Palaces for the people
"An eminent sociologist--and coauthor, with Aziz Ansari, of the #1 New York Times bestseller Modern Romance--makes the provocative case that the future of democratic societies rests not only on shared values but also on shared "social infrastructure": the libraries, childcare centers, bookstores, coffee shops, pools, and parks that promote crucial, sometimes life-saving connections between people who might otherwise fail to find common cause"
Stats for nerds
3recommend
5mentions
3people
2023–2026years
80% recommend20% neutral
Mentions per year
What Hacker News says
- We need weekly activity plans to introduce multi-racial, multi-age, multi-political people to each other in palaces for the people venues.
Read the book 'Palaces for the People'... Invest Billions in social infrastructure... and run the country like it was a retirement community. Everyone is welcome, everyone has value and we need to learn (with practice) how to love each other again.
- I highly recommend Klinenberg's Palaces for the People, which he named after Carnegie's phrase for libraries. Here's an interview he did on 99% Invisible:
https://99percentinvisible.org/episode/palaces-for-the-peopl...
- At least in the U.S. (and likely elsewhere) the design of the suburbs encourages neighborhoods with individual houses and very little walk able space (occasionally there are sidewalks or parks in the richer areas, but developments may be large and they're not evenly spaced throughout). Exclusionary zoning in the U.S. has also reduced the number of "third spaces" (coffee shops, malls, grocery stores, barber shops, etc. where people congregate and meet) near or in neighborhoods. This means fewer chance encounters since you have to plan to both go out in a car to meet. You have to find a friend then say "let's go get drinks at 13:00 across town at this place" instead of just happening to walk into the small neighborhood grocery and seeing each other. It's even worse in the exurbs where large housing developments have been created with no amenities nearby, sometimes within upwards of an hour drive!
There are a number of good books on how the built environment affects our social life, if you're interested. It's not specifically about suburbs but "Palaces for the People" by Eric Klinenberg is one of my favorites that covers a lot of this sort of thing.
- Klinenberg's book "Palaces for the People" is very worth a (quick) read. Talks about the importance of physical, "social infrastructure" (similar to the idea of "third places") in cities that enable people to weave communities ties that then lead them to be resilient in times of stress.
- Carnegie called libraries "palaces for the people" and that investment in libraries across the country created Third Places for people that in some communities are the only ones left. (This is something Klinenberg explored in his book by the same name.)
There's an opportunity for someone to continue Carnegie's legacy and fund and build anew libraries that continue that tradition but also make Third Place-ness central to their mission.
