Read the latest news, commentary, and analysis from the Ash Center.
Commentary
In this opinion piece, Audrey Feldman, Todd Rogers and Ben Valenta — participants in the Sports, Democracy and Civic Health project — describe their findings showing that shared fandom can soften partisan animosity and make political opponents more willing to connect.
Newest
Feature
Joel Chastain MC/MPA 2022 is taking lessons learned from the Chickasaw Nation and Harvard Kennedy School to promote tribal economic development.
Feature
In a visit organized by the Ash Center’s Vietnam Program, Prime Minister Phạm Minh Chính outlined his country’s desire to remain politically and economically integrated.
Commentary
Fixating on the degree—rather than the type—of decentralization is leading us astray.
Web3 today centers around expressing transferable, financialized assets, rather than encoding social relationships of trust.
Q+A
HKS Professor Maya Sen analyzes the new balance of power on the Supreme Court and how the conservative majority aligns with the beliefs of Americans.
Video
You are invited to a virtual book talk featuring Stephen Goldsmith, Derek Bok Professor of the Practice of Urban Policy at the Harvard Kennedy School and Kate Markin Coleman, director of ias advising, LLC. Goldsmith and Markin, co-authors of “Growing Fairly: How to Build Opportunity and Equity in Workforce Development.” They were joined by moderator Earl Buford, President, Council for Adult and Experiential Learning (CAEL.)
Video
At a time when many are rightly concerned about the health of American democracy, scholars and reformers are evaluating proposals to make democracy more functional and representative. One such proposal is to move beyond the winner-take-all electoral system used at the federal and state levels in the United States to enable adoption of proportional voting systems. What would be the impact of proportional voting in the United States, and what will it take to enact it?
Join panelists Rob Richie, President and CEO of FairVote, Rebecca Chavez-Houck, Community Engagement Consultant and Former Utah State Legislator, and Danielle Allen, James Bryant Conant University Professor at Harvard University in discussion. Archon Fung, Winthrop Laflin McCormack Professor of Citizenship and Self-Government at Harvard Kennedy School, Director of the Ash Center’s Democratic Governance Programs, moderated.
Feature
Following recent victories in San Francisco and New York City, Boston advocates are looking to expand the franchise to all residents with legal status for local elections.
Video
As efforts get underway to expand the franchise to non-citizens in Boston, the Ash Center and the Rappaport Institute for Greater Boston hosted a conversation to learn about how non-citizen voting once was the norm and how it’s making a comeback.