Skip to content
Search

Latest Stories

Top Stories

Digital Citizen

Digital Citizen, a pioneer in citizen engagement media since 1998, connects Americans to their leaders, each other, and the world.

Our deeply divided nation agrees on one thing, at least: Your facts and my facts are irrevocably different.


Digital Citizen is a pioneer in citizen engagement media since 1998 that connects Americans to their leaders, each other, and the world. As a strategic partner in innovative media design, the non-profit produces for television and the Internet, and combines media and mediation in numerous projects in the U.S. and around the world, working with organizations including PBS.org, the World Bank, The Bridge Alliance, Oakland Tribune, United Republic, Twin Cities Public TV, Link TV, the San Francisco Sheriff’s Department, and many more.

Digital Citizen has been involved in a range of projects, including under our original name, Internews Interactive. These include the News Ambassadors radio pilot; the Goldziher award for journalists in 2017, 2019 and 2022; the TV and web video series This Planet; and a special program about the 2016 US election for Link TV and KCET.

Citizen engagement projects history

Besides contributing to the engagement community’s vital work through frequent writing, we remain involved in connecting Americans and Russians in dialogue, and have produced a number of TV and online projects, including the 2013 Real Dialogues “Work & Wages” project and Digital Citizen 2012. InterAct grew out of our work in the analog era, connecting Americans to the world using technologies like satellites to produce the Emmy Award-winning Spacebridges, and videoconferencing for Vis a Vis and other TV series. Clips of citizen engagement programs we produced in the US and around the world between 1998 and 2004 can be seen at our Archive Page. Articles we have written and news stories about our work can be found at the Archive: Articles page of this website.

Sign up for The Fulcrum newsletter

This short video from the Transpartisan Leadership Workshop at the World Affairs Council of Northern California provides a good overview of Interact’s work:

Read More

Chicago South Siders impacted by air pollution can help shape future environmental policy
factory chimney emitting smoke
Photo by Ria on Unsplash

Chicago South Siders impacted by air pollution can help shape future environmental policy

Communities in the southwest and southeast sides of Chicago impacted by the adverse effects of air pollution from truck traffic, warehouses, and factory operations have the opportunity to change their future. But what exactly are they experiencing, and how can they change it?

For the greater part of the last year, officials, including State Sen. Javier Cervantes (D-1) and 12th Ward Ald, Julia Ramirez and others from organizations such as the Environmental Defense Fund have been drafting Senate Bill 838. The bill aims to curb environmental injustices, such as air pollution caused by heavy truck traffic and industrial practices, that overburden Chicago’s Southwest and Southeast communities.

Keep ReadingShow less
Behind the “Lie of the Year,” some bitter truths

Diners watch as Republican presidential candidate, former U.S. President Donald Trump, and Democratic presidential candidate, U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris, debate for the first time during the presidential election campaign on September 10, 2024 at the Bar Tabac in New York City.

(Photo by Robert Nickelsberg/Getty Images)

Behind the “Lie of the Year,” some bitter truths

As it has been doing yearly since 2009, the fact-checking organization PolitiFact has chosen the Lie of the Year (2024). There was an abundance of nominees.

And, it turns out, they chose the same whopper I identified as a top contender months ago: President-elect Donald Trump’s unfounded claim that Haitian migrants were eating the household pets of Springfield, Ohio.

Keep ReadingShow less
Moderate voices are vanishing. Here’s how to get them back.
Moderate voices are vanishing. Here’s how to get them back.

Moderate voices are vanishing. Here’s how to get them back.

Fifty years ago this month, the US Congress established the Harry S. Truman Scholarship, which brings together service-minded college juniors who span the ideological spectrum – from Neil Gorsuch, now a Supreme Court Justice, to Stacey Abrams, founder of Fair Fight, to Bill Gates, who served as the Chair of Maricopa County Board of Supervisors during the 2020 presidential election. The scholarship is intended to serve as a living memorial to our 33rd President’s commitment to public service by building a diverse community committed to upholding public institutions.

After receiving the scholarship in 1997, I spent two intense summers with my fellow Trumans, soaking in diverse viewpoints, debating policy, wrestling with ethical dilemmas, and dreaming about how we might serve our country. During the Clinton impeachment's seemingly unprecedented partisan tensions, we discussed running on cross-partisan slates – not promising to always agree, but committing to respectful engagement and understanding our differences. Twenty-five years later, watching my 17-year-old son write about losing his faith in politics, I wonder what happened to that vision.

Keep ReadingShow less