Giving Compass' Take:

• Nicole Corea from the Aspen Institute discusses J.D. Vance's book entitled, Hillbilly Elegy,  which analyzes the challenges of white, working class, rural communities who feel farther apart from the rest of America due to lack of social cohesion. 

• Vance says that the lack of common purpose serves no will to solve social problems. How does this mindset play out differently in rural and urban communities in the U.S.?  How can philanthropy address issues of social cohesion?

• Read about the importance of cohesion in turning around communities. 

When J.D. Vance sat down to write his first book, he intended for it to be a social commentary on the lives of his white, working-class, rural community. Vance’s memoir, Hillbilly Elegy, has become an oft-cited work in the conversation about the growing division between rural and urban Americans.

This anti-elite sentiment has bled into the white working class’ perceptions of the media. While Vance worries about Americans not trusting factual reporting due to partisan allegiance, he said that the Iraq War lead-up, the housing crisis, and other high-profile incidents in which the public was misled have made it hard for them to discern fact from fiction.

The willingness of Americans to isolate themselves from one another only contributes to the lack of social cohesion in this country. And without a sense of common purpose there is no will to solve our problems. In addition to running a nonprofit in Ohio, Vance now spends time thinking about how to get people of different backgrounds into the same room. “The fundamental barrier is that we don’t spend enough time with the people we share this country with,” he said.

Read the full article by Nicole Corea about social cohesion from The Aspen Institute.