May 2024 Newsletter | Our Common Purpose
By Zachey Kliger | zachey.kliger@gmail.com | May 30, 2024
Bridging Movement Leaders Convene at the Academy
Our Common Purpose calls for dramatically expanding the capacity of civic leaders and civil society to bring people together and build bridges across lines of difference. Vital to this work in recent years is the Bridging Movement Alignment Council (BMAC). BMAC is a cohort of over 100 leading organizations that are deeply invested in the bridge building movement to increase social cohesion and collaboration in our country. The Council sparks collective action and produces resources for the entire bridging field. On May 2-3, members of BMAC’s steering committee convened at the House of the Academy in Cambridge, MA. Steering committee members expressed optimism over the bridging movement’s growth, discussed new opportunities to build cross-movement synergies, and identified strategic priorities ahead of the November election and into 2025.
Stories From The Field
National Week of Conversation Promotes Curiosity and Cohesion.
Between April 15-24, National Week of Conversation, an initiative of the Listen First Project, produced conversations, cultural events, learning activities and signature experiences for Americans to join the movement to shift our country away from toxic division.
Stephen Heintz Promotes Trust for Civic Life at University of Chicago Panel.
Stephen Heinz, co-chair of the Commission on the Practice of Democratic Citizenship, spoke about Our Common Purpose and the Trust for Civic Life at a panel convened by the University of Chicago’s Institute of Politics conference on “Bridging the Divide: Forging Ties between Urban and Rural America.”
Bipartisan Policy Center to Fund Research on Election Workforce.
The Bipartisan Policy Center will fund nine research projects that will investigate a variety of challenges facing the elections workforce including turnover, funding, public trust, and threats against election workers.
How to Create Better Governance? Move to Proportional Representation.
A paper released by Protect Democracy and New America that is co-authored by Academy Member John Carey explains why proportional representation would make our government more responsive, accountable and stable over time.
Poll: Americans Define U.S. by its Ideals, not Heritage.
Americans by wide margins prefer to define their country by its commitment to civic ideals rather than by shared ancestry, history, traditions or culture, according to a new survey from Nationhood Lab at Salve Regina University’s Pell Center for International Relations and Public Policy.
CMF Names Democracy Awards Finalists.
The Congressional Management Foundation (CMF) named 15 finalists for its Democracy Awards, a program that recognizes members of Congress who have worked to improve accountability in government.
In The News
Building Civic Bridges Act Re-Introduced.
Senators Chris Coons (D-Del.) and Todd Young (R-Ind.) introduced the Building Civic Bridges Act, bipartisan legislation to establish a pilot program through AmeriCorps that would empower local communities to address contentious civic issues and reduce polarization at the local level.
Ethan Zuckerman: I love Facebook. That's Why I'm Suing Meta.
Ethan Zuckerman, a member of the Academy’s Commission on the Practice of Democratic Citizenship, explains why he is asking a federal court in California to rule on whether social media users should have a right to use third-party tools that give them increased power over how they use social networks.
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