Someone may need to tell Carlton Turner that he’s working to save democracy.

Turner is co-director of the Mississippi Center for Cultural Production in the town of Utica, population 600, where his family has lived for eight generations. The organization, better known as Sipp Culture, is helping breathe life into a region that’s seen schools, grocery stores, and factories shutter or leave. A project in the works: transformation of one of Utica’s oldest buildings into a cultural center and commercial kitchen.

While that may seem like traditional community development, a new philanthropic venture sees Turner as key to grand ambitions to shore up democracy. On Monday, the Trust for Civic Life named Sipp Culture one of 20 inaugural grantees in its bid to reinvigorate rural, often high-poverty towns, regions, and tribal areas. A collaborative of 15 grant makers — most of them high-profile national funders — the trust sees small, local groups as instruments of change — modern versions of the organizations that scholars from Alexis de Tocqueville to Robert Putnam have singled out as a distinguishing feature of American democracy.

The trust announced $8 million in funding, the first installment of what it says will be investments of $50 million over five years. Grantees exemplify what the trust calls “everyday democracy” as they bring people together to address often-fundamental concerns, whether that’s a fading industry, a dilapidated park, or access to quality health care.

“Pragmatic problem-solving is the most effective way to build trust and counter polarization,” said Charlie Brown, executive director of the trust. “Efforts don’t have to be labeled ‘democracy’ or ‘civic’ to contribute toward a stronger democracy. And sometimes the more we try to convince people to participate in our democracy and be democratic, the more we alienate them from the process.”

Grantees “don’t ever have to see themselves as democracy advocates,” said Sarah Cross, a vice president with Stand Together, a trust partner. “They care about the issues that are keeping them from being able to feed their families and educate their kids and have safe and strong communities.”

Here are takeaways from this new venture as it launches:

  • The trust bills itself as cross-ideological collaboration.
  • It’s a rare investment by national philanthropy in small groups in rural America.
  • The grantees look nothing like the groups that many other democracy-minded funders are backing.
  • The trust sees poor parts of the country and areas in transition as democracy laboratories.
  • The measures of impact will be critical.
  • The work may stir opposition.

Read the full article about betting big on rural America by Drew Lindsay at The Chronicle of Philanthropy.