Winter 2021

Table of Contents

What the Rest of the World Knows

From the Editors

Introduction: What the Rest of the World Knows

It was a bitter reality to witness residents in this country having to fend for themselves against the devastating impact of the COVID-19 pandemic. Millions have lost their jobs and homes. Hundreds of thousands have lost their lives.

The pandemic has brought home some undeniable truths about the way our country is run, and specifically, how it stacks up against the rest of the world.

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Where Incarceration Isn’t the Answer

Frustrations with the U.S. prison system have prompted a global search for alternatives. Yet the solution might not be as simple as “be like Scandinavia.”
Mark P. Fancher
Just the Facts

The 25% Tipping Point

New research reveals how to make social change.
Tracy Matsue Loeffelholz

Photo Essay | Signs of Your Identity

A visual exploration of the lasting harm of Canada’s residential schools on the Indigenous population.
Daniella Zalcman

A Way Out of a Dark Past

Can Canada’s Truth and Reconciliation efforts help the U.S. with its own reckoning?
Stacey McKenna

How Norway Built an Economy That Puts People First

The national ethos of economic equity was decades in the making.
Isabella Breda

11 Better Ideas for a Country in Need of Social Change

Even nations with long histories of inequality and violence carry lessons for how to move toward what might be called a more perfect union.
Sunnivie Brydum

A Reset for Unprecedented Times

Buen Vivir is both a philosophy and a lived practice that puts Earth at the center of “the Good Life.”
Natasha Chassagne

Solutions We Love

Explore Section
Indigenous Foodways

Good Medicine: A Powerful Punch

Both Western and traditional medicine agree, cranberries are more than just tart and tasty.
Valerie Segrest
4 Places

Workers Flex for Social Justice

Never underestimate the power of direct action.
Chris Winters
People We Love

Hurricane Relief Through Mutual Aid

Three groups using mutual aid as a tool for natural disaster response.
Isabella Garcia

Culture Shift

Explore Section
Books+Film+Music

Can We Live Up to James Baldwin’s Hope for a Multiracial Democracy?

To make these after times different from the ones Baldwin lived through, White people need to reimagine their Whiteness and their wokeness and how they perform both.
Ruth Terry
Books+Film+Music

Edible City

Moving away from grass lawns demands the extensive transformation of our relationship not only with our cities but also with nature.
Charles Mudede
Books+Film+Music

Rights and Justice: Disability Advocates Blazing Trails

We need to build on past achievements, expand our ideas of the possible, and move toward a shared vision of the future—with disabled people at the forefront of the push toward justice.
Luticha André Doucette
Small Works

Food Is For Eating

“Use everything, waste nothing.”
Sarah Lazarovic