Skip to content
Search

Latest Stories

Top Stories

A personal note to America in troubled times

People standing near 4 American flags

American flags fly near Washington Monument.

Jakub Porzycki/NurPhoto via Getty Images

Harwood is president and founder of The Harwood Institute. This is the latest entry in his series based on the "Enough. Time to Build.” campaign, which calls on community leaders and active citizens to step forward and build together.

I wanted to address Americans after the attempted assassination of former President Donald Trump. Consider this a personal note directly to you (yes, you, the reader!). And know that I have intentionally held off in expressing my thoughts to allow things to settle a bit. There’s already too much noise enveloping our politics and lives.

Like most Americans, I am praying for the former president, his family and all those affected by last weekend’s events. There is no room for political violence in our nation.


I'm not here to offer political commentary or make predictions about this act of senseless violence. That’s not my role. But here's the deal. We are all suffering these days. There is so much division, acrimony, recriminations and hatred in our land. Right now, my chief concern is this: How do any of us — how do you — maintain a sense of hope during this time? How do you stay grounded when things can feel so confusing and disorienting — when we can feel unmoored?

Our nation is at an impasse. Things may get worse before they get better. But that does not mean there is no hope to be found. There is a way to find authentic hope during these tumultuous times and stay grounded at the same time.

I travel America almost weekly, working with community leaders and active citizens to support their efforts to catalyze and unleash change that addresses what matters most to people and strengthens their communities’ civic culture. In spite of the divisions we hear about every day, everywhere I go I see people from all walks of life, from all political persuasions, and from all faiths coming together to build. To figure out what they can agree on, amid our real differences, to get in motion and to take shared action. They are making a real, practical difference.

I take hope from these efforts. So can you. But to do so, you must first be willing to see them — that means you must actively look for them, lift them up and keep them in your heart and mind. You must be a guardian of these efforts even as the noise of the world seeks to crowd them out or devalue them. It does not matter how large or small the change is that they produce. What matters is that they are proof that we can restore our belief in one another and move forward together.

I am also traveling America on our campaign, “Enough. Time to Build.” The response to this campaign has been remarkable — and is growing by leaps and bounds each day. Honestly, it is spreading so fast I can barely keep up. Indeed, we are the only national campaign that is being invited to communities of all political persuasions — red and blue and purple. The important question is why?

It is a sign of just how hungry people are for a new path — a civic path — forward. Where change begins in our local communities and grows from there. This is how significant change has often started in our country. I take hope from people’s response to this effort. As Fanny Lou Hamer said, “People are sick and tired of being sick and tired.” You may be, too.

Staying grounded when you feel like things are coming apart is never easy. Platitudes only make things worse. Calls to simply bridge our divides are not enough. Raising the volume of our debate only adds more anxiety.

Being grounded requires that we see reality for what it is — and then put a stake in the ground about what we seek it to be. Progress during times like these throughout our history — from the abolition of slavery to women's suffrage to civil rights and voting rights to gay rights — has never been easy. But we have also never given up, or given in. We persevered. We came together around kitchen tables, in church basements and in civic halls — and we refused to settle. History teaches us that it is everyday Americans who are most responsible for our progress. That we can once again lead this country forward if enough of us come together around our shared aspirations rather than allowing our differences to overcome us.

Like me, you may be deeply troubled by what is happening in our country — and to our country. It keeps me awake at night. At times, my anxiety rises. I fear things coming apart. Until I think about what gives me hope and how I can stay grounded. Then, I rise up and do the work. I know you do, too. Every single day.

Keep looking for where you can find hope. Let’s put a stake in the ground about the kind of country we seek to build. And let’s go together.

Read More

This Isn’t My Story. But It’s One I’ll Never Forget.

Children with American flags

This Isn’t My Story. But It’s One I’ll Never Forget.

My colleague, Meghan Monroe, a former teacher and trainer in the Dignity Index, went out to lunch with a friend on the 4th of July. Her friend was late and Meghan found herself waiting outside the restaurant where, to her surprise, a protest march approached. It wasn’t big and it wasn’t immediately clear what the protest was about. There were families and children marching—some flags, and some signs about America being free.

One group of children caught Meghan’s eye as they tugged at their mother while marching down the street. The mom paused and crouched down to speak to the children. Somehow, Meghan could read the situation and realized that the mom was explaining to the children about America—about what it is, about all the different people who make up America, about freedom, about dignity.

“I could just tell that the Mom wanted her children to understand something important, something big. I couldn’t tell anything about her politics. I could just tell that she wanted her children to understand what America can be. I could tell she wanted dignity for her children and for people in this country. It was beautiful.”

As Meghan told me this story, I realized something: that Mom at the protest is a role model for me. The 4th may be over now, but the need to explain to each other what we want for ourselves and our country isn’t.

My wife, Linda, and I celebrated America at the wedding of my godson, Alexander, and his new wife, Hannah. They want America to be a place of love. Dozens of my cousins, siblings, and children celebrated America on Cape Cod.

For them and our extended family, America is a place where families create an enduring link from one generation to the next despite loss and pain.

Thousands of Americans in central Texas confronted the most unimaginable horrors on July 4th. For them, I hope and pray America is a place where we hold on to each other in the face of unbearable pain and inexplicable loss.

Yes. It’s complicated. There were celebrations of all kinds on July 4th—celebrations of gratitude to our military, celebrations of gratitude for nature and her blessings, and sadly, celebrations of hatred too. There are a million more examples of our hopes and fears and visions, and they’re not all happy.

I bet that’s one of the lessons that mom was explaining to her children. I imagine her saying, “America is a place where everyone matters equally. No one’s dignity matters more than anyone else’s. Sometimes we get it wrong. But in our country, we always keep trying and we never give up.”

For the next 12 months as we lead up to the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence, we’re going to be hearing a lot about what we want America to be. But maybe the more important question is what we the people are willing to do to fulfill our vision of what we can be. The answer to that question is hiding in plain sight and is as old as the country itself: join with others and do your part, and no part is too small to matter.

At our best, our country is a country of people who serve one another. Some may say that’s out of fashion, but not me. Someone is waiting for each of us—to talk, to share, to join, to care, to lead, to love. And in our time, the superpower we need is the capacity to treat each other with dignity, even when we disagree. Differences of opinion aren’t the problem; in fact, they’re the solution. As we love to say, “There’s no America without democracy and there’s no democracy without healthy debate and there’s no healthy debate without dignity.”

Keep ReadingShow less
Beyond Party Lines
An illustration to symbolize two divided groups.
Getty Images / Andrii Yalanskyi

Beyond Party Lines

The American Experiment tested whether groups with diverse interests could unite under a declaration of common principles. In this moment, we face a critical juncture that tests whether distrust and political fervor could drive Americans to abandon or deny everything that unites us.

Henry Bolingbroke contends that party spirit inspires “Animosity and breeds Rancor.” Talking of his countrymen, he wrote, “We likewise derive, not our Privileges (for they were always ours) but a more full and explicit Declaration”; Whigs and Tories can unite on this alone. That Declaration of Ours was penned by Thomas Jefferson when his colonists repelled the redcoats at the Siege of Charleston and when Washington’s troops were awaiting battle in Manhattan. The American Declaration set out those principles, which united the diverse colonies. And the party system, as Bolingbroke said, brought animosity and weakened the Union. Critics disputed these claims. William Warburton attacked Bolingbroke as an evil-speaker with “dog-eloquence”—claimed his calls for party reform were an aristocratic conspiracy to cement the power of elites. An anonymous critic argued that the government is a union of unrelated people where laws supplant the natural bonds between families. Then, the government of the United States would not exist, or would not exist long.

Keep ReadingShow less
From Vision to Action: Remaking the World Through Social Entrepreneurship
assorted notepads

From Vision to Action: Remaking the World Through Social Entrepreneurship

Social entrepreneur John Marks developed a set of eleven working principles that have become his modus operandi and provide the basic framework for his new book, “From Vision to Action: Remaking the World Through Social Entrepreneurship," from which a series of three articles is adapted. While Marks applied these principles in nonprofit work, he says they are also applicable to social enterprisesand to life, in general.

PART TWO

PRINCIPLE #4: KEEP SHOWING UP. It has been said that 80 percent of success in life is showing up. For social entrepreneurs, this means continuing to stay engaged without dabbling or parachuting. Like a child’s toy windup truck that moves forward until it hits an obstacle and then backs off and finds another way forward, social entrepreneurs should be persistent—and adept at finding work-arounds. They must be willing to commit for the long term. I found that this was particularly important when working with Iranians, who tend to view the world in terms of centuries and millennia.

Keep ReadingShow less
Similarity Hub Shows >700 Instances of Cross-Partisan Common Ground

Two coloured pencils one red and one blue drawing a reef knot on a white paper background.

Getty Images, David Malan

Similarity Hub Shows >700 Instances of Cross-Partisan Common Ground

It is a common refrain to say that Americans need to find common ground across the political spectrum.

Over the past year, AllSides and More Like US found >700 instances of common ground on political topics, revealed in Similarity Hub. It highlights public opinion data from Gallup, Pew Research, YouGov, and many other reputable polling firms.

Keep ReadingShow less