In many PCs, the first software to run after hitting the power button is called BIOS (Basic Input-Output System). BIOS loads the computer’s operating system and the individual settings that make your personal computer so...personal. A malfunction at this most basic level leads to a cascade of other problems, including error messages, poor performance, or refusing to boot at all.
It’s important to get the foundational things right, and not just in our computers. For too long, says Blake Pagenkopf, author of The Structure of Political Positions, our political discourse has been hobbled by a fundamental error—an error not just in our language but in the structures beneath that language. In particular, we tend to locate ourselves and others as points on a single line, a Left-Right spectrum. But this one-dimensional paradigm is too limiting. There are too many data points that fall outside the conventional Left-Right political modes, says Pagenkopf. We need to reboot our politics with a fuller, richer way to frame our political disagreements. We need to upgrade our political BIOS.
In today’s episode of the Strong Towns podcast, Strong Towns president Chuck Marohn talks with Pagenkopf about why we must transition from a one-dimensional view of political positions to a two-dimensional view—with a Values Axis (the familiar Left-Right/Liberal-Conservative line) but also a Power Axis, from “centralized” at the top to “citizen-based” below.
Marohn and Pagenkopf talk about how Pagenkopf’s background in architecture helped him think differently about political positions, and why the current approach obscures opportunities to work together...and delegitimizes some people altogether. They talk about why the Strong Towns movement is one part of a larger “meta-movement” that doesn’t fit traditional liberal-conservative modes. And they discuss how a two-dimensional view reveals surprising bright spots in our politics, right when we need them most.
Additional Show Notes:On the Conservative Reaction to 15-Minute Cities
The Property Tax System is Broken—Regrid Works on Tools to Help Fix It
Jeff Speck on the 10th-Anniversary Edition of Walkable City
Lawsuit Update: Making a Stand for Engineers in the Minnesota State Court of Appeals
Mike Hathorne: Where Does Decision-Making Need to Occur in Our Communities?
Ben Hunt: In Praise of Bitcoin
Thanks for a Great Year
Sam Quinones: True Tales of America and Hope in the Time of Fentanyl and Meth
Get Ready for #BlackFridayParking
The Impact of Systemic Racism on Jackson’s Water Crisis
A Behind-the-Scenes Look at the Most Comprehensive Resource Strong Towns Offers
A Whole New Framework for Analyzing Car Crashes
This Is How the Strong Towns Movement Becomes “Unignorable”
The Power of Talking Locally Over the Noise of National Politics
The Strong Towns Strategy
Water System Crises and Solutions
The Highway Boondoggles Report
What Customer Service Should Mean for a City
Hawaii’s Suburban Experiment
The Jackson Water Crisis Is Not a Fluke—Your City Could Be Next
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