It’s time for a new American agenda

America is once again gripped by multiple political and societal crises. Most days in our local communities and in our wider public lives it can feel like we’re living through dizzying confusion, chaos, and division.

Acrimonious partisanship only deepens in Washington, DC, and our state capitols. Renewed calls for a third party are heating up, while Democrats plan to spend tens of millions of dollars to understand voters better, as if they had just discovered some new civilisation. It’s like we’re collectively stuck in the Tower of Babel, unable to understand one another and what we share in common, according to the Tribune News Service.

Yet when I engage with Americans of all political persuasions and backgrounds, I am struck by what we do hold in common. From the food bank employee in small-town Connecticut to the business owner in Northern California, to the librarian in suburban Florida, to the philanthropic leader in North Carolina, and everyday Americans all across this nation, the aspirations I hear people articulate form something akin to a new American agenda. Not a political party platform. Not a new think-tank treatise. Not a recipe for mass resistance. Not an excuse to stay on the sidelines or simply disengage altogether.

This is something fundamentally different and more hopeful. The Americans I meet want a new agenda. One that calls us to greatness. One that involves:

* Acknowledging our past and telling the truth about it, knowing that American history is complex and multifaceted* Ensuring basic needs like food, housing, and safety are met in ways that bring us together rather than being used as political wedges

* Focusing on concerns people are ready to work on, and which require shared action in our local communities, such as education and youth opportunities, senior care, affordable housing, loneliness and mental health, and belonging, among other things

* Safeguarding our most cherished civic assets, like libraries, museums, and public media

* Making our communities and the country work for all of us, not just some of us

* Finding ways to come together, even amid our real differences, to become builders, doers, creators, and innovators again

We have lost sight of the pursuit of this kind of greatness amid the distracting power of our toxic politics. With no meaningful alternative, we find ourselves held hostage, unable to move forward.

Meanwhile, our societal challenges continue to grow: a loss of control and agency in our civic lives, widespread mistrust, and too much hatred and bigotry. Furthermore, many of us can no longer discuss certain topics with one another, especially with our close friends and family. We live and work in fragmented and siloed ways. Our civic culture is atrophied, making it much harder to accomplish things together.

The trend lines on all these pain points date back decades. They aren’t new. But they are accelerating. And they are amplified. Meanwhile, the issues people care deeply about — and which animate the agenda I outlined above — get pushed aside.

Moreover, no national or statewide legislation alone can address these issues. They demand local action. People intuitively know that. It’s why I’m traveling the country this year on a civic campaign to show community after community how getting on a new civic path can help us reclaim these issues from a political frame and instead focus on what matters to people in their daily lives. This new civic path — not more divisive politics — is a practical and more hopeful way to activate this new American agenda, repair our broken civic culture, and restore our belief in one another and our nation.

In just the past month, I’ve visited a booming suburb in Florida, one of the poorest communities in North Carolina, a working-class community in Connecticut, one of the most diverse communities in all of New England, and multiple communities across Northern California, where literal militias still exist. I’m heading to Selma, AL, and communities throughout Maryland, Virginia, Georgia, and Ohio over the coming weeks.