute all they could contribute. Possibly because of social norms, but also because their work simply didn’t allow it.

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on the importance of measuring civic engagement

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Yesterday’s White House Summit on Civic Learning and National Service focused heavily on how civic learning and engagement should be measured at the college level–on the theory that if we don’t measure something, we don’t take it seriously and we can’t improve our practices. Right now, I am on a conference call discussing how ambitiously, and how often, the U.S. Census should survey Americans about our civic engagement. In the midst of these conversations, the National Journal’s Fawn Johnson published an article that drew heavily on the available public data (“Why Are Political Scientists Studying Ice Bucket Challenges?“). She writes:

Levine and his colleagues [who were numerous and more influential than I was] were instrumental in pushing the U.S. Census Bureau to add a series of questions to its Current Population Survey that might capture less traditional types of community involvement. Pollsters began asking respondents in 2008 if they have worked with neighbors to fix a community problem; if they have done favors for their neighbors; or if they are a member of any organization—whether it be religious, recreational, school, service, or sports.

The upshot is that we now know that well over one-third of Americans participate in one or more groups, the most common being religious and school organizations. We know that about 10 percent have served as a group officer or committee member of those organizations. We know that almost half of Americans talk to their neighbors frequently. About one-third of them discuss politics more than once a week.

Lo and behold, when you ask the right questions, the country doesn’t look nearly as disconnected as it might seem to the civics professors who wring their hands when only half of Americans vote.

The post on the importance of measuring civic engagement appeared first on Peter Levine.

Reflecting on the Movement at NCDD 2014

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As we are watching the attendees gather today for the start of NCDD 2014 in Reston, VA, it is a sight to see. Over 400 dialogue, deliberation, and public engagement professionals are coming together to work and learn together, and we couldn’t be more excited!

In the spirit of honoring all that our wonderful NCDD community represents, we wanted to share a thoughtful piece adapted from a talk NCDD Board member Susan Stuart Clark gave at San Rafael City Hall on September 26, 2014 to a local community group about the movement we are building with NCDD. You can read it below or find the original here.

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Map of the National Coalition for Dialogue and Deliberation network

NCDD: The Invisible Movement

Shhh…can you hear that?

It’s the sound of an invisible movement.  Over 30,000 people across the U.S. and Canada are engaging thousands – and, at times, millions – in doing something that most people have no idea is happening.

What are they doing? They’re leading conversations – a different kind of conversation that challenges the assumption that our society is getting ever more divided.  This is a network of thousands of innovators who bring people together across divides to tackle today’s toughest challenges.

At the center of this growing network is the National Coalition of Dialogue and Deliberation. NCDD is a non-profit organization that provides resources for people who plan and lead meaningful conversations that help find common ground for action on important issues that affect all of us.

1. Who are these people and what are they doing?

The NCDD network is made up of a wide variety of group facilitators, professors, students, government officials, organizational development consultants and committed volunteers.  While the range of backgrounds is diverse, NCDDers share a common dedication to creating opportunities for people to talk, listen and act together in new ways – ways that build deeper understanding and create new openings for solving problems.

NCDD is non-profit and non-partisan.  We are not advocates for any particular position – instead we are advocates for more constructive and inclusive process.

NCDDers might be leading dialogues about health care, schools, land use decisions or the environment.  And these conversations can be taking place in community centers, in churches, county or town council chambers or in classrooms – with community members from all kinds of backgrounds and often with translation. What binds us together is that we believe that inclusive dialogue can generate shared understanding and shared goals – and that shared understanding is the “secret sauce” for new possibilities and new paths forward that can help us make progress as we join forces rather than waste energy on divisive debates.

The “deliberation” part of this work is when we frame up a topic by acknowledging the real choices and trade-offs at hand – whether it’s about the drought, increasing educational opportunities for all kids and the workforce of the future or what should get built where. In deliberation, we make sure that these tough choices are informed by the perspectives of everyone who is impacted and by the values we as a society decide will shape our decisions.

2. Why haven’t you heard of us?

Here are my theories:

A. Dialogue and deliberation are not embedded in the formal structures of our democracy.  We vote yes or no on ballot measures.  We often choose between two candidates.  We are well versed in a thumbs up/thumbs down kind of thinking that leads to winners and losers.  In a debate, you listen to hear your opponent’s weakness.  But in a dialogue you listen to learn from each other.

At the local level of our democratic systems, we have public hearings. But taking turns for three minutes at the microphone is not the same as a dialogue where community members can set the framework for what’s important and explore and ask for clarifications from each other to see where we agree and don’t agree.

B. If you want the kind of dialogue I’m talking about, someone has to go outside the norm to set it up, find the resources, plan it and convince people something good is going to come out of it.  But most people have rarely if ever had this experience of genuine public dialogue, which makes it harder to convince them to participate.

So our invisible movement of NCDDers is finding ways to set up these experiences so people can feel what it’s like to come together and learn from each other and discover that the “other” can be an ally.  The problems we face may not be easy – but there are solutions when we can talk about them in constructive ways with a broad range of the affected community.

C. Facilitators don’t draw attention to themselves. When I do my job well as a facilitator, I fade into the background as I let the group do its work.  When I first started out, my facilitation was more visible, like the old yellow version of scotch tape.  But the better I get, the more invisible I become and the meeting participants remember their experience rather than my expertise.

3. Why do we persist in this work?

Because we know that most people outside of the political system are looking for connection, and practical solutions to the pressing issues of our day.  And as the size and complexity of our challenges keeps expanding, we know that more inclusive and collaborative dialogue can generate more effective and longer lasting solutions.

As we go through yet another election season, with divisive campaigns that purposefully use wedge issues to isolate groups from one another, and a news industry perpetuating a tired old strategy of selling conflict and controversy, people are left to wonder if a new politics is possible. NCDD operates on the premise that it IS possible because we are planting and nurturing the seeds that we see growing every day in communities across the country.

4. What can you do?

Visit NCDD.org to see how we work to change how we do democracy. Look at the map and the extensive set of resources to see who in your area and/or on your issue of interest is working hard to make a difference.

Check out the amazing array of presenters and projects featured at our biennial conference this weekend (October 17-19) in the Washington DC area.  Over 400 leaders young and old are connecting our work and our passion for the “Democracy for the Next Generation.”

Consider joining NCDD – it’s just $50 between now and Election Day.  NCDDers are in the “parallel universe” of what democracy can be like.  Your membership is like a vote that makes this alternate reality more visible to all.

And, next time you hear someone say “that’s just politics” and throw up their hands, I ask you to instead engage them in a dialogue about what they think is important. Maybe you’ll find some common ground.  And that leads to new possibilities to change the world.

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Susan Stuart Clark is founder and director of Common Knowledge.  She serves on the board of the National Coalition for Dialogue and Deliberation. You can find the original version of this piece on her blog at www.ckgroup.org/2014/10/16/the-invisible-movement.

Civic Learning in Higher Education

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I had the honor to spend the day listening to an engaging conversation with university leaders, policy makers and advocates from around the country. Tisch College, where I work, hosted the White House’s Civic Learning and National Service Summit – a day long conversation focused on validating, elevating and integrating civic learning in higher education.

A lot of critical issues – and stories to celebrate – were raised throughout the day. I’m afraid I haven’t quite synthesized these into a concise and compelling format, but here are a few of the ideas that I am walking away with -

Civic learning is more than civic engagement. It is broader and it is deeper. It’s not just about engaging students in civic work, it’s about preparing students and educating them to be continually engaged in civic work, to the best of their abilities.

It is about embracing higher education, not as something which can propel an individual to success, but as something which can fundamentally strengthen our democracy.

And embracing civic learning isn’t just a program shift, it is a culture shift. It means creating environments where faculty dedicated to civic learning can thrive. Where staff can dedicate their careers to helping young people and communities flourish.

There is much work to be done – in higher education as in other sectors. But there are many successes to celebrate and many allies deeply engaged in this work. Nothing gets solved in a one day meeting, but the conversation is important.

And the conversation continues.

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where I’ve been

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Some observations about this map:

Screen Shot 2014-10-15 at 6.14.55 PM

  1. It is creepy that Google knows, automatically from my cell phone, where I’ve been for the past 30 days. (Try https://maps.google.com/locationhistory to track yourself.)
  2. I have been traveling a lot.
  3. This is a great country. We may be running it down a bit. Its people are very divided–including the people I’ve enjoyed meeting over the past month in settings as different from one another as downtown Baltimore and Provo, UT. But it remains magnificent in its natural and architectural beauty and its endless parade of human beings.

The post where I’ve been appeared first on Peter Levine.

Diffusing Tension Through Dialogue – and a Touch of Humor

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Public Agenda is partnering with AAAS to facilitate a series of dialogues between scientists and evangelical Christian pastors throughout the summer and fall. The purpose of the project is to improve dialogue, relationships and collaboration between these two communities, often viewed as staunchly divided. This blog is one in a series from our public engagement team, who write to reflect on their experiences moderating the dialogues. Read more about this project here and here, and download the discussion guide used during these conversations here. For more information, email Allison Rizzolo.


A few weeks ago in Atlanta, I found myself in a room surrounded by church pastors, evolutionary biologists, theology professors, mathematicians and a former Vietnam veteran turned evangelical Christian. I was there for the third dialogue in the Perceptions Project, which brings together individuals who self-identify as belonging to the evangelical Christian community or (though in some cases “and” is more appropriate) the scientific community.

Many of the participants seemed nervous at the start of the dialogue. Though I served as a co-facilitator and was not technically a participant, I admit that I too approached the conversation with a hint of reticence. Before boarding my plane to Atlanta, a friend told me to “watch myself” since he claimed that there was “no way those two groups could manage to be civil toward one another, especially down in the Bible belt.”

What I found, however, was quite the opposite of that presupposition.

The group certainly tackled some tricky topics – evolution, stem cell research, and abortion, to name a few. Still, the group my colleague Susan and I led was filled with some of the most empathetic, curious, and kindest people I had met in quite some time.

For example, one of the scientists in the room brought up the Institutional Review Board process. Through this process, scientists present their research projects to a group of their institutional colleagues, who determine whether or not that project is ethical and can proceed. The board is responsible for deciding whether the welfare of human participants is protected, among other things.

One pastor was shocked to learn that all scientists must go through this process, saying, “I had no idea that scientists actually cared about the sanctity of life.”

A biologist quipped “We have morals too!”

Within a moment, laughter filled the room. The participants began to ease up, and suddenly the stage was set for true, honest, and constructive dialogue. Everyone in the room seemed to start abandoning their preconceived notions of the “other’s” theoretical identity and began to view one another as real people who deserved credit for having their own unique perspectives, all varying in scope and range. Not one person in that room fit the mold of a cookie-cutter stereotype. And the truth is, no one ever does.

One of the biggest takeaways of Public Agenda’s partnership with AAAS is that no barrier is ever too big to break down. Participants exchanged business cards across communities and made plans to continue the conversation after the workshop was over – a true sign of a successful event. While some participants agreed to disagree, they did accomplish one major feat, as the beloved Aretha Franklin would put it:

“R-E-S-P-E-C-T, find out what it means to me…”

And that, in my opinion, is exactly what happened in Atlanta.

Scaling (not) Up

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When people talk about “scaling” they seem to generally mean “scaling up.” This is often used particularly within the business context – how can we scale up our business model to serve more customers? Or, as perhaps the more skeptical add, to make more money.

“Scaling up” is also prevalent within the non-profit sector – how can we broaden our reach? How can we connect more people with our services or convince more people of our message?

Scaling up is, perhaps, a litmus test, which divides strong companies from the weak. Great idea, I’ve heard people say, but will it scale?

It is, perhaps, nice to do something at a small, local, level, but if you can’t effectively scale up, conventional wisdom seems to say, there’s not really much point. Or at least, the conversation then turns into a (worthwhile but secondary) debate over whether it’s okay to improve one life rather than many.

But is scaling up really the only way to go?

I’m not intrinsically opposed to scaling up, but I question the assumption that it’s the only way to go – that success and upwards scale are inextricably linked.

As someone recently commented to me, perhaps some efforts could benefit from scaling down.

I am particularly intrigued by what I can only describe as scaling laterally – connecting local work in one place to local work in another place.

Scale, I suppose, is at its essence a navigation problem. How does information, or perhaps commands, get from one place to another?

The typical model of scaling up tackles this problem more or less effectively. Some centralized governing body oversees a network of smaller entities. A well articulated company brand or character can greatly help in making sure that all the pieces are working together, but it tends to be a very vertical solution.

Perhaps that is the easiest solution, and perhaps it is the best solution – I am certainly in no position to judge.

But it is not the only solution.

A central governing body is not inherently necessary. A vertical structure is not inherently necessary. What’s necessary is that information can get from point A to point B. And this information needs to flow in a timely enough matter that the two can truly communicate.

…But what kind of scale is that?

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Co-ops and Commons: Exciting Convergences in the UK

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New Start magazine, a British magazine associated with the Manchester-based Centre for Local Economic Strategies, has just come out with a terrific issue (#525, October 2014) about co-operatives and commons.  The essays focus on how “more democratic forms of ownership – of land, housing, workplaces and the public realm – can revive our places.” 

While most of the essays deal with British co-ops and commons, the lessons and strategies mentioned have a relevance to many other places. Consider land ownership, a topic that is rarely a part of progressive political agendas.  Steve Bendle, director of a group called Community Land and Finance, offers a clear-eyed assessment of how government is obsessed with enhancing the value of land for landowners and developers – while largely ignoring how land could be used to serve citizens, taxpayers and the wider community. 

Unneeded land and government buildings, for example, are generally put up for sale on the market rather than used to serve the needs of a community for housing, work spaces or civic infrastructure.  The assumption is that privatized, market-driven uses of the assets will yield the greatest “value” (narrowly defined as return on investment to private investors). 

When government (i.e., taxpayers) finances new roads, subways or rail systems, the market value at key locations and buildings invariably rises.  But government rarely does much to capture this value for the public. 

Bendle concludes:  “So developers and landowners make profits, while the public sector struggles to secure a contribution to infrastructure costs or to deliver affordable homes despite successive attempts to change the planning system.”

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A Note from John Gastil, NCDD 2014 Co-Emcee

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Before our wonderful community starts arriving in droves for NCDD 2014, we wanted to make sure you all see a message from our  co-emcee, John Gastil. NCDD has inspired John to complete revisions on his best-selling book on democratic methods, and he’s using it to help NCDD continue our work. Read more about it below, and we’ll see in Reston this week!

Gastil BookServing as co-emcee of the NCDD conference spurred me to bring to the finish line a project three-years in the making. I’ve brought into the digital world my very first (and best selling) book, Democracy in Small Groups. And in celebration of NCDD’s conference, all royalties from the first week of sales – from Oct 14-21 – go to NCDD.

Yup, all of ‘em.

Then again, it was NCDD attendees who convinced me to make my next book cheap enough for anyone to buy, so the royalties on a $2.99 book won’t go too far. But everyone needs to buy new office supplies, so it’ll pay for somethin’.

The book’s now available in Kindle format (which can be read via a free Kindle app on phones/PCs/Macs) at http://tinyurl.com/DSG2Kindle

The new edition is expanded and revised, with a special feature built just for online reading. As much as the Internet makes possible, the references link to original sources, so you can drill down as deep as you want while you read.

Twenty one years have passed since the first edition (blackjack!), so there are more than two decades worth of new sources filling out the book’s argument. If you want to make your own groups more democratic or better understand how small groups can change our larger world, this book might help you get there.

Versions for iBooks (I hear ya, iTooners), Nook (anyone using that?), and print will be following shortly.

John Gastil