The Future of American Community

The Future of American Community Four Trends Transforming How We Live and Connect THE FUTURE OF AMERICAN COMMUNITY: Four Trends Transforming How We Live and Connect 1 Contents PAGE 2 PAGE 6 PAGE 18 PAGE Introduction Out of Many, One Block Club 2.0 The Future of Immigration, Digital Community Community in the Identity and the Organization United States American Dream for Hyper-Local Innovation ALAINA HARKNESS ALI NOORANI JAHMAL COLE PAGE 25 PAGE 34 PAGE Cities on a Reckoning, Human Scale Redemption, Resilience Place and the Pursuit of Happiness, Lessons from Religion Upward Mobility and on Community Life the American Dream Today RYAN STREETER REV. JENNIFER BAILEY 2 THE FUTURE OF AMERICAN COMMUNITY: COMMUNITY: OF AMERICAN THE FUTURE Four Trends Transforming How We Live and Connect Live We How Transforming Trends Four Introduction The Future of Community in the United States ALAINA HARKNESS 3 Introduction: The Future of Community The Future Introduction: in the United States in the United magine for a moment that you Learning this new term, you might start to are an interplanetary visitor to the United States. investigate how people in these United States in You’ve just arrived today with a benevolent, 2019 think and talk about community. Dipping Ianthropological curiosity about the beings into mainstream conversation on the subject, you who call this place home. Initially, you might would observe a divided narrative. “Community” be preoccupied with the characteristics and is either in crisis, eroding as Americans pursue actions of individual humans, but you would their individual goals and interests at the expense quickly come to focus on the interactions and of common good, as the population composition communications between them: in their homes shifts, as the media landscape changes, as social and neighborhoods; places of learning, work, play media filter bubbles deepen our already polarized and worship; and on and through their devices. politics, and as institutional anchors that once grounded them disappear or change form. With your extraterrestrial senses you would Or communities are flourishing in increasingly quickly appreciate the heterogeneity of both the diverse forms, adapting out of necessity to physical environment and its corresponding respond to economic and social pressures or populations: dense cities, gridded towns and because of new technologies and opportunities. neighborhoods, cul-de-sac suburbs, rural Communities are dying, or they are thriving. regions, wilderness. Yet you would also detect Failing to meet the demands of the 21st century strong similarities and emergent patterns of or powering the bottom-up problem solving and behavior. Without knowing the word for it, you innovation that will lead the U.S. into the 22nd. would see everyone, everywhere, connecting. Connecting in groups defined by similarities and Flashing back in time, you would see that this differences. In places, and across them. Online fascination with (and concern for) the health and IRL. Identifying common points of reference of community and communities is not new to and developing empathy. Building platforms for the United States. In fact, it is one of the nation’s joint problem solving and mutual aid. Creating, defining concepts. The link between country and participating in, and shaping “community.” community is not unique to the United States, of 4 THE FUTURE OF AMERICAN COMMUNITY: COMMUNITY: OF AMERICAN THE FUTURE course. Nearly 40 years ago, Irish historian and prompt: “What is the most important trend political scientist Benedict Anderson called the that will transform how Americans think about nation itself an “imagined community,” calling community over the next decade?” out the enabling role of newspapers and print communication in forging a collective identity The resulting essays are meant to be arguments, for individuals who would never meet face to provocations, and invitations to consider face. But the United States does have a very dimensions of the American experience of particular historical relationship to community. community in some of its myriad forms. Another curious observer of the early American experience, Alexis de Tocqueville, arrived from Four Trends Transforming How We Live and Connect Live We How Transforming Trends Four France to document the strength and diversity “Out of Many, One: Immigration, of civic associations – communities, formalized Identity and the American Dream” to varying degrees – and their relationship to American democracy. With such high stakes, it Ali Noorani, executive director of the National is not surprising that concern for the health and Immigration Forum, begins by grounding us vitality of community runs deep and strong in in the changing demographics of American the political discourse of the United States and communities and how these changes affect the that this focus has been a constant, common perception of immigrant communities. He then characteristic of American life. draws lessons from a series of “Living Room Conversations” held across the country in 2018 But what will the future look like for community and shows how listening and careful unpacking in America? As evolved an observer as you of tangled concerns about economic and social are, you haven’t yet developed the ability to see changes can lead to greater empathy and ahead so clearly, but looking backward, you respect for diversity. can discern some of the drivers of change. The characteristics and composition of the people. Technologies that enable communication and “Block Club 2.0: Digital Community connection. The landscape, including the natural Organization for Hyper-Local and built environments. The institutions that Innovation” provide structure, stability, and boundaries for our and interactions. Jahmal Cole, founder of My Block, My Hood, My City (M3), shares his perspective on the In commissioning this series, Knight Foundation evolution of block clubs, one of the building block asked a diverse group of leading scholars, institutions of community engagement and policymakers and practitioners to consider neighborhood development in his hometown of this timely and timeless question. The project Chicago. By pairing social media strategies with has two primary goals: first, to identify some the door-to-door, real-life interaction of neighbors of the forces shaping communities and our in the block club model, Cole is working to amplify collective understanding of what communities the effects and efficacy of these groups beyond are and how they are changing; second, to their traditional boundaries. Through it he shows spark thoughtful conversation about solutions how community institutions can be reimagined, to challenges communities are facing. The using new technologies and tools to adapt to authors that lend their distinctive voices and changing pressures and conditions. visions to this collection responded to a single 5 Introduction: The Future of Community The Future Introduction: “Cities on a Human Scale: Place and the Common themes emerge across these diverse Pursuit of Happiness, Upward Mobility perspectives. The power of careful, considerate and the American Dream” listening as a precondition to connection across difference and a step along the path Ryan Streeter, director of domestic policy to community building. The inevitability of research at the American Enterprise Institute, institutional evolution, adaptation, and change, examines the connections between American and profound need for people living through ideals, the physical design of neighborhoods these sometimes disconnecting and destabilizing and the geography of economic opportunity. In shifts to find steadying forces and ways to come describing the characteristics of desirable and together. The toxic human tendency to deepen States in the United competitive “multicentric communities of the distrust of difference when economic and future,” he argues for defining quality of life in social stability is threatened. The conviction that communities not just by traditional measures community will remain central to the American such as affordability, job access, and amenities, experience, and that with inevitable change will but by the networks and mobility that they enable. come new expressions, forms, and meanings. These questions are central to Knight “Reckoning, Redemption, Resilience: Foundation’s origins in local journalism, covering Lessons from Religion on Community and serving several dozen cities across the Life Today” country, and to its philanthropic mission to further informed and engaged communities as Rev. Jennifer Bailey, founder and executive the bedrock of a healthy democracy director of Faith Matters Network, offers her reflections on the changing nature of American faith communities, grounded in her own Connection is at the heart of community building. experience as a faith leader and facilitator of Whether online, around the dinner table, in sacred secular (but still spiritual) dialogue through The spaces, or neighbor to neighbor, it requires a People’s Supper. Her account brings examples process of communing: coming together. of multiple tools and strategies that help people build empathy and connection across differences of faith, race, and class. Hers is also a Connection is at the heart of community story of institutional change, showing where and building. Whether online, around the dinner how new institutions are and even whole new table, in sacred spaces, or neighbor to neighbor, fields of practice are rising

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