Values

When addressing immigration in the current economic climate, it is clear that advocates need to support arguments with facts. It’s equally clear, however, that facts will only go so far. Research shows that people are often most motivated by their values—and if data don’t support their deeply held beliefs, audiences will reject them.  So we need to shape conversations with values, and then support our arguments with the best data available. This memo sets forth some ideas about how to do this when it comes to opportunity and inclusion for immigrants.

During an election year, how can you promote your issue with limited resources?  This sheet offers simple ways to promote the concept of community values, but you can use it to think about how to promote a variety of causes and issues. 

This Op-ed is an example of harnessing a media opportunity, in this case the Iowa caucuses, to frame a message.

 A third-generation Italian-American and first-generation Chinese immigrant talk about health care and a living wage.

If the promise of opportunity is a core national commitment, it is essential to measure our success in fulfilling that commitment.  This report assesses the nation’s progress toward protecting and expanding opportunity for all Americans and encourages our policymakers, through bold leadership and innovative policies, to ensure the promise of o

This fact sheet reviews the history of disinvestment in FEMA and offers recommendations for rebuilding our national infrastructure for safety and opportunity.

By: Jill Mizell

December 9, 2011

Americans’ views of family are undergoing major shifts. Divisions arise over definitions of family, and many still hold a negative view of single parents, particularly mothers. Polling research shows the wide range of attitudes and perceptions that lead Americans to judge other people’s families, including families that do not mirror their own. 

Check out our channel on YouTube.  See video clips that show the state of opportunity—or lack thereof—in America. We feature man on the street interviews, produced video spots, mini documentaries, and other videos that we encourage people to share with their friends, and hope that social justice advocates will use in their work.

 Year after year, equal opportunity and fairness are critically important values on the minds of Americans. Surveys find a collective desire for greater economic equality, greater government involvement in employment and opportunity, and a more widespread distribution of wealth, but people don’t think that these values are reflected in the current economy.  For example, a November 2011 poll found that just over half of Americans said that a major problem in the U.S. is that “everyone does not have an equal chance in life.” The same number agreed with this statement in September 2010. More than two of three Democrats and one in two Independents agreed, but more than half of Republicans disagreed. 

The edges are fraying.  While xenophobia is nothing new in American life, the use of particularly rancorous and fear-inspiring rhetoric by prominent spokespeople, affiliated with mainstream institutions that have real power to shape our dialogue, is surely on the rise, and ideas that were once whispered (or grumbled under the breath, perhaps after one too many drinks) are becoming increasingly mainstream.  These ideas not only demean us all, but they are also one of the surest harbingers of those dark events in our nation’s history—the Red Scare, the Chinese Exclusion and Geary Acts, Executive Order 9066—that most fundamentally undermine our founding values.  

Shirley Sherrod, as most of us know by now, is the Agriculture Department official vilified this week after a distorted video posted by right-wing blogger Andrew Breitbart went viral. When the facts were in, it was clear that Breitbart had engaged in an intentional and callous attempt to smear Ms. Sherrod, an African American, and the NAACP with a false charge of racism.

While we’re spending our federal funds on policies that threaten both human rights at the border and judicial and prosecutorial safeguards, is there room for us to reaffirm our commitment to human dignity and due process? 

In light of International Women’s Day and the 54th United Nations Commission on the Status of Women, on Tuesday, March 9th, the Urban Agenda’s Human Rights Project, The National Council on Research for Women and the Center for Women’s Global Leadership joined together with The Opportunity Agenda to hold a side event at the UN Commission on the Status of Women.

According to a 2007 poll, Americans define human rights as the rights to equal opportunity, freedom from discrimination, a fair criminal justice system, and freedom from torture or abuse by law enforcement. Despite the current political wrangling over how to reform it, a majority of Americans even believe that access to health care is a human right.

Belief in opportunity is a bedrock American value. The lure of the hope that your circumstances will be dictated by your ability and your effort is the primary motivation that brings people from the rest of the world to our shores. Central to a belief in opportunity is the ideal of equality – the thought that we all begin from the same starting line.

The University of California's Regents recently announced plans to raise undergraduate fees, the functional equivalent of tuition, an eye-popping 32% for the upcoming school year.  While desperate times do call for desperate measures—and these are indeed desperate times for California’s budget—erecting economic obstacles to educational achievement will only hurt the state in the long-run.  California became a leader in high-tech industries like software and semi-conductors by fostering the type of innovation that only comes from providing economic opportunity for all, and it can doom itself to long-term economic obsolescence by making higher education a luxury good.

This week's roundup covers some state immigration news and a few book reviews. 

One of the themes President Obama spoke about in his speech the other night was returning to the America we grew up knowing--returning to the America which we believe in.  In addressing the nation, President Obama reminded us that "living our values doesn't make us weaker.  It makes us safer, and it makes us stronger."