localism 172
The Roots of an American Mover
The sins of the movers may be visited upon their children, but it’s possible for the children to suffer well the consequences of their parents’ and grandparents’ decisions.
Vermont Papers Redux
All in all, mark The Vermont Papers down as a brave if idealistic attempt to chart the beginning of a campaign to preserve and refresh liberty, community and democracy in…
Root, Root, Root for the Home Team
While the nationalization of sports media outlets brings games and analysis to every living room in America, fan culture retains a very distinct regional and local flavor.
Can There be a National Conservatism?
Here’s the irony: a growing number of conservatives realize that it will require the assistance of the State to correct many of the problems that have been created by the…
Rethinking the Local vs. Global Divide
In Down to Earth: Politics in the New Climatic Regime, Bruno Latour provides a challenging but potentially hopeful take on why climate denial continues to be a political force. For him,…
Walking in a Dead Man’s Shoes
A woman in another kind of grief uttered the terrible “should have been.”
On Being Less than We Are
What you miss out on by not making the climb is too great a loss on such a morning as this.
What Wendell Berry’s Brush Teaches Us About Capitalism, Community, and “Inevitability”
[Cross-posted to In Medias Res] The Art of Loading Brush: New Agrarian Writings, the latest collection of writings by Wendell Berry, isn't a perfect book, nor the perfect expression of…
And Then Came the Chickens, Part Two: A Dispatch from Dumb-Ass Acres
“Bawk-bawk be-gehk!” she cries, and I know just where she’s coming from.
And Then Came The Chickens—After the Bobcat: A Dispatch
Heaven favored me with three successive clement weekends.
On Dreher’s Benedict Option, the Christians and Localists Who Can Live It, and the Ones Who Can’t
[Cross-posted to In Medias Res] Rod Dreher and I aren't close friends, but like many Front Porch Regulars, I've been blessed with the opportunity to associate with and learn from…
Two Last Suppers and Ordinary Greatness: A Double Eulogy
What are the compensations on the downhill side of life?
After Trump #1: Getting Urbanists and Localists Together
[Cross-posted to In Medias Res] So at the beginning of the month, when I finally got my election reflections out of my system, I concluded by re-iterating what I said…
Back There Where the Past Was
From The American Conservative, memories of the Crooked Lake Review gang.
The United Kingdom Votes “Localism”
When Front Porch Republic came into the world seven years ago, it did so largely on the strength of an intuition. Everyone was weary of "bigness." The financial collapse triggered by the…
Ten Theses on Our Populist Moment
[Cross-posted to In Medias Res] Tomorrow, with the California Democratic primary, the populist developments that so many have observed in this electoral cycle will definitively change. Either Sanders will prevail…
The Holy Earth and Liberty Hyde Bailey’s Front Porch Cred
He wrote sixty-five books and had a hand in another hundred and thirty-five.
Christopher Lasch and the Lasting Dilemma of Localism
[Cross-posted to In Media Res] This past weekend, at the annual Front Porch Republic gathering (this year held at SUNY-Geneseo), three scholars reflected upon the writings of the historian and…
Whatever Happened to Communitarianism?
[Cross-posted to In Medias Res] Twenty years ago, the concept and label "communitarianism" was riding high, or at least as high as any broadly applicable yet intellectually coherent ideological movement…
Hanging Out with, and Learning from, Some Thoroughly Material Benedictines
[Cross-posted to In Medias Res] A few weeks ago I was able to, once again, do something that I enjoy doing immensely--take a group of students out on a local…
Local Wonderings in Wichita
[Cross-posted to In Medias Res] Wichita, KS, is the home to a wonderful bookstore, Eighth Day Books. (Which isn't my favorite bookstore in Wichita, but that's partly because my wife…