Category: Academic Reportage

Source: The Conversation – USA (2) – By Robbyn Abbitt, Associate Director of the Geospatial Analysis Center, Miami University

If you told me a decade ago that I’d become an expert in mapping cemeteries, I would’ve laughed and been very confused about the dramatic turn my professional life must’ve taken at some point.

I’m an environmental scientist who specializes in geospatial technology, which involves analyzing the Earth and how geography plays a role in human societies. I use these tools in my work to map conservation planning, food deserts, trail systems and green space accessibility.

For the past 20 years I’ve been overseeing Miami University’s Geospatial Analysis Center, building relationships with local cities, counties and companies. I started pairing my classes with outside partners to do mapping and analysis work. Some of the work my students most enjoyed was mapping small local cemeteries in and around southwest Ohio. The projects allowed them to gain experience with collecting data in the field and provided a human connection to the data.

Then in 2020, the local cemetery association of Oxford, Ohio – which owned and operated the area’s largest cemetery, spanning over 40 acres – fell upon financial troubles and dissolved. This meant the city was now solely and fully responsible for the management and maintenance of this historic and active cemetery. And it was provided only old paper maps and stacks of interment cards that listed names, dates and funeral homes. The assistant city manager reached out to see whether there was a way we could help with mapping the cemetery and transitioning from all-paper to digital resources.

Thus began a yearlong adventure in harnessing the efforts of over 50 college students to figure out how to map a cemetery with over 6,000 headstones and virtually no records. What I didn’t anticipate was the newfound connections students would develop to the college town they call home.

Old school cemetery mapping

Traditional mapping methods would have us divide and conquer: We’d go out to the cemetery with multiple GPS units and mark a point on each headstone. While at the cemetery, we’d also take a photo of the headstone and write down its information – such as name and dates of birth and death – in a notebook.

Back in the office, we’d then combine the data from all our GPS units with the handwritten notes and photos. The final dataset would include the location of the headstone, all information on the headstone and a reference link to a photo.

This process took roughly 10 to 15 minutes per headstone overall. So a small cemetery of roughly 300 headstones would require nearly 60 hours of work to successfully map.

In the past five to 10 years, however, geospatial technology tools have gone through a transformation. Smartphones and the cloud have replaced the need for hand-held GPS units and local data servers. Drones can also quickly capture high-resolution aerial imagery. We could use these tools to combine all the separate steps necessary to collect headstone information and imagery.

All of this got me thinking: What if we used these advances in geospatial mapping technology to flip the script on cemetery mapping?

Flipping the script

What happened next was a giant experiment. Luckily for us, the city of Oxford had a new drone it had used to capture high-quality imagery of the cemetery. With this imagery, you could zoom in and see individual headstones very clearly.

In the classroom, we created a new database and divvied up the cemetery into areas we were each responsible for. Before we even went on a site visit, every person placed a dot on top of each headstone they could see in the drone imagery of their area. Then at the cemetery we could simply walk to each headstone we were responsible for, take a photo and attach that to the dot we had placed earlier.

The result was a database of over 5,000 headstones marking where over 6,000 individuals had been laid to rest. With old field methods this would have taken over 1,200 hours. The new methods cut that time in half: just over 600 hours of work, or roughly six minutes per headstone.

Using this database, we then created a web application where family members and the city could search for individuals by name or by location. The city of Oxford now manages and updates this online resource.

Building community, past and present

While our goal had been to create a searchable online database of the cemetery to help the city, my students and I also learned a lot about our community. We said names and read stories that had previously been lost to time.

We learned that Miami University has a special section of the cemetery set aside for faculty and staff. Students encountered names they see every day as they enter campus buildings and walk the streets of Oxford.

We encountered “Babyland,” a special section where the local hospital, McCullough-Hyde, offers burial of infants who are lost during childbirth or treatment.

And we discovered that there are over 400 military veterans in the cemetery, including four from the Revolutionary War.

After this project, my students reported feeling more connected to the community of Miami University and the city of Oxford. They felt proud of the work they had done to preserve the area’s local history. And many continued to do research on the family names they encountered in the cemetery.

As the role of cemeteries shifts over time, they remain a treasure trove of local history and family connection. Knowing where to find a loved one is part of the human experience. Paying homage to those community members who worked and lived where we are now continues to be an important part of documenting our shared history.

And for students, mapping cemeteries provided a space to build community among their peers – and with their community ancestors.

Robbyn Abbitt receives funding from local entities that manage the cemeteries that have been mapped. She works for Miami University.

– ref. Mapping cemeteries for class – how students used phones and drones to help a city count its headstones – https://theconversation.com/mapping-cemeteries-for-class-how-students-used-phones-and-drones-to-help-a-city-count-its-headstones-273154

Source: The Conversation – USA (2) – By Gary W. Yohe, Professor of Economics and Environmental Studies, Wesleyan University

In 2009, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency formally declared that greenhouse gas emissions, including from vehicles and fossil fuel power plants, endanger public health and welfare. The decision, known as the endangerment finding, was based on years of evidence, and it has underpinned EPA actions on climate change ever since.

The Trump administration now wants to tear up that finding as it tries to roll back climate regulations on everything from vehicles to industries.

But the move might not be as simple as the administration hopes.

EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin sent a proposed rule to the White House Office of Management and Budget in early January 2026 to rescind the endangerment finding. But on Jan. 30, a federal judge ruled that the Department of Energy violated the law when it handpicked five researchers to write the climate science review that the EPA is using to defend its plan. The ruling doesn’t necessarily stop the EPA, but it raises questions.

There’s no question that if the EPA does rescind the endangerment finding that the move would be challenged in court. The world just lived through the three hottest years on record, evidence of worsening climate change is stronger now than ever before, and people across the U.S. are increasingly experiencing the harm firsthand.

Several legal issues have the potential to stop the EPA’s effort. They include emails submitted in a court case that suggest political appointees sought to direct the scientific review.

To understand how we got here, it helps to look at history for some context.

The Supreme Court started it

The endangerment finding stemmed from a 2007 U.S. Supreme Court ruling in Massachusetts v. EPA.

The court found that various greenhouse gases, including carbon dioxide, were “pollutants covered by the Clean Air Act,” and it gave the EPA an explicit set of instructions.

The court wrote that the “EPA must determine whether or not emissions from new motor vehicles cause or contribute to air pollution which may reasonably be anticipated to endanger public health or welfare.”

But the Supreme Court did not order the EPA to regulate greenhouse gas emissions. Only if the EPA found that emissions were harmful would the agency be required, by law, “to establish national ambient air quality standards for certain common and widespread pollutants based on the latest science” – meaning greenhouse gases.

The EPA was required to follow formal procedures – including reviewing the scientific research, assessing the risks and taking public comment – and then determine whether the observed and projected harms were sufficient to justify publishing an “endangerment finding.”

That process took two years. EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson announced on Dec. 7, 2009, that the then-current and projected concentrations of six key greenhouse gases in the atmosphere – carbon dioxide, methane, nitrous oxide, hydrofluorocarbons, perfluorocarbons and sulfur hexafluoride – threatened the public health and welfare of current and future generations.

Challenges to the finding erupted immediately.

Jackson denied 10 petitions received in 2009-2010 that called on the administration to reconsider the finding.

On June 26, 2012, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit upheld the endangerment finding and regulations that the EPA had issued under the Clean Air Act for passenger vehicles and permitting procedures for stationary sources, such as power plants.

This latest challenge is different.

It came directly from the Trump administration without going through normal channels. It was, though, entirely consistent with both the conservative Heritage Foundation’s Project 2025 plan for the Trump administration and President Donald Trump’s dismissive perspective on climate risk.

Trump’s burden of proof

To legally reverse the 2009 finding, the agency must go through the same evaluation process as before. According to conditions outlined in the Clean Air Act, the reversal of the 2009 finding must be justified by a thorough and complete review of the current science and not just be political posturing.

That’s a tough task.

Energy Secretary Chris Wright has talked publicly about how he handpicked the five researchers who wrote the scientific research review. A judge has now found that the effort violated the 1972 Federal Advisory Committee Act, which requires that agency-chosen panels providing policy advice to the government conduct their work in public.

All five members of the committee had been outspoken critics of mainstream climate science. Their report, released in summer 2025, was widely criticized for inaccuracies in what they referenced and its failure to represent the current science.

Scientific research available today clearly shows that greenhouse gas emissions harm public health and welfare. Importantly, evidence collected since 2009 is even stronger now than it was when the first endangerment finding was written, approved and implemented.

For example, a 2025 review by the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine determined that the evidence supporting the endangerment finding is even stronger today than it was in 2009. A 2019 peer-reviewed assessment of the evidence related to greenhouse gas emissions’ role in climate change came to the same conclusion.

The Sixth Assessment of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, a report produced by hundreds of scientists from around the world, found in 2023 that “adverse impacts of human-caused climate change will continue to intensify.”

In other words, greenhouse gas emissions were causing harm in 2009, and the harm is worse now and will be even worse in the future without steps to reduce emissions.

In public comments on the Department of Energy’s problematic 2025 review, a group of climate experts from around the world reached the same conclusion, adding that the Department of Energy’s Climate Working Group review “fails to adequately represent this reality.”

What happens if EPA does drop the endangerment finding

As an economist who has studied the effects of climate change for over 40 years, I am concerned that the EPA rescinding the endangerment finding on the basis of faulty scientific assessment would lead to faster efforts to roll back U.S. climate regulations meant to slow climate change.

It would also give the administration cover for further actions that would defund more science programs, stop the collection of valuable data, freeze hiring and discourage a generation of emerging science talent.

Cases typically take years to wind through the courts. Unless a judge issued an injunction, I would expect to see a continuing retreat from efforts to reduce climate change while the court process plays out.

I see no scenario in which a legal challenge doesn’t end up before the Supreme Court. I would hope that both the enormous amount of scientific evidence and the words in the preamble of the U.S. Constitution would have some significant sway in the court’s considerations. It starts, “We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union,” and includes in its list of principles, “promote the general Welfare.”

Gary W. Yohe does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Trump’s plan to wipe out US climate rules relies on EPA rescinding its 2009 endangerment finding – but will courts allow it? – https://theconversation.com/trumps-plan-to-wipe-out-us-climate-rules-relies-on-epa-rescinding-its-2009-endangerment-finding-but-will-courts-allow-it-274194

Source: The Conversation – USA (2) – By Andrea Hagan, Instructor of Criminology & Justice, Loyola University New Orleans, Loyola University New Orleans

Historically Black colleges and universities, often known as HBCUs, are well known for their deep roots in U.S. higher education and proven effectiveness at graduating Black students who go on to become professionally successful.

HBCUs are colleges and universities that were established before 1964, with the mission of educating Black Americans, though now anyone can attend.

As a criminology instructor who has spent 13 years studying the relationship between educational trajectories and criminal justice – and a Black woman who grew up in the South and attended an HBCU – I believe that HBCUs offer another often overlooked benefit.

They give young people, especially Black people, a pathway in higher education that they might not otherwise receive. By opening doors to education, jobs and mentorship, HBCUs disrupt the conditions that can cause young people – especially Black people – to get lost in the criminal justice system.

The U.S. incarcerates approximately 1.6 million people. Black Americans are locked up at five times the rate of white Americans. This disparity starts young: Black teenagers are 5.6 times more likely to be placed in juvenile detention than white teenagers, and people who are incarcerated as juveniles are nearly four times more likely to be incarcerated as adults. Overall, the vast majority of Black people are not incarcerated.

Attending a HBCU, or any other university, does not guarantee a stable financial future. And not graduating from high school or college certainly does not not mean that someone will become incarcerated.

But research shows that education, especially a college degree, is closely linked to lower crime rates. College graduates who do commit crimes reoffend at rates below 6%, while people who drop out of high school return to prison at rates around 75%.

This is why I believe HBCUs in particular have an important role to play in helping young Black people avoid this path.

Understanding HBCUs

Today, there are roughly 100 HBCUs in 19 states, as well as the District of Columbia and the U.S. Virgin Islands. The schools are a mix of public schools and private, nonprofit colleges and universities.

HBCUs make up just 3% of the country’s colleges and universities. But their graduates include 40% of Black engineers, 50% of Black lawyers and 70% of Black doctors in the United States.

Most HBCUs are located in Southern and mid-Atlantic states – a legacy of when segregation barred Black students from attending most colleges and universities.

Many HBCUs are also located in rural Southern communities, in particular. Residents of these areas tend to live in poverty and have limited educational opportunities.

Attending a local HBCU is often one of the most practical ways these prospective students can get a degree – in part because HBCUs are often more affordable than other four-year college options.

The average annual tuition for an in-state student at a public HBCU is roughly US$7,700 per year – well below the national average, which ranges from $12,000 at public schools to $45,000 at private schools. Some public HBCUs charge as little as $1,000 in annual tuition for in-state students.

Schools like Coppin State University in Baltimore and the University of Maryland Eastern Shore also offer in-state rates to out-of-state students from places that do not have HBCUs nearby.

Despite their focus on Black students, HBCUs are increasingly diverse.

In 2022, non-Black students made up 24% of the student population at HBCUs. By comparison, 15% of non-Black students made up HBCU populations in 1976.

HBCUs also enroll low-income students, regardless of race, at three times the rate that predominantly white colleges do.

Upward mobility

Research shows completing high school reduces arrest rates by 11% to 12% for both property and violent crimes, regardless of race or economic background.

College takes this effect further.

Studies have found that college enrollment helps young people with histories of delinquency to stop committing crimes. Completing a four-year degree reduces the likelihood of criminal behavior by 43% to 48%, compared to those who started college but did not finish.

A few long-recognized reasons help explain this pattern. Education increases earning potential, making crime a riskier and less attractive option for people with a degree. Education also encourages long-term thinking, strengthens ties to employers and communities, and builds problem-solving skills that help people navigate challenges.

I have seen firsthand, through my own experiences growing up in the South and teaching students, how HBCUs can help move Black students out of poverty. These schools stand out among other colleges in terms of how effectively they graduate low-income Black students and move them into the middle class, outcomes that research links to reduced criminal behavior.

When researchers rank colleges by whether and how their students improve their socioeconomic status, income and wealth over time, more than half of the highest-performing schools are HBCUs.

Black students who attend HBCUs are 30% more likely to earn a degree than Black students who attend colleges that are not HBCUs. Black HBCU graduates are also likely to earn more money than Black non-HBCU college graduates.

This matters because poverty is one of the strongest predictors of whether someone will commit a crime.

When colleges and universities graduate students who earn middle-class incomes, they help break what researchers call the cycle of intergenerational poverty and incarceration. This pattern describes how children of incarcerated parents are six times more likely to end up in the justice system.

An ongoing money problem

Despite their benefits, HBCUs have chronically struggled with funding. In recent decades, state governments have not given Black land-grant universities – meaning public colleges originally created through federal legislation to serve Black students during segregation – at least $12.8 billion the federal government said they were owed.

Recent federal support for HBCUs has been mixed, as the Trump administration has made widespread cuts to many universities and colleges.

In April 2025, President Donald Trump signed an executive order renewing the White House Initiative on HBCUs, a federal effort to help support these schools. At the time, he said that Black colleges had no reason to fear cuts.

But days later, Trump’s proposed 2026 budget included $64 million in cuts to Howard University, one of the oldest HBCUs.

In September 2025, the Trump administration redirected $435 million to HBCUs by cutting funds from grant programs that had supported Hispanic-serving institutions and other colleges that have a large proportion of Hispanic or other minority students.

The context that matters

The U.S. criminal justice system disproportionately affects Black people at every stage – from arrests to incarceration. Black Americans make up about 13% of the U.S. population but account for roughly 37% of all people in U.S. jails and prisons.

According to the National Academies of Sciences, the lifetime risk of imprisonment for Black men born between 1975 and 1979, and with less than a high school education, was about 68% – meaning nearly 7 in 10 in that group experienced incarceration at least once.

I have seen firsthand that when Black students from low-income backgrounds enroll at HBCUs, they become more likely to complete a degree and achieve the kind of financial stability that research shows helps reduce the risk of becoming caught up in the criminal justice system.

Andrea Hagan does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Historically Black colleges and universities do more than offer Black youths a pathway to opportunity and success – I teach criminology, and my research suggests another benefit – https://theconversation.com/historically-black-colleges-and-universities-do-more-than-offer-black-youths-a-pathway-to-opportunity-and-success-i-teach-criminology-and-my-research-suggests-another-benefit-272976

Source: The Conversation – USA (2) – By Ted Olson, Professor of Appalachian Studies and Bluegrass, Old-Time and Roots Music Studies, East Tennessee State University

The presence of Department of Homeland Security agents in Minnesota compelled many people there to use songs as a means of protest. Those songs were from secular as well as religious traditions.

On Jan. 8, 2026, the day after Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent Jonathan Ross killed Minneapolis resident Renée Good on Portland Avenue, an anonymous post appeared on Reddit that featured an uncredited text clearly adapted from the lyrics of a Depression-era protest song from Appalachia, “Which Side Are You On?” The Reddit text criticized the recent federal presence in Minnesota and implored Minnesotans to take a stand.

In our town of Minneapolis,
There’s no neutrals here at home.
You’re either marching in the streets
or you kill for Kristi Noem
Which side are you on,
Oh which side are you on?
Which side are you on,
Oh which side are you on?
ICE is a bunch of killers
who hide behind a mask.
How do they get away with this?
That’s what you have to ask.
Which side are you on …

For centuries, songs have served as vehicles for expressing community responses to sociopolitical crises, whether government repression or corporate exploitation. “Which Side Are You On?” resonated with Minnesotans, in part because it has been recorded by numerous artists over the decades.

The song dates back to another societal struggle that occurred in another part of the United States during another crisis moment in American history. “Which Side Are You On?” has consoled and empowered countless people for generations during struggles in red as well as blue states. It has also inspired people to write new protest songs in the face of new crises.

Birth of a protest anthem

“Which Side Are You On?” was composed in 1931, a woman’s spontaneous response to a coal company’s effort to prevent miners in Harlan County, Kentucky, from joining the United Mine Workers of America. Those miners hoped the labor union would improve their working conditions and overturn imposed reductions to their wages.

In support of the coal company, sheriff J. H. Blair and armed deputies broke into the house of union organizer Sam Reece to apprehend him and locate evidence of union activity. Reece was in hiding elsewhere, but his wife, Florence, and their children were present. After ransacking the house, the sheriff and deputies left.

Florence tore a page out of a calendar and jotted down lyrics for an impromptu song, which she recalled setting to the melody of a Baptist hymn “I’m gonna land on the shore.” Others have observed that the melody in Florence’s song was similar to that of the traditional British ballad “Jack Monroe,” which features the haunting refrain “Lay the Lily Low.”

“Which Side Are You On?” channeled Florence’s reaction to that traumatic experience. Throughout the 1930s, she and others sang the song during labor strikes in the Appalachian coalfields, and the lyrics were included in union songbooks. Then, in 1941, the Almanac Singers, a folk supergroup featuring Woody Guthrie and Pete Seeger, recorded the song, and it reached many people beyond Appalachia.

Since then, a range of musicians – including Charlie Byrd; Peter, Paul and Mary; the Dropkick Murphys; Natalie Merchant; Ani DiFranco; and the Kronos Quartet – performed “Which Side Are You On?” in concert settings and for recordings. A solo live performance with a concert audience joining the chorus was a focal point of Seeger’s “Greatest Hits” album in 1967.

The Academy Award-winning documentary film “Harlan County U.S.A.” (1976) included a clip of Florence Reece singing her song during a 1973 strike. “Which Side Are You On?” was translated into other languages – a testament to its universal theme of encouraging solidarity to people confronting authoritarian power.

Protest songs of the modern era

While the American protest song tradition can be traced back to the origins of the nation, “Which Side Are You On?” served as a prototype for the modern-era protest song because of its lyrical directness. Many memorable, risk-taking protest songs were composed in the wake of, and in the spirit of, “Which Side Are You On?”

Noteworthy are numerous protest classics in the folk vein, epitomized by a sizable part of Guthrie’s repertoire, by early Bob Dylan songs like “Masters of War” (1963), “The Times They Are a-Changin’” (1964) and “Only A Pawn in Their Game” (1964), and by Phil Ochs’ mid-1960s songs of political critique, such as “Here’s to the State of Mississippi” (1965).

But protest songs have hailed from all music genres. Rock and rhythm and blues, for instance, have spawned many iconic recordings of protest music: Sam Cooke’s “A Change Is Gonna Come” (1964), Buffalo Springfield’s “For What It’s Worth” (1966), Creedence Clearwater Revival’s “Fortunate Son” (1969), Edwin Starr’s “War” (1970) and Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young’s “Ohio” (1970) among many others.

Blues, country, reggae and hip-hop have spawned broadly inspirational protest songs, and jazz too has yielded classic protest recordings, such as Abel Meeropol’s “Strange Fruit” (1939), popularized by Billie Holiday, and Gil Scott-Heron’s 1971 recording of the jazz-poem “The Revolution Will Not Be Televised.”

Indeed, there are so many enduring contributions to the American protest song canon that a list like Rolling Stone’s recent “100 Best Protest Songs of All Time” is only the tip of the iceberg. Regardless of the genre, effective protest songs retain their power to move and motivate people today despite having been composed in response to past situations or circumstances. And protest songs from the past are often adapted to help people more effectively respond to the crisis of the moment.

Songs for this moment

“Which Side Are You On?” was sung – and its theme invoked – in Minnesota throughout January 2026. On Jan. 24, shortly after Border Patrol agents killed Alex Pretti on Nicollet Avenue, Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey referred to the song’s title during a public address to his constituents: “Stand up for America. Recognize that your children will ask you what side you were on.” That same day, the grassroots organization 50501: Minnesota posted online an appeal to those in power: “[E]very politician and person in uniform must ask themselves one question – which side are you on?”

The next day, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz acknowledged divisions in the U.S. during a televised briefing, urging citizens in his state and across the nation to consider the choice before them: “I’ve got a question for all of you. What side do you want to be on?”

People protesting ICE and Customs and Border Protection actions in Minnesota and elsewhere have been singing “Which Side Are You On?” and other well-known protest songs, but musicians have also been writing new protest songs about the crisis. On Jan. 8, the Dropkick Murphys posted on social media a clip of “Citizen I.C.E.,” a revamped version of the group’s 2005 song “Citizen C.I.A.,” augmented by video of the Jan. 7 fatal shooting of Renée Good. On Jan. 27, British musician Billy Bragg released “City of Heroes,” which he composed in tribute to the Minneapolis protesters.

Following suit was Bruce Springsteen, a longtime champion of the protest song legacy. On Jan. 28, Springsteen released online his newly composed and recorded “Streets of Minneapolis.” Millions of people around the world heard the song and saw its accompanying video.

On Jan. 30, Springsteen made a surprise appearance at the Minneapolis club First Avenue, performing his new song at the “Defend Minnesota” benefit concert, organized by musician Tom Morello to raise funds for the families of Good and Pretti.

Making a difference

On the day Pretti was shot dead, hundreds of Minneapolis protesters attended a special service at Minneapolis’ Hennepin Avenue United Methodist Church. Pastor Elizabeth MacAuley, in a televised interview with CNN’s Anderson Cooper, reflected on the role of song in helping people cope: “It’s been a time when it is pretty tempting to feel so disempowered. … [T]he singing resistance movement … brought out the hope and the grief and the rage and the beauty.”

Cooper asked: “Do you think song makes a difference?” MacAuley replied: “I know song makes a difference.”

Ted Olson does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. ‘Which Side Are You On?’: American protest songs have emboldened social movements for generations, from coal country to Minneapolis – https://theconversation.com/which-side-are-you-on-american-protest-songs-have-emboldened-social-movements-for-generations-from-coal-country-to-minneapolis-274907

Source: The Conversation – USA – By Lauren Hall, Associate professor of Political Science, Rochester Institute of Technology

When it comes to national politics, Americans are fiercely divided across a range of issues, including gun control, election security and vaccines. It’s not new for Republicans and Democrats to be at odds over issues, but things have reached a point where even the idea of compromising appears to be anathema, making it more difficult to solve thorny problems.

But things are much less heated at the local level. A survey of more than 1,400 local officials by the Carnegie Corporation and CivicPulse found that local governments are “largely insulated from the harshest effects of polarization.” Communities with fewer than 50,000 residents proved especially resilient to partisan dysfunction.

Why this difference? As a political scientist, I believe that lessons from the local level not only open a window onto how polarization works but also the dynamics and tools that can help reduce it.

Problems are more concrete

Local governments deal with concrete issues – sometimes literally, when it comes to paving roads and fixing potholes. In general, cities and counties handle day-to-day functions, such as garbage pickup, running schools and enforcing zoning rules. Addressing tangible needs keeps local leaders’ attention fixed on specific problems that call out for specific solutions, not lengthy ideological debates.

By contrast, a lot of national political conflict in the U.S. involves symbolic issues, such as debates about identity and values on topics such as race, abortion and transgender rights. These battles are often divisive, even more so than purely ideological disagreements, because they can activate tribal differences and prove more resistant to compromise.

Such arguments at the national level, or on social media, can lead to wildly inaccurate stereotypes about people with opposing views. Today’s partisans often perceive their opponents as far more extreme than they actually are, or they may stereotype them – imagining that all Republicans are wealthy, evangelical culture warriors, for instance, or conversely being convinced that all Democrats are radical urban activists. In terms of ideology, the median members of both parties, in fact, look similar.

These kinds of misperceptions can fuel hostility.

Local officials, however, live among the human beings they represent, whose complexity defies caricature. Living and interacting in the same communities leads to greater recognition of shared interests and values, according to the Carnegie/CivicPulse survey.

Meaningful interaction with others, including partisans of the opposing party, reduces prejudice about them. Local government provides a natural space where identities overlap.

People are complicated

In national U.S. politics today, large groups of individuals are divided not only by party but a variety of other factors, including race, religion, geography and social networks. When these differences align with ideology, political disagreement can feel like an existential threat.

Such differences are not always as pronounced at the local level. A neighbor who disagrees about property taxes could be the coach of your child’s soccer team. Your fellow school board member might share your concerns about curriculum but vote differently in presidential elections.

These cross-cutting connections remind us that political opponents are not a monolithic enemy but complex individuals. When people discover they have commonalities outside of politics with others holding opposing views, polarization can decrease significantly.

Finally, most local elections are technically nonpartisan. Keeping party labels off ballots allows voters to judge candidates as individuals and not merely as Republicans or Democrats.

National implications

None of this means local politics are utopian.

Like water, polarization tends to run downhill, from the national level to local contests, particularly in major cities where candidates for mayor and other office are more likely to run as partisans. Local governments also see culture war debates, notably in the area of public school instruction.

Nevertheless, the relative partisan calm of local governance suggests that polarization is not inevitable. It emerges from specific conditions that can be altered.

Polarization might be reduced by creating more opportunities for cross-partisan collaboration around concrete problems. Philanthropists and even states might invest in local journalism that covers pragmatic governance rather than partisan conflict. More cities and counties could adopt changes in election law that would de-emphasize party labels where they add little information for voters.

Aside from structural changes, individual Americans can strive to recognize that their neighbors are not the cardboard cutouts they might imagine when thinking about “the other side.” Instead, Americans can recognize that even political opponents are navigating similar landscapes of community, personal challenges and time constraints, with often similar desires to see their roads paved and their children well educated.

The conditions shaping our interactions matter enormously. If conditions change, perhaps less partisan rancor will be the result.

Lauren Hall is a Distinguished Fellow for the Study of Liberalism and a Free Society with the Institute for Humane Studies. She was previously a Pluralism Fellow with the Mercatus Center.

– ref. Local governments provide proof that polarization is not inevitable – https://theconversation.com/local-governments-provide-proof-that-polarization-is-not-inevitable-273986

Source: The Conversation – USA – By Christopher Magra, Professor of American History, University of Tennessee

This Presidents Day, I’ve been thinking about George Washington − not at his finest hour, but possibly at his worst.

In 1754, a 22-year-old Washington marched into the wilderness surrounding Pittsburgh with more ambition than sense. He volunteered to travel to the Ohio Valley on a mission to deliver a letter from Robert Dinwiddie, governor of Virginia, to the commander of French troops in the Ohio territory. This military mission sparked an international war, cost him his first command and taught him lessons that would shape the American Revolution.

As a professor of early American history who has written two books on the American Revolution, I’ve learned that Washington’s time spent in the Fort Duquesne area taught him valuable lessons about frontier warfare, international diplomacy and personal resilience.

The mission to expel the French

In 1753, Dinwiddie decided to expel French fur trappers and military forces from the strategic confluence of three mighty waterways that crisscrossed the interior of the continent: the Allegheny, Monongahela and Ohio rivers. This confluence is where downtown Pittsburgh now stands, but at the time it was wilderness.

King George II authorized Dinwiddie to use force, if necessary, to secure lands that Virginia was claiming as its own.

As a major in the Virginia provincial militia, Washington wanted the assignment to deliver Dinwiddie’s demand that the French retreat. He believe the assignment would secure him a British army commission.

Washington received his marching orders on Oct. 31, 1753. He traveled to Fort Le Boeuf in northwestern Pennsylvania and returned a month later with a polite but firm “no” from the French.

Dinwiddie promoted Washington from major to lieutenant colonel and ordered him to return to the Ohio River Valley in April 1754 with 160 men. Washington quickly learned that French forces of about 500 men had already constructed the formidable Fort Duquesne at the forks of the Ohio. It was at this point that he faced his first major test as a military leader. Instead of falling back to gather more substantial reinforcements, he pushed forward. This decision reflected an aggressive, perhaps naive, brand of leadership characterized by a desire for action over caution.

Washington’s initial confidence was high. He famously wrote to his brother that there was “something charming” in the sound of whistling bullets.

The Jumonville affair and an international crisis

Perhaps the most controversial moment of Washington’s early leadership occurred on May 28, 1754, about 40 miles south of Fort Duquesne. Guided by the Seneca leader Tanacharison – known as the “Half King” – and 12 Seneca warriors, Washington and his detachment of 40 militiamen ambushed a party of 35 French Canadian militiamen led by Ensign Joseph Coulon de Jumonville. The Jumonville affair lasted only 15 minutes, but its repercussions were global.

Ten of the French, including Jumonville, were killed. Washington’s inability to control his Native American allies – the Seneca warriors executed Jumonville – exposed a critical gap in his early leadership. He lacked the ability to manage the volatile intercultural alliances necessary for frontier warfare.

Washington also allowed one enemy soldier to escape to warn Fort Duquesne. This skirmish effectively ignited the French and Indian War, and Washington found himself at the center of a burgeoning international crisis.

Defeat at Fort Necessity

Washington then made the fateful decision to dig in and call for reinforcements instead of retreating in the face of inevitable French retaliation. Reinforcements arrived: 200 Virginia militiamen and 100 British regulars. They brought news from Dinwiddie: congratulations on Washington’s victory and his promotion to colonel.

His inexperience showed in his design of Fort Necessity. He positioned the small, circular palisade in a meadow depression, where surrounding wooded high ground allowed enemy marksmen to fire down with impunity. Worse still, Tanacharison, disillusioned with Washington’s leadership and the British failure to follow through with promised support, had already departed with his warriors weeks earlier. When the French and their Native American allies finally attacked on July 3, heavy rains flooded the shallow trenches, soaking gunpowder and leaving Washington’s men vulnerable inside their poorly designed fortification.

The battle of Fort Necessity was a grueling, daylong engagement in the mud and rain. Approximately 700 French and Native American allies surrounded the combined force of 460 Virginian militiamen and British regulars. Despite being outnumbered and outmaneuvered, Washington maintained order among his demoralized troops. When French commander Louis Coulon de Villiers – Jumonville’s brother – offered a truce, Washington faced the most humbling moment of his young life: the necessity of surrender. His decision to capitulate was a pragmatic act of leadership that prioritized the survival of his men over personal honor.

The surrender also included a stinging lesson in the nuances of diplomacy. Because Washington could not read French, he signed a document that used the word “l’assassinat,” which translates to “assassination,” to describe Jumonville’s death. This inadvertent admission that he had ordered the assassination of a French diplomat became propaganda for the French, teaching Washington the vital importance of optics in international relations.

Lessons that forged a leader

The 1754 campaign ended in a full retreat to Virginia, and Washington resigned his commission shortly thereafter. Yet, this period was essential in transforming Washington from a man seeking personal glory into one who understood the weight of responsibility.

He learned that leadership required more than courage – it demanded understanding of terrain, cultural awareness of allies and enemies, and political acumen. The strategic importance of the Ohio River Valley, a gateway to the continental interior and vast fur-trading networks, made these lessons all the more significant.

Ultimately, the hard lessons Washington learned at the threshold of Fort Duquesne in 1754 provided the foundational experience for his later role as commander in chief of the Continental Army. The decisions he made in Pennsylvania and the Ohio wilderness, including the impulsive attack, the poor choice of defensive ground and the diplomatic oversight, were the very errors he would spend the rest of his military career correcting.

Though he did not capture Fort Duquesne in 1754, the young George Washington left the woods of Pennsylvania with a far more valuable prize: the tempered, resilient spirit of a leader who had learned from his mistakes.

Christopher Magra does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. How a 22-year-old George Washington learned how to lead, from a series of mistakes in the Pennsylvania wilderness – https://theconversation.com/how-a-22-year-old-george-washington-learned-how-to-lead-from-a-series-of-mistakes-in-the-pennsylvania-wilderness-274466

Source: The Conversation – USA (2) – By Siti Nuraisyah Suwanda, Doctoral Student and Graduate Researcher in Marketing, West Virginia University

It’s February, and you grab a box of cheap Valentine’s chocolate from the grocery store on your lunch break. Later, you’re eating it at your office desk when you realize someone else is watching. Suddenly, you feel a flicker of embarrassment. You hide the box away, make a joke or quietly wish they hadn’t noticed – not because the chocolate tastes bad, but because you don’t want to be judged for choosing it.

If the scenario above feels familiar, you’re not alone. Many people experience subtle embarrassment or self-consciousness about everyday consumption choices, from eating cheap Valentine’s chocolate to accepting free lunch from a school food program or having visible tattoos.

We are social marketing researchers who study stigma in marketing. In our research, we coined the term “consumption stigma” to describe how people can be judged or looked down on by others, or by themselves, simply for using certain products – even when there’s nothing objectively wrong with them.

Living with consumption stigma

When people feel judged for what they consume, or choose not to consume, the effects can be mentally exhausting. Feeling stigmatized can quietly erode self-esteem, increase anxiety and change how people behave in everyday settings. What starts as a small moment of embarrassment can grow into a persistent concern about being seen the “wrong” way.

In reviewing 50 studies about stigma in marketing, we found that people respond to consumption stigma along a continuum. Some try to avoid stigma altogether by hiding their consumption or staying away from certain products. Others adjust their behavior to reduce the risk of being judged. At the far end of the spectrum, some people actively push back, helping to destigmatize certain forms of consumption for themselves and for others.

The research we reviewed found that to avoid stigma, people may deliberately consume more expensive or socially approved alternatives, even when those choices strain their finances. Imagine someone who switches to a premium chocolate brand at the office, not because she prefers the taste, but because she wants to avoid feeling embarrassed.

Over time, this kind of adjustment could pull people into spending patterns that are beyond their means, feeding a cycle of consumption driven more by social pressure than genuine need or enjoyment. We suggest that the ramifications can be even more stark in other contexts – for example, when a child skips a free school lunch to avoid being teased, or when a veteran turns down mental health support because they fear being judged by others.

From a business perspective, when consumers avoid or abandon products to escape stigma, companies may see declining demand that has little to do with quality or value. We suggest that if consumption stigma spreads at scale, the cumulative effect can translate into lost revenue and weakened brand value.

Understanding consumption stigma, then, isn’t just about consumer well-being; it’s also critical for businesses trying to understand why people buy, hide or walk away from certain products.

Take back the narrative

Stigma often feels powerful because it masquerades as reality. But at its core, consumption stigma is a social judgment, a shared story people tell about what certain choices supposedly say about someone. When that story goes unchallenged, stigma sticks. When it’s questioned, its power starts to fade.

One way people reduce stigma is by reclaiming the narrative around their consumption. Instead of hiding, explaining or compensating, they openly own their choices. This shift from avoidance to acceptance can strip stigma of its force.

Imagine a shopper who embraces buying cheaper store brands at the grocery store, seeing it not as a compromise but as a sign of being savvy to pay less for the same thing. When people wear their choices like armor, whether it’s cheap chocolate, secondhand clothing or specialized physical or mental health services, those choices lose their sting. When a behavior is no longer treated as something shameful, it becomes harder for others to use it as a basis for judging or looking down on people.

Of course, stigma doesn’t disappear overnight. But research shows that when enough people stop treating a behavior as something to hide, the social meaning around it begins to change. What feels embarrassing in one moment can become normalized in the next. For example, research on fashion consumption has shown how wearing a veil, once widely stigmatized in urban and secular settings, gradually became seen as ordinary and even fashionable as more women openly adopted it.

Enjoying cheap chocolate shouldn’t require justification. Cold water tastes just as good out of an unbranded travel mug as it does from a Stanley tumbler. A generic sweatshirt keeps you just as cozy as Aritzia. And yet, many people feel the need to explain, deflect or upgrade their choices to avoid being judged. Understanding consumption stigma helps explain why and underscores that these feelings aren’t personal failures, but social constructions.

Sometimes, the most effective response isn’t to consume differently, but to think differently. When people stop treating everyday choices as moral signals, they make room for a more humane – and hopefully honest – marketplace.

The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Why eating cheap chocolate can feel embarrassing – even though no one else cares – https://theconversation.com/why-eating-cheap-chocolate-can-feel-embarrassing-even-though-no-one-else-cares-273644