Q+A
How Sports Fandom Strengthens Community Connection
New research from More in Common explores how sports connect Americans across differences and strengthen their community ties.
Book
In this book, Empowering Affected Interests, Archon Fung and Sean W. D. Gray explore the radical implications of the All-Affected Principle in a globalized world, bringing together leading theorists to examine how democracy might be reimagined to address cross-border interdependence on issues like immigration, climate change, and labor markets.
Many demands for democratic inclusion rest on a simple yet powerful idea. It’s a principle of affected interests. The principle states that all those affected by a collective decision should have a say in making that decision. Yet, in today’s highly globalized world, the implications of this ‘All-Affected Principle’ are potentially radical and far-reaching. Empowering Affected Interests brings together a distinguished group of leading democratic theorists and philosophers to debate whether and how to rewrite the rules of democracy to account for the increasing interdependence of states, markets, and peoples. It examines the grounds that justify democratic inclusion across borders of states, localities, and the private sector, on topics ranging from immigration and climate change to labor markets and philanthropy. The result is an original and important reassessment of the All-Affected Principle and its alternatives that advances our understanding of the theory and practice of democracy. This title is also available as Open Access on Cambridge Core.
In celebration of over 20 years as Harvard’s hub for democracy research, the Ash Center launched its Open Access Scholarship Initiative to enhance the accessibility and the democratization of key works by making them downloadable for free.
Q+A
New research from More in Common explores how sports connect Americans across differences and strengthen their community ties.
Podcast
As the 2026 midterm elections approach, new research raises an urgent question: are Americans operating within fundamentally different information realities? In this episode, Professor Matthew Baum examines what voters know about election rules, where they get their information, and how partisan divides shape perceptions of the voting process.
Feature
On Tuesday, September 15, 2026, the House Judiciary Subcommittee on Oversight held a hearing featuring testimony from Stephen Richer, a former Maricopa County, Arizona, Recorder, election administration expert and Ash Senior Fellow.
The hearing examined allegations that approximately 6,600 noncitizens were improperly registered to vote in New Jersey between June 2023 and June 2024.
Commentary
Allen Lab Fellow Tyler Fisher examines the untapped potential of city charters as a vehicle for deliberative democracy, arguing that advocates should work to embed tools like citizen assemblies, participatory budgeting, and town meetings directly into the governing architecture of cities, institutionalizing deliberative democracy one municipality at a time.
Feature
Books, reports, and articles exploring the front lines of American politics and democracy, as featured on the Terms of Engagement podcast.
Feature
Tova Wang, director of research projects in democratic practice at the Ash Center, shares her top picks for summer reads focused on making democracy more resilient, responsive, and inclusive.