The “Beyond the Broadcast” panel last week hosted by Paragon relied on the unreleased documentary Join or Die and the book “Bowling Alone” for inspiration. The basic idea is that communities, not geographic communities but communities who share common interests, are essential to a healthy democracy and a potential opportunity for public media. My hope was that by watching the documentary and the panel, a larger conversation would unfold about public media’s role in society today and in the future as compared to the past.

During and after the panel, I received encouraging feedback from public media leaders I admire:

  • “THIS is the discussion. I loved the movie! It speaks to my soul.”
  • “Thank you for doing this. Lots of smartness happening.”
  • “Just watched the recording — and WOW — this is very compelling content, surprisingly highly produced, and very valuable for us all.”
  • “The webinar was exactly what I was hoping for…inspiration and a bit of a compass.
  • “That was the best webinar I’ve ever seen.”

Yesterday, National Federation of Community Broadcasting (NFCB) CEO Rima Dael posted a critique in their newsletter entitled, “Civic Engagement, Social Capital, and Robert Putnam’s “Bowling Alone” — A Critique” (scroll down to “Food for Thought” to read). I agree with her position and encourage everyone to read it. I don’t want to try and paraphrase what Dael said, but she concludes by stating, “My critique and offered reframing here, is that we need to look at more inclusive models to measure civic participation and social capital. My call to action is to simply ask that we consider a framework of inclusivity; to include lived realities and experiences of women and BIPOC folks across the generations. To truly understand civic life today, we must look beyond the binary of decline and revival. Let’s consider how people are finding new ways to connect and build community in a rapidly changing world. Civic engagement and social capital are evolving to meet the needs of contemporary society. Public media, particularly community radio, has a significant role in strengthening civic ties and building social capital. We must explore frameworks beyond Putnam’s ‘Bowling Alone’ for this work. And yes, we can include Putnam’s work in our analysis too, this just can’t be the only framing.” I agree 100%. Clearly, communities do not and should not have boundaries.

When the book was released 24 years ago, there was backlash about a perceived “white” traditional perspective that the documentary tackles directly. The film shows several examples of communities that specifically started because people (women, minorities, etc.) were not allowed into traditional groups, so they formed their own. Hillary Clinton comments on this directly. The film then shows how participation in these groups has also declined. Putnam explains that it took him five years instead of the expected six months to write the book because he wanted to do more research to answer these critiques. Since then, many commentaries, articles, research papers, and follow up studies have addressed the need to explore the definition, meaning, and usefulness of communities across all demographics, geographies, ethnicities, and lifestyles. His book created more research by other social scientists and more conversation within our culture that have added to the discussion.

Similarly, any continuing conversation regarding community building for public media is positive and must include a true representation of our citizenry. I’m glad Dael stoked the embers to keep the fire going. Paragon may have restarted the fire, but this is a public media existential conversation about mission and sustainability that must burn in all directions.

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