Aspen is a place for leaders to lift their sights above the possessions which possess them. To confront their own nature as human beings, to regain control over their own humanity by becoming more self-aware, more self-correcting, and hence more self-fulfilling.
Walter P. Paepcke, Aspen Institute Co-Founder
Aspen Institute
IDEAS Article, IDEAS: the Magazine of the Aspen Institute Summer 2018, and Longform
The Right Place for an Argument
June 18, 2018
Citizenship and American Identity Program
In an era of deep divisions, many Americans yearn to heal schisms, repair the nation’s social fabric, and restore civility to public discourse. These efforts are admirable. Done wrong, however, they have the potential to compound political problems rather than ameliorate them. That’s why the Institute’s Program on Citizenship and American Identity recently launched the Better Arguments Project, which helps Americans engage with one another more productively across their differences—because civic life doesn’t need fewer arguments; it needs better ones. Better arguments allow people to connect across political, cultural, and economic divides. They do so not by papering over those divides but by teaching Americans how to have better, more informed, intelligent, compassionate arguments that are honest about power. The Better Arguments Project, in partnership with The Allstate Corporation and the education nonprofit Facing History and Ourselves, has already been selected as a featured initiative of Erase the Hate, a new social-impact campaign by NBCUniversal Cable Entertainment. betterarguments.org
