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Russell Arben Fox

Russell Arben Fox is a Front Porch Republic Contributing Editor. He grew up milking cows and baling hay in Spokane Valley, WA, but now lives in Wichita, KS, where he runs the History & Politics and the Honors programs at Friends University, a small Christian liberal arts college. He aspires to write a book about the theory and practice of democracy, community, and environmental sustainability in small to mid-sized cities, like the one he has made his and his family’s home; his scribblings pertaining to that and related subjects are collected at the Substack “Wichita and the Mittelpolitan.” He also blogs–irregularly and usually at too-great a length–more broadly about politics, philosophy, religion, socialism, bicycling, books, farming, pop music, and whatever else strikes his fancy, at “In Medias Res.”

Articles by Russell Arben Fox

Defending Lasch, Left and/or Right

[Cross-posted to In Medias Res] Wichita, KS. No one, I think, has ever summed up the longing for a life with front porches--the localist longing which is this blog's raison…
October 8, 2009

So What if it was the States that Centralized Health Care?

Adding to the many discussions thus far here at FPR about the ongoing health care debate, an open question, especially directed to Messrs Stegall, Medaille, and Iliff: How should a…
September 26, 2009

Canaries in a Coal Mine? (APSA Reflections)

Wichita, KS I just returned from my near-annual pilgrimage to the American Political Science Association's annual convention...this year held, ironically enough, in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. I didn't mind--it meant I'd…
September 1, 2009

Can Health Care Be Local?

[Cross-posted to In Medias Res] Wichita, KS Over the past couple of weeks, I've written a few things on the current debate over health care reform. A couple of smart…
August 6, 2009

Lessons from a Motorcycle Mechanic

Wichita, KS [Cross-posted at In Medias Res] Let's pause a moment and be grateful that the job market for political theorists is so bad. Because if it wasn't, Matthew Crawford,…
July 17, 2009

Monty Python’s Shop Class

As so often seems to be the case, the Monty Python troop somehow managed to make Matthew Crawford's point about the enduring value of working with your hands decades before…
July 12, 2009

In Praise of States (and Why There Should be More of Them)

Wichita, KS Over the July 4th weekend, we made a quick trip south to Dallas, and were blessed with a brief look at that particular large chunk of the American…
July 8, 2009

On Canada, Conservatism, Tories, and Blackberries

Wichita, KS In honor of Canada Day, in the fine federation (though these days, in the eyes of a majority of Canadians, less a federation than an Americanized nation, or…
July 1, 2009

What’s Modernity Marx Got to Do With It? (FPR vs. PoMoCon, Part Drei)

[Cross-posted to In Medias Res] Wichita, KS Blogger though I am, I can't deny that there is a major advantage to arguments conducted through the slower media of paper (to…
June 29, 2009

Communitarianism, Conservatism, Populism and Localism: An Updated Survey

Wichita, KS [Cross-posted to In Medias Res] Michael Sandel's giving of the prestigious Reith Lectures for the BBC (hat tip: the ever-watchful Harry Brighouse at Crooked Timber) has prompted me…
June 11, 2009

The Front Porch Cyclist talks Autarchy

I have been remiss in following up on some superb thinking that has been going on, partly prompted by my earlier link to his blog, but mostly prompted by the…
June 5, 2009

Every Jar a Victory

[Cross-posted to In Medias Res] Wichita, Kansas We feared that we'd missed out on fresh strawberries this year, both because there was an early April freeze and snowstorm that killed…
June 2, 2009