One of the dimensions of ongoing democratic strength that I highlighted in chapter 8 of Citizens Uniting was the phenomenon of people living in watersheds or ecosystems who, in spite of deep partisan or ideological differences, are still managing to work across those divides in pursuit of a good life on their shared landscapes. One good place to learn more about this hopeful sign of democratic health is at Stories for Action, where, among many other resources, you might come across a podcast in which I’m interviewed about the “politics of place.”

That same subject came up a few months ago when a newly launched electronic journal called Barn Raiser reached way back to my first book, Community and the Politics of Place, with a request to reprint a chapter from that book that I had entitled “Barn Raising.”  Then a few days ago, I opened an email from the journal to find a hero of mine featured there.  As it turns out, Wendell Berry had recently submitted a letter to the editors of the New York Review of Books, who had declined to print Berry’s letter.  Now Barn Raiser, with Berry’s permission, had printed the letter under the title “What Liberal Elites Don’t Know About Rural Americans Can Hurt Us.”  Like just about anything Berry writes or ever has written, it’s well worth a read.