How To Citizen with Baratunde

We head to Eliot, Maine, where a multiracial, multidisciplinary group of artists have reimagined what a conference can be. At SeaCHANGE, creativity isn’t an afterthought—it’s the starting point. The gathering opens with movement and dance. It invites deep connection through shared meals, collaborative workshops, and artistic expression. And it creates space for belonging, especially for artists of color.

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Today we bring you Story #6 in our Week of Citizening. We’ve already shown you how people are rethinking democracy through libraries, labor, and school boards. Now we’re headed to a place often overlooked but brimming with democratic possibility: West Virginia.

See the visuals and links to all these stories here: https://newsletter.baratunde.com/p/dont-wait-for-better-leaders-become 

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Today, we head to Chicago, where a civic gathering called Chi Hack Night is bringing technologists, designers, policy nerds, and everyday residents together to build a better city.

Access to visuals for this story are here:

https://newsletter.baratunde.com/p/we-found-the-anti-doge-in-chicago 

and that conversation on Life Wi...

We’re told some people just need to be saved. But what people really need is to be needed. This community of young single mothers in Lexington, Kentucky reveals a version of this story.

Full video viewing options for this story plus links to the Instagram and LinkedIn versions:

https://newsletter.baratunde.com/p/young-mothers-asked-to-lead-and-they-did

This episode features Tanya Torp, Executive Director of Step by Step, a no...

We’re told America is hopelessly divided. But zoom in—like, say, to a school board in South Central Pennsylvania—and a different story emerges.

Full video viewing options for this story plus links to the Instagram and LinkedIn versions:
https://newsletter.baratunde.com/p/proof-we-can-overcome-division-3rd 

This episode features Steph and Lance: one conservative, one liberal, both neighbors, both schoo...

It’s Tax Day in the U.S., a moment when many of us think about how we fund collective life. So today’s story? It’s about layoffs — but not the kind we’ve come to expect.

See the visuals for this story and all our Week of Citizening stories here:
https://newsletter.baratunde.com/p/this-tax-day-solidarity-and-consent  

We’re often told democracy is too slow or messy for hard moments. B...

Watch this first video story from the Week of Citizening on Instagram or LinkedIn: https://newsletter.baratunde.com/p/1st-story-libraries-are-hubs-for?r=204q7

What if every library in the world was a hub for citizening—a space where people could come together, tell their own stories, and build new ones? It’s already happening. And Cossit Llibrary in downtown Memphis is leading the way.

🎙️ Meet Ena Esco — Innovato...

It's been almost two years, and I (Baratunde) am back with an experimental drop because democracy is something we DO, not something we HAVE (or don't), and this moment calls for that reminder. So...

I’m teaming up with my friend and fellow citizenist Jon Alexander (author of CITIZENS) to do something we believe is urgent and necessary: shine a light on the everyday people practicing democracy in extraordinary ways.

We’v...

Welcome to a special bonus episode of How To Citizen. We are sharing Baratunde's appearance on the What Could Go Right? podcast, created by The Progress Network. Baratunde discusses technology, and specifically generative artificial intelligence, and how it might help or hinder human progress and how it aligns or deviates from our concept of citizen as a verb.

As always, find How To Citizen on Instagram or visit howtocitizen.com to...

So much of the conversation around democracy focuses on the external: from elections and policy to protests and organizing. While getting active is important...what could happen if we ALSO turn inwards? When we shift our relationship with our insides—what we believe and feel and the unconscious patterns we act from—our world shifts with us. In the final episode of season four, Baratunde sits down with Source Code creator and former...

There’s no shortage of volunteer opportunities or organizations offering them. But how often are the communities meant to benefit from all of this volunteer work determining what help is truly needed, and which issues are most pressing? Christian Vanizette has spent the last decade building MakeSense, a global network of over 100,000 citizens and entrepreneurs committed to solving social and environmental issues where they live — b...

Whether you’re a sports fanatic, or you’ve never stepped foot on a court or field—there’s a lot we can learn about citizening from the lens of coaches and athletes. To show us how sports can help us with teamwork, discipline, and a sense of play in our citizening efforts— Baratunde is joined by Steve Kerr, head coach of the NBA championship-winning Golden State Warriors and relentless advocate for gun violence prevention, along wit...

How we gather matters. A lot. And what is a nation but a big ol’ gathering of gatherings? Baratunde talks with Priya Parker, facilitator and author of The Art of Gathering: How We Meet and Why it Matters, about how we can use gatherings as a tool for strengthening our relationships by doing things together that invoke joy and have meaning. Listen till the end to hear Priya answer a listener’s pressing question during the live tapin...

The intensifying political division and violence in our country is concerning — but it’s not unique. And few know that better than Tim Phillips. For 30 years, his organization Beyond Conflict has been bringing people from opposing sides of violent divides together to find common ground. He shares insights from their research into human psychology that could hold keys for overcoming violent division, along with lessons from Northern...

According to Ruha Benjamin, we’re living inside someone else’s imagination. An imagination that  limits our ability to build a more just, liberated world. So, how do we take back our agency and begin to seed something different? Baratunde talks with Princeton professor and founding director of the Just Data Lab, Ruha Benjamin to find out.

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Internally Reflect - Bear witness and create a ripple

This one is inspired from...

It’s no secret that our economy only works for a select few. But what would our economy look like if we prioritized people and the planet, instead of profit? Economist Kate Raworth says it might look like a doughnut and to build it requires changing how we talk about, teach, and imagine economics. Baratunde talks with Kate about her theory of doughnut economics and how we can build an economy that works for all life on Earth—explor...

Imagine if the members of your group chat shared more than memes but also shared a bank account, or if the early users of a social media app helped decide how that app grew, made money, and moderated content. How does the group make decisions and make sure everyone is heard? Who decides how the money is spent? These are some of the questions Friends with Benefits (FWB), a decentralized autonomous organization (DAO) has had to answe...

Instead of electing politicians to represent us…what if we just represented ourselves? Peer to peer. Neighbor to neighbor. Baratunde talks with Claudia Chwalisz about citizens’ assemblies—groups randomly-selected by lottery that are shifting political and legislative power into the hands of everyday people. Claudia is one of the world’s leading voices on citizens’ assemblies and founder and CEO of DemocracyNext, an organization wor...

We all know that voting alone won’t save democracy. But it does help…a lot. No one understands that better than voting rights organizer Nsé Ufot. She’s the former CEO of the New Georgia Project, where she leveraged technology and culture to register 600,000+ new voters. Nsé and Baratunde talk about why voting still matters and how we can bring love into the ways we citizen together. 

SHOW ACTIONS

Internal Reflection - What Do You...