The future of religious spaces (V)

The challenges faced by religious institutions in today's West are highlighted even when celebrating the year's best artistic and architectural achievements. Editor Michael J. Crosbie noted increasing numbers of nominations in recent years discussed their projects at least in part in terms of the "need [to] forge connections between the faith community and the context" (Crosbie 2018).

Here on Holy Mountain, we're all about the context i.e. the work of the religious body in the world, and how the group acts out its relationship to the world. Often that starts with the building. So while something like this is eye-catching and would probably be even more impressive if I knew all of the design and engineering that had to go into it...

Snyder Chapel, Lynn University, Boca Raton FL (Source: faithandform)

...an urbanist would rather know [a] how does this work with the street [hypothetically, as in this actual case it's a college campus building], and [b] how does this building's design contribute to the communal act of worship?

Other trends: a lot of renovation-related nominations, but only two entries in the adaptive re-use/re-purpose categories. Also, "The absence of megachurches submitted might indicate a decline in their construction." I am not sorry if this is true. Marc Auge (Non-Places: An Introduction to Supermodernity [Verso, 2nd ed, 2008]) considers all houses of worship to be "anthropological places" because the people who gather there have specific identity, rituals, stories and such. The standardizing of the megachurch form, however, verges on making it a non-place, with the individual worshiper in the role of spectator-consumer, sort of like at a religious mall.

Churches, synagogues and other houses of worship surely have a lot on their plates:

• They provide both welcome to the stranger and a haven for their members, which must be hard to balance in practice; 
• The best of them maintain a presence in their neighborhood, while accommodating the vast majority of their attendees who arrive by single-family auto; and 
• Their worship spaces are at once functional (this is where the act of worshiping gets done) and political (their design speaks volumes to group dynamics like community and hierarchy).

All this must be accomplished in the context in which many public and quasi-public institutions find themselves today: declining resources and increasing demands/needs.

With that said, and with every disclaimer you can possibly imagine, three award winners struck me as particular examples of successful religious urbanism.

1. All Saints Episcopal Church, Chicago, Illinois (Religious Architecture--Restoration).

(Source: faithandform)

All Saints Chicago, initially constructed in 1884, sits on a busy street corner in the Ravenswood neighborhood near the Damen L stop. According to their website, they nearly closed in 1992 after losing most of their membership base to the suburbs. Their resurgence stressed celebration of diversity, engagement with the real world, and "commitment to our neighbors"--as well as a lot of fundraising. They don't say a lot about the restoration of the worship area, but the altar is notably in the center, a feature commended by Professor James F. White (Protestant Worship and Church Architecture, Oxford University Press, 1964) to reinforce the communal nature of worship.

(Source: Google street view screen capture)

2. Phap Vu Buddhist Cultural Center of Florida, Orlando, Florida (Religious Architecture--New Facilities)

(Source: faithandform)

The Buddhist Cultural Center is located on a busy stroad just north of the East-West Expressway. The entrance, however, is welcoming and accessible to the sidewalk. According to their contractor, Rowland Construction, the entire project built four buildings and a parking lot on six acres, taking nearly a year and costing "multi" millions of dollars. Not every congregation has access to those kinds of resources, or would spend that much on a campus. The availability of land and/or access to the highway probably account for the decidedly un-urban choice of location, but they've done a lot to create human scale.  (Compare the Jehovah's Witnesses more remote structure down the street.)

3. Our Lady of Good Counsel Church, Deepdene, Victoria, Australia (Religious Architecture--Renovation).

(Source: faithandform)

Deepdene is a suburb of Melbourne, recently carved out of another suburb, Balwyn. The church is located on Whitehorse Road, a major east-west stroad through metropolitan Melbourne. So both the municipal and the street situation raise red flags.  On the plus side, I love the worship space with its somewhat cured seating area and plenteous natural light. And the church is built close to the street, so if people walk there, they can walk here. The original church, from 1922, is still part of the campus; the current church was built in 1955.

(Source: Google street view screen capture)

The interior picture may be misleading; it's hard to see how far back the seats go. The sanctuary is described as distinctively narrow because of the constraints of the property. So someone seated in the far back of the row of seats could feel quite remote from the worship activities--better get there early!

Religious organizations have a lot to offer America in the 21st century--a sense of the sacred and permanent, experience acting in common, a place to be quiet--and design has a lot to contribute to that. Design needs to emphasize neighborliness, though, without which the house of worship is merely an isolated island. A structure like this clearly received a lot of expert attention and boasts some striking design features.

Christ Cathedral Arboretum and Tower of Hope, Garden Grove CA (Source: faithandform) 

I see rows and rows of seats all facing forward, and huge windows overlooking a huge parking lot. We owe it to our neighbors, and to ourselves, to do better.

Primary Source: Michael J. Crosbie (ed), "2018 International Awards Program for Religious Art and Architecture," Faith and Form 51:4 (2018)

Last Year's Model: "The Future of Religious Spaces (IV)," 1 January 2018

The Fall 2018 issue of The Wheel includes a review of an intriguing book analyzing worship spaces from an Eastern Orthodox perspective: Nicholas Denysenko, Theology and Form: Contemporary Orthodox Architecture in America (Notre Dame Press, 2017). Hat tip to F. John Herbert for this item.

Window Wonderland

Next Page Books on 3rd St SE (Window Wonderland winner)

The Czech Village-New Bohemia Main Street District is celebrating the winter holidays and welcoming shoppers with festive window displays. A brisk walk around the district last weekend identified these memorable efforts, which hint at placemaking days of yore when store windows like Marshall Field's in Chicago were must-see destinations.

Analog Vault on 11th Av SE (best newcomer) warmed the heart of this former college radio dj

Fong's Pizza on 3rd St decorated their totem pole

Parlor City on 3rd St has a lot of window space to cover. They went with a Nightmare Before Christmas theme.

Found & Formed on 16th Av SW went for the more traditional "Night Before Christmas"

Lucky's Tavern on 16th Av is having a white Christmas

Create Exchange on 16th and C (2016-17 winner). This is a small sample of their efforts.

Our arrival in Cedar Rapids coincided with the end of Armstrong's, the last of the downtown department stores; it was up to Smulekoff's Furniture on 1st Street SE to keep up the window tradition for years after that. In that heyday of shopping malls, hardly anyone cared about having a civic space where people gathered to celebrate holidays like Christmas.

Today's resurgent downtowns have smaller shops, so decoration-as-destination/placemaking requires coordinated effort. The district is... getting there.

Official city tree in Green Square downtown

The public library as base for belonging

Sophia Rodriguez at the Center for Urban Research and Learning

Until schools reinvent themselves, which I don't see happening anytime soon, after-school programs are going to be the micro-spaces where students gain a sense of positive identity.--SOPHIA RODRIGUEZ

After a lull after the 2008 recession, immigration to America is at historically high levels--maybe not as much in percentage terms as in the 1850s or 1880s, but about 1.5 million newcomers arrived in 2016, which is a lot. Their impacts are felt strongly in some places, less so in others, as these newcomers are not randomly distributed.

One such place is Hartford, Connecticut, where 130 students from Puerto Rico moved into the school district following Hurricane Sandy, adding to an influx of immigrants from a variety of Latin American and African countries, as well as Myanmar (Burma). With 20,000 students in the public school system, this would have been a major event, even without the challenges of language, academic background, and housing uncertainty.

Dr. Sophia Rodriguez, assistant professor of Educational Foundations at the University of North Carolina-Greensboro, spoke at Loyola University's Center for Urban Research and Learning about an unusual pilot program based at the Hartford Public Library. Library and school district officials saw an opportunity because many immigrant students lack permanent homes and so hang out at the library. Dr. Rodriguez's report on the first year of the program was cautiously positive: Students reported greater feelings, not only of belonging, but also civic competence.

Newcomers refers to people who have been in the United States less than 30 months. Some are seeking refugee status, some are going through naturalization, and some are undocumented. Some are fleeing violence, some seek economic opportunity, some have lost everything they had in a hurricane or other natural disaster. Rodriguez, who has worked in a variety of school systems throughout the country including Chicago's, notes that even in culturally diverse urban areas, school-aged newcomers face hostility, lack of staff awareness, lack of support staff for languages other than Spanish, and a powerful norm for conducting classes in English, all in schools that are often under-resourced.

The Hartford program sought effective integration of newcomer youth into the community. Dr. Rodriguez used the word belonging, and I gather the program does, too, but as she pointed out that traditionally refers to improving the individual's comfort level with his or her surroundings. Hartford worked up a "civically-minded social justice curriculum... including policy awareness, accessing resources, and how to engage in activism." She describes three levels of belonging: (1) personal-individual day-to-day feelings; (2) relational i.e. networks of peers; (3) civic awareness i.e. feelings of belonging to the city.

The good news is, observation and surveys from 2017-18 showed improvements on all three dimensions, and responses from participants and staff were broadly positive. The program's small size (never more than 35 participants) and national-linguistic diversity improved students' levels of belonging by creating an instant peer network. Using the public library as a base showed that institution's potential in any city to be a "springboard to other resources and opportunities." All this was achieved despite numerous "logistical, methodological and staffing challenges."

Side note: As someone occasionally involved in after-school activities, the apparent willingness of students simply to hold still after a long school day seems miraculous.

With such a small sample--only 22 students participated in the surveys--inferences are made cautiously. Indeed, only on the second dimension  of belonging ("relational") were improvements statistically significant. Participants in the second year of the program are all Spanish-speaking, which presents a different dynamic from the diverse first-year group.

If someone, say library director Bridget Quinn-Carey, were to talk about this program at 1 Million Cups, very soon someone would ask if the program could be scaled up. Aye, there's the rub. One of the favorable circumstances of the program is the relatively small size, smaller than the typical class at Hartford or Bulkley High Schools. Effective integration of newcomers takes investment in staff and other resources, at a time when schools are hardly flush. This program was funded in part by the U.S. Institute for Museum and Library Services, but they're not going to be good for more than piloting and research.

In the richest society in the history of Earth, resources for those investments are here, just historically hard to tap. It might be worth it. Diversity can be a source of strength for this uncertain century--no ecologist in the world speaks favorably of monocultures--but only if newcomers are effectively integrated. Large-scale immigration is a fact, and we can choose how to respond. We can follow the example of our President, and respond with bigotry, political opportunism, and what amounts to a government kidnapping ring. Or we can rise to the challenge of inclusion, and support the work necessary to make it happen.

What's next for Cedar Rapids transit?

How do we make bus transportation more helpful to those who use it, and more attractive to those who don't? Ideas abounded at the open house hosted by the Corridor Metropolitan Planning Organization this week, in advance of their 2019-2024 transportation plan. Without objecting to any of them, and without regard to resource availability or legal constraint, here are my top priorities:

1. Nighttime service. The last buses leave the downtown Ground Transportation Center at 6:15 p.m. This means it is not available for those who work swing or night shifts, or who might use the bus to take advantage of the city's night life or sporting events. I might start slowly, picking some routes--like the #5, which runs along 1st Avenue--that serve employment centers. But this has always been a glaring omission in city transit service.

2. Mobile ticketing options. The online bus trackers are wondrous--though occasionally they go funky--and should be accompanied with online ticketing. The $3 day passes are great for busy days, and it's great that they can be bought on the bus. But they do require cash, and drivers don't give change, so if I don't have three singles I make other plans. In the past month or so I have bought tickets online for the I-380 express as well as Metra (Chicago suburban commuter rail), and it takes less than a minute to do. Not everyone has mobile access, but for those who do this is a must.

3. Outreach to children and other groups. A common urbanist criticism of suburban-style development is that children can't be as independent as we remember ourselves being. Free bus rides throughout the summer will enable children to visit friends, go to parks or the library, and explore the city on their own. This will, of course, require overcoming a lot of parental fears, so the outreach will have to be sustained and implementation attentive to problems. (Alternatively, parents could ride along. I rode the bus with both my boys when they were young; it was an adventure for them, and more companionable than driving them in the car.)

4. Transit to Work Week. Free rides with heavy promotion, and possibly valuable prizes, on the model of Bike to Work Week? Sounds like a party! The worst that could happen is that regular riders, most of whom probably have monthly passes anyhow, will ride for free; anything else is upside. 

5. Explore Sunday service. Not everyone works Monday-to-Friday, or even Monday-to-Saturday. Also, many of us attend worship services on Sunday. Are there churches that would be willing to contribute some missions money towards Sunday transit service? For one example, the church I currently attend is near downtown, served by both the #3 and #5 lines. It hosts an Kirundi-language service on Sunday afternoons, to which transportation is a weekly challenge for many attendees from the west side of town. How much would the church need to offer to make this happen?

(I didn't rank "increase sidewalks along transit routes," because that shouldn't even be an issue. The picture accompanying the text is from Wiley Boulevard SW. It was not taken this week, because there's not snow on the ground. It doesn't make sense to build sidewalks everywhere, but where we expect pedestrians to be--and why would you have a bus stop unless you expect pedestrians to be there?--they should be an obvious priority. Congratulations to the city, by the way, for already building sidewalks in many parts of town.)

Promoting transit usage in Cedar Rapids is often a thankless task. About 20 years ago, I attended a City Council meeting where the new public relations staffer for Cedar Rapids Transit was introduced. She talked briefly about her plans for the position, such as encouraging downtown workers to bus out to Westdale Mall (which was still a mall back then) on their lunch hours. She probably eventually found out that it's an hour round trip by bus from downtown to Westdale and back, along a maddeningly circuitous route, which would leave time for neither errands nor lunch. I imagine she left the position soon afterwards, and is now writing fake news stories for Russia Today.

Cedar Rapids is small enough that most car trips are short, is festooned with acres of parking much of which is free, and is so sprawled that an efficient transit service is practically impossible to design. Incremental improvements, such as those advertised at the open house, are not too much to ask on behalf of those who rely on the service, not to mention for the city's resilience in the future.

Election 2018 and what happens next

"Young Corn" by Grant Wood (1892-1942). Source: socks-studio.com. Used without permission.

The "rural-urban divide" is a widely-touted way to describe the current trend in American politics, but as appealingly simple as it is, it lacks substance. There's nothing about nearness to corn that makes someone Republican, nor does seeing pavement or high-rise apartment buildings make a person a Democrat.

Democrats made substantial gains in U.S. House elections in 2018, gaining about 40 seats and capturing majority control for the first time since the 2010 elections (and only the third time since the 1994 elections). Their gains actually masked a historically high 8 percentage point in the national popular vote; the national district map still favors Republicans. Democrats had a net loss of two Senate seats, but that could have been a lot worse given where most of the Senate elections were.

2018 U.S. House results (swiped from cnn.com)

Exit polling provided by CNN mostly show continuity in the partisan coalitions that have obtained since the 1980s, with some interesting variations for the Trump era. Nonwhites, especially blacks, remain solidly Democratic, with Asian-Americans voting somewhat more Democratic than Latinx. A number of other demographic trends are seen among whites but not nonwhites: age (younger more Democratic), education (college graduates more Democratic), and religion (less attachment means more Democratic). This probably is also true of other demographic categories that CNN does not break out by race.

Major partisan differences:

white born again or evangelical/not 44 points

gun owners/not 36

white/nonwhite 32

monthly religious attendance/less  21 points

veteran/nonveteran 15

male/female 12

age over/under 44 12

college graduate/not 11

Urban residents voted 69 percent Democratic, suburban 49 percent, rural 42 percent. So the urban/nonurban divide ranks among the larger differences.

As I said, this is pretty similar to the Reagan-era partisan alignment, with college graduates, suburbanites and Asian-Americans shifting Democratic and white non-graduates and rural residents shifting Republican. At the same time, cultural comfort seems to be a factor in where people choose to live (see Bill Bishop, The Big Sort); and economic activity and young professionals have moved "back to the city." America's economic gains in the 2010s have been concentrated in certain places, which are overwhelmingly metropolitan, but far from all cities have seen these benefits.

The resulting divide is not strictly urban vs. rural, but between economically successful and unsuccessful places, overlaid, as American politics inevitably is, by race. As Richard Florida noted in The Rise of the Creative Class, the economic success of a place correlates not only with economic assets but with cultural comfort with diversity (what he called the "Gay-Bohemian Index"). Democrats are drawing votes from nonwhites and from whites who are educated for the 21st century and culturally tolerant. The Republican base is in urban and rural areas which are not economically competitive, where educated young people are leaving. This might explain the strong element of nostalgia in Republican political appeals from Reagan (or even Nixon) on through to Trump. They likely draw from professional groups that are based in resource extraction rather than the knowledge economy. Oil made the Koch Brothers rich; President Trump made whatever money he's made in real estate.

The partisan alignment of government is the mirror image of the situation from 2011-2015, when Democrats held the Presidency and the Senate while Republicans controlled the House. That was a notably unproductive period in U.S. government--featuring as it did the infamous government shutdown--so my best hope for this round is that both parties produce some policy proposals they can argue about in 2020.

(Source: Wikimedia commons)

Whatever the strengths of this analysis nationally, it works pretty well to explain the results in Iowa (for which, alas, we have no exit polls handy). Republican Governor Kim Reynolds was returned to office despite national political winds that were blowing in a Democratic direction. Although Democrats flipped two Republican U.S. House seats, Republicans maintained strong control of both houses of the state legislature, retaining a 54-46 edge in the House despite losing five seats, and actually increasing their Senate edge by three to 32-18. Factors ideosyncratic to individual races aside, this remains a red state for the time being.

But not as red as this map of 2018 results makes it look: an ocean of Republican red with a few islands of Democratic blue! More than half of Iowa's population lives in ten of those 99 counties, which account for 74.5 percent of job growth in this decade, and whose net in-migration balances loss of population in the rest of Iowa.

Nor have the 2010s have not been equally kind to Iowa's ten largest counties:

COUNTY	%DEM VOTE	%GRAD/PROF DEGREES	%WHITE	%COLL GRAD	10-16 JOB GROWTH	NET MIGRATION
JOHNSON (Iowa City)	71.6	24	84	28	12810	in
STORY (Ames)	58.8	19	87	22	4793	in
POLK (D. Moines)	58.2	10	86	29	31048	in
LINN (C. Rapids)	55.6	10	90	26	8131	in
BLKHAWK (Waterloo)	55.0	8	86	24	2635	out
SCOTT (Davenprt)	50.8	11	86	26	6632	in
DUBUQUE (Dubuque)	49.4	9	93	24	5495	in
DALLAS (Waukee)	47.5	12	92	30	17499	in
POTTAW. (C. Bluffs)	41.3	5	95	24	1291	out
WOODBR (Sioux City)	41.1	7	88	25	2310	out

(Source for most of these data: U.S. Bureau of the Census)

Correlations are not perfect, but support for Democratic gubernatorial candidate Fred Hubbell is associated with cities where there are more knowledge workers, more nonwhites, and improved economic conditions. Cities that are hurting and whitest supported Reynolds.

What can be done for those areas of the country that face being left behind? Clara Hendrickson and colleagues from the Brookings Institution suggest improving digital skills in lagging area, helping small businesses gain access to capital, extending broadband access to rural areas, and targeting national development assistance to ten potential growth "poles." They also suggest helping those stuck in underperforming areas to relocate (Hendrickson, Muro and Galston 2018). Bloomberg columnist Noah Smith commends the advice of James and Deborah Fallows' book Our Towns to support universities, welcome immigration, and develop public-private partnerships (Smith 2018). For more ideas, see my July piece, cited below.

Even in a Democratic year, voters in Iowa's lagging areas outnumber those in growing areas, and Iowa will have unified Republican control of government for the forseeable future. Statehouse Republicans owe their supporters answers to the problems of our "struggling regions" (Noah Smith's term). These may yet emerge in the next legislative session, after years of playing to the crowd by defunding Planned Parenthood, banning abortion after six weeks, and banning sanctuary cities, while cutting taxes and state services. I'm not hopeful--Reynolds made her final campaign push in the company of over-the-edge U.S. Representative Steve King, who also served as her campaign co-chair--but I will be watching the next legislative session with particular interest.

SEE ALSO:
Paul Krugman, "The New Economy and the Trump Rump," New York Times, 20 November 2018, A23
Erin Murphy, "Is Iowa Not a Presidential Tossup State?" Cedar Rapids Gazette, 19 November 2018
"What is the Future of Iowa's Small Towns?" Holy Mountain, 3 July 2018

E prayeribus unum

How one responds to "Prayer," the installation by artist James Webb currently at the Chicago Art Institute, depends a lot on what you bring to the exhibit. At first the different recordings coming from twelve speakers at the same time are pure cacophony. But what kind of cacophony: chaotic? joyous? competitive? coordinated? futile? 

Then, as one moves around the exhibit, individual voices can be distinguished: some speaking, some chanting, some singing, some in English, some not. A religious studies scholar might be able to identify all of the traditions represented; I am not that scholar, but I can tell you, because I read the curation (see picture at left), Webb records people from multiple traditions at prayer in the city where his art is exhibited. This is the 10th time the work has been exhibited, beginning in his native South Africa in 2000, and the first time in the United States. All those voices you hear at once were recorded in Chicago.

I came to the exhibit with a strong belief that diversity of all kinds can make a community stronger, and that no individual or group can contain all the knowledge the community needs going forward. (This has been one the core principles of this blog project all along.) I have always worshiped in the Christian tradition, and am quite comfortable there, but I have learned lessons and drawn inspiration from other traditions as well. I also think a lot of people have religious feelings that they themselves don't consider religious because they've been taught a more narrow definition of religion.

So when I hear the many voices raised to God (or however they refer to the ultimate reality), I hear pieces of the beautiful human mosaic that is Chicago--or any complex community, really. I hear their yearnings and their hopes and their fears, and I think I hear something of myself in each one. As long as we recognize our common humanity--a big if, given the depressing number of religious wars over the eons--the various bits that each tradition brings to the table adds to the wisdom of the whole community.

We were invited to kneel by the speakers to listen more closely to each prayer, but I found I could hear the chants and the singing just fine. I found myself listening more closely and critically to words spoken in English; I do have a rather hyper-verbal way of relating to the world. The Christian prayers asked, "through Jesus Christ our Lord and savior," for blessings on the whole city, and for peace (and in one case for attendees of the exhibit). I admit to hoping, rather than knowing, that's what the non-English speakers were praying for as well.

All of us can be particular at times, and can see other identities as rivals rather than fellow builders of community. But where each prays for all, the cacophony is productive, joyous, and beautiful. I thus found Webb's piece profoundly moving.

"Prayer" continues at the Art Institute through December 31, 2018.

SEE ALSO: Cynthia G. Lindner, "The Art of Prayer Meets the Prayer of Art," Sightings, 18 October 2018

Put off your shoes from your feet; for the place on which you are standing is holy ground.

--EXODUS 3:5 (RSV)

Trails opened, trails in the works, and other Corridor biking news

Cycling in the Corridor is being celebrated as summer turns into fall, with more infrastructure and increased levels of participation, in spite of enduring more than our share of foul weather.

On August 26 the last leg of the Cedar Valley Trail was opened, from downtown Ely to the Johnson County line.

Trail displays and guides were provided by the Linn County Trails Association

Not quite finished: intersection of  Ely and Seven Sisters Roads

Posh new bridge

Where it ends, for now

Eventually, the trail will connect to the Hoover Nature Trail in Johnson County, which extends all the way to the Quad Cities

Access to Lake MacBride State Park and the town of Solon will be via this roundabout:

There was some rain on the ride, inevitably, but not enough to throw it off.

The same cannot be said for the annual Mayors' Bike Ride on Labor Day.

The forecast called for heavy rains with thunder, forcing its cancellation. There was a lot of rain that weekend:

So we had to be content with recalling Labor Days of yore.

A dry and sunny Mayors' Bike Ride in 2015

More rain later in the month both delayed completion and forced postponement of the scheduled September 30 opening of a new stretch of the Grant Wood Trail near Marion. The Cedar River got above flood stage three separate times...

3rd Avenue bridge, 25 September 2018

...forcing closure of some other trails, but unlike 2008 there was no major damage. Phillip Platz, astute urbanist in charge of communications for the Linn County Trails Association, promises a ribbon cutting ceremony and opening ride soon.

There's no questioning public interest in trails, particularly after the extraordinary turnout at a late October forum on how a ped-bike trail included in the Tower Terrace Road project will interface with Interstate 380, where there will be a new exit constructed in the next few years.

Tower Terrace Road will be gradually improved, to accommodate current congestion and anticipated future growth, from Edgewood Road to Route 13.

Given current rates of funding, that will take approximately 30 years to complete! However, the exit off the Interstate is of highest priority and is expected to happen soon.

Current plans call for at-grade crossings across exit ramps.

An alternative proposal is to route the path through a tunnel to avoid cross-traffic.

 
The alternative is somewhat more expensive--maybe $500,000 on top of an $18 million project--but the attendees appeared strongly supportive. I agree... the additional cost is marginal, and would ensure the path got used. It will be a cool way to get from Marion and the northern parts of Cedar Rapids to Wickiup Hill Park, but only if people feel they can safely ford the highway.

Will we ever stop being angry?

(Source: Wikimedia commons)

Senator Ben Sasse (R-Nebraska) has a new book out, subtitled "Why We Hate Each Other--and How to Heal." Three weeks before the midterm elections, Sasse seems to be speaking to a weariness in at least some corners of America with the fraught, angry, tribal nature of our national politics. Perhaps, reader, you are one of the weary ones? I certainly am, being the sensitive sort who readily relates to the Framers' concern with the "tumults and disorders" that surround elections. Or perhaps you enjoy being angry? A few years ago, a Cedar Rapids activist allowed, "I have low blood pressure. When I get mad, I feel good." The problem for me is, these days election campaigns are always going on, especially though not only because President Trump is a bottomless well of offensive inflammatory remarks. He is a symptom, not a cause, of our present discontents.

A colleague walked into my office yesterday, observing that people on the left and the right are contributing to the public anger. At that time I rose to the shiny lure of "false equivalence," but I think if we're going to be productive here we need to jump quickly past the assignment of blame. Besides, to some degree anyway, he's right (Frenkel 2008).

Maybe I'm besotted with economics, but I think a good way to start understanding people's actions is to look for the incentives that drive them. Politicians, whose career success depends on winning elections, will take the stances and pursue the measures that will get them comfortably reelected; if they don't they are likely to be replaced by somebody who does that better. In the 1970s and 1980s, we used to think that mostly meant competing with the other party for the majority of the public in the center of the political spectrum. But as voters have sorted themselves ideologically--they're typically all left or all right on a wide range of seemingly-unrelated issues--there's less of a middle to compete for. (Voters have also sorted themselves geographically, so individual representatives often come from more politically homogeneous districts, and so their main danger is not from the center but from within their own party... so their electoral incentives are against compromise.) In a bipolar political universe, you try to rally your base, and you fear the other side's base. Besides, strong emotional appeals are more likely to encourage donations and volunteering, which are the vital forces of any competitive campaign. (See R. Kenneth Godwin, One Billion Dollars of Influence [Chatham House, 1988], ch. 3).

Whichever came first, the polarized public or polarizing politicians, they have a reinforcing effect on each other. The red meat that Party A rationally throws to its base is going to anger followers of Party B, and provide them greater amounts of their own red meat. Those who remain in the center, those who once provided a moderating influence in politics and government, are either leaving in disgust, or choosing the "lesser of two evils" and contributing to the success of the extremists of either Party A or Party B. News media and websites, following the examples of the interest groups Godwin studied, find market niches by appealing to strong partisans with more partisan appeals. This too contributes to the roaring bonfire of public anger.

What I'm describing, with my dime-store game theory, is a political world where anger pays and moderation does not, with the byproduct being increasing levels of anger on both sides. Think of an alternative where a player can choose an uncooperative strategy with a 50% chance of complete success and a 50% chance of complete failure, or a cooperative strategy with a higher chance of partial success--say, 75% chance of 75% success. (Obviously, I'm making these numbers up.) Based on expected value, you'd choose the cooperative success unless you estimated the chance of partial success with the cooperative strategy even slightly lower--say, 70% chance of 70% success. Or if we added another rule whereby the uncooperative had unlimited chances to play and the cooperative had to quit after one turn.

(Source: totalmedia.co.uk)

If, as former House Speaker Newt Gingrich advises, we think of people with different politics than ours as "sick" and "traitors," we would also get some utility in preventing them from attaining any of their "destructive" and "corrupt" goals. There's no such thing as joint gains in a world where I view anything you gain as inherently a loss for me (not to mention America). That needs to be factored into our game as well.

Is anyone, in this sort of world, likely to be constrained in their statements and actions? Could there possibly be incentives to counteract those which are provoking ever-higher levels of anger?

The country has, occasionally, come together in recent years, most memorably after the 9/11 terrorist attacks. Bipartisan coalitions in Congress have formed around certain necessary actions, like economic stimulus during the 2008 recession, or avoiding government shutdowns. But these were momentary emergencies, and the impulses to cooperation proved short-lived. My sense is the default state of political affairs, even in these times of great uncertainty, is going to be laden with anger, stoked by partisan rivalry.

Alan I. Abramowitz of Emory University, whose book The Disappearing Center (Yale University Press, 2010) is as good an account of political polarization as any, concluded that partisan-ideological polarization is not going away any time soon.... Even if efforts at bipartisanship are sincere and not mere window dressing, the differences between the two parties on almost every major domestic and foreign policy issue are so great and the numbers of moderates in both parties are so small that reaching any agreement will be almost impossible (p. 169). Given that, the more direct route for either party to achieving its policy goals is to win unified control of the Presidency and Congress. Given how nationally competitive the parties are nationally, this prospect is always within reach for both Democrats and Republicans. Case in point: Republicans control the Presidency and Congress today, but Democrats have designs on capturing the House next month, and think about how little would have had to change in 2016 for Democrats already to have control of the rest. This alone motivates both sides to gin up their respective bases, which raises everyone's blood pressure.

Once in control of the levers of government, the prospect of losing control is always just around the corner, too. So the incentive is to act quickly around issues that unify the base, rather than working to achieve common solutions.

If there is hope from either side to lead us out of this vortex of anger, it would probably have to come from the Democrats. (Bear with me here--I'm not just being partisan!!) Republicans are heavily invested in President Trump, vicious rhetoric and reckless disregard for the truth notwithstanding. Moreover, Democrats are the "party of government," in domestic policy at least, so have more to lose when government doesn't work.

It is pleasant to imagine a Democratic President in 2021, using their position to lead the country back together. They could seek policies on issues of common concern; offer policy concessions to Republicans; and include members of the opposition in key appointments. But President Obama did all these things, and look where it got him--and the body politic. It's easy to imagine additional items Obama might have pursued--malpractice reform in the Affordable Care Act, for example--but it's hard to think of successful approaches to national leadership that haven't already been tried.

I think we're stuck with this situation for a long time. Eventually something may come along that really shakes things up. That will bring its own trauma, of course. In the meantime, individuals are best advised to do what they can to avoid the crazy, and to avoid adding to it.

SEE ALSO:
Elizabeth Bruenig, "The Left and Right Cry Out for Civility, But Maybe That's Asking for Too Much," Washington Post, 16 October 2018: similar topic and worth a read, though it addresses public expression rather than public attitudes
"What's the Matter with Congress?" Holy Mountain, 30 May 2013: review essay of recent works on political polarization.

(Source: themindfulword.org)

Bret Kavanagh and the art of protest

Judge Bret Kavanagh's appointment to the U.S. Supreme Court was confirmed by the Senate this weekend by nearly the narrowest of margins, 51-49. While any appointment by President Donald Trump would have been cheered by conservatives and damned by liberals, Kavanagh's selection was especially problematic because of [a] time spent as a partisan hatchet man, about which he has been less than candid; [b] recent conversion to a broad view of presidential immunity, which might have been what attracted him to Trump; and then, at the eleventh hour, [c] several accusations of sexual assault or harassment.

Those last were the occasion for a spectacular hearing September 27, featuring separate interviews with Kavanagh and his first accuser, Dr. Christine Blasey Ford. Then followed a brief follow-up investigation by the FBI, a clumsy and clueless interjection by the President, and some senatorial speeches, before Saturday's vote. Much, or not much, was revealed in this cauldron of a week; what was revealed depends on your frame of reference.

For many women, the situation described by Dr. Ford rang all too familiarly, as did the dismissive-to-angry responses of Kavanagh and his backers, including the Senate leadership and the President. It reopened personal experiences, or the experiences of close friends, because a year on the "#Metoo" movement has shown that an astonishing (to this naive male, anyway) pervasiveness of sexual aggression by powerful men. Even if it didn't happen to Ford and the other accusers, similar behavior has happened so frequently that the confirmation saga rubbed a lot of raw wounds. For these women and their friends, the political became painfully personal.

So it was so surprise, when I returned to Washington this weekend for a professional meeting, to find a lot of people gathered in protest of the Senate's handling and eventual confirmation of Kavanagh's nomination. When I went out Saturday morning, I found a sizable contingent preparing for some "civil disobedience"--not sure how that turned out. Across the street was a man with a very loud microphone addressing a small audience, on the same topic. Then there was this group, gathered in front of the Capitol.

The rally was organized by students from area law schools. Speeches were short but well-articulated and passionate. They called out Kavanagh and some of the offending senators, but mostly they demanded a country in which women are safe from sexual predation--a vision we should all be able to celebrate. I find it personally energizing to be around so much energy and passion, and I hope they're able to sustain that energy, not just for the midterm elections but into their careers and their lives as citizens.

On the other side of the ledger, there's this.

This is bad. Don't do this. I shouldn't have to explain why, but my whole professional identity is based on explanation, so I will. Expression of political views can be as strong and as pointed and as public as you wish, but don't follow people. Or attack them when they're eating dinner. (Senator McConnell is in the top three of people responsible for the general fix we're now in, but I'd still treat him like a human being, and allow him the same zone of privacy I value.) And don't do this, for goodness' sake.

Because then we've made it about the person, and just about winning by whatever means, instead of about a positive vision for living together in the 21st century.

When we protest, we call out what is wrong and demand/promise it be made right, "as God gives us to see the right," to quote Abraham Lincoln. Parker Palmer writes about the power of "hearts broken open" (as opposed to "broken apart") to work with others to heal the world's wounds. As the student speakers outside the Capitol repeatedly articulated, this isn't just about one judge, or one President, or on election--it's about building a common life where everyone is heard, and valued, and safe, and has the opportunity to live their best lives. President Trump has shown he does not share this vision, and the Republican leaders who have enabled his toxic rhetoric clearly don't value it, either. We who care about communities should no more emulate his toxicity than we do his hostility. As some of us (like me) become aware of the indignities many of us have known all too well, let our broken hearts help us see what needs changing, and to build the world we need.

SEE ALSO:"The Scary Side of Urbanism," 18 October 2017