Palaces for the People: How To Build a More Equal and United Society

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Residents clean up the streets in Englewood, Chicago, where abandoned lots have been turned into urban farms. As meaningful as the friendships we establish online can be, most of us are unsatisfied with virtual ties that never develop into face-to-face relationships. deindustrialization devastated neighborhoods, making cities and suburbs throughout the United States even more segregated by race and class” (151).

Communities with strong social capital—as evidenced by the density of civic organizations and rates at which citizens voted—are more likely to be insulated from the crisis.

Libraries are not the kinds of institutions that most social scientists, policymakers, and community leaders usually bring up when they discuss social capital and how to build it. Richly reported and ultimately uplifting, Palaces for the People offers a blueprint for bridging our seemingly unbridgeable divides. The Germans have their beer gardens, the French their cafés, the Japanese their izakayas and karaoke bars. Today, the word “infrastructure” usually makes us think of what engineers and policy makers refer to as hard or physical in­frastructure: large-scale systems for transit, electricity, gas, oil, food, finance, sewage, water, heat, communications, and storm protection. But Klinenberg, an optimist, tells heartwarming stories of abandoned lots in Englewood, Chicago, that have been converted to agriculture, of “geriatric parks” in Spain, complete with age-appropriate play equipment, of measures in Singapore to help people of different generations know one another.

I never joined the early morning Tai Chi or group dance sessions in the parks near the places I stayed in Shanghai or Beijing, but undoubtedly millions of older Chinese people participate in them regularly for the social as well as physical benefits. During Hurricane Sandy, a branch library in Staten Island became the place where local people sheltered and where relief was coordinated.Why is diversity across social class, race, ethnicity, and religion important in the formation and socialization of groups? They are the kinds of places where the public, private, and philanthropic sectors can work together to reach for something higher than the bottom line.

The consequences of that neglect may be less visible than crumbling bridges and ports, but they’re no less dire. By paying attention to social infrastructure, we can make our communities safer, more inviting, and more supportive. Americans are sorting themselves along race, class, and political lines, leading to a polarization we have not seen since the Civil War. Does the fact that the entire tech industry “depends on a technology developed by the government—the Internet—and a publicly funded communications infrastructure” (219) play a role in their degree of accountability to the public? The conversation around community spaces such as churches, senior centers, public schools and libraries representing the bulk of social infrastructure continues as we enter the “Great Reknitting.If it had been written by someone who knows firsthand the importance of queer spaces or Black spaces or spaces for folks with disabilities that are intentionally unshared, and how much work it takes to build those spaces in this culture. Described by Andrew Carnegie as "palaces for the people," public libraries welcome everyone, no matter their situation.