Eyal Press

Why do some poor communities fall apart while others cohere? Community organization can help — up to a point.

On October 26, some two dozen reporters crammed into a conference room on the 18th floor of a concrete high-rise in downtown Newark to await the arrival of Hany Kiareldeen, a 31-year-old Palestinian man who, shortly before midnight on the previous day, had been released from the nearby Hudson County jail. An immigrant’s release from […]

Shortly after George W. Bush announced the creation of the White House Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives–launched on January 29 to facilitate a new era of partnership between the government and religious groups–the nation’s airwaves were filled with assertions about the unique capacity of religious organizations to solve our most intractable social problems. “Study […]

Were it not for the butterfly ballots in Palm Beach County and the Democratic Party’s failure to insist on a statewide recount of the Florida vote, the crisis that has engulfed America since September 11 would be unfolding in a vastly different political landscape. Both houses of Congress would still be controlled by Republicans. Attorney […]

On April 14, 1998, two days after Easter, Janice Lacy called the Appleridge group home in Houston, Texas, to see how her sister Trenia had spent the holiday. “They told me she’d had a nice Easter and was asleep,” says Janice, recalling her conversation with a caregiver at the home where Trenia […]