National Commission seeks recommendations on role of humanities and social sciences in local communities in preparation for report to Congress

Danielle Allen shares how her family’s history of civic engagement inspires her belief in America’s constitutional democracy.

“Democracy is under siege.” So begins the Summer 2017 issue of Dædalus on “The Prospects & Limits of Deliberative Democracy.”

The Winter 2021 issue of Dædalus “On the Novel,” guest-edited by Michael Wood, features fourteen essays, written by scholars with a variety of approaches and interests, that offer remarkable insights into the behavior of this versatile literary form.

On June 19–20, 2019, the Academy convened an Exploratory Meeting in Boston, MA, on “Water in Our Future.” The participants included water program officials, water policy experts, research scientists, and scholars in the humanities and sciences from the United States and around the world. The meeting was organized to help identify key questions related to water security and to inform how a potential Academy project might make a contribution in this area.

This online data set – the first of its kind – attracted extensive attention in the news media and in the blogosphere and the website received more than 250,000 hits originating from 38 countries. The prototype includes 74 indicators and more than 200 tables and charts.

Private and public pushes to increase STEM education have given rise to new concerns about the value of a liberal arts education. Humanities Indicators reports that the number of bachelor’s degrees in the humanities that were earned in 2015 was down nearly 10 percent from three years earlier.

Danielle Allen assesses the threats that new AI tools may pose to American democracy.

The humanities are anomalous in their focus on academe as being “the one true career path” for students, Robert Townsend said, which is why he feels he has to defend the importance of career diversity.

The 2015 Induction Ceremony included presentations by five new members: Phil S. Baran, Patricia Smith Churchland, Roland G. Fryer, Jr., Sally Haslanger, and Darren Walker.

Where does creativity come from? That is the question that animated a December 2025 concert lecture delivered by clinical psychiatrist Richard Kogan (Weill Cornell Medical College) at the House of the Academy in Cambridge.

Economic uncertainty is a disruptive force in American life. Too many families are unable to achieve the life they want despite their best efforts, too many communities have not benefited fully from national economic growth, and too many Americans believe the economy does not work for people like them. In a 2021 Pew Research Center survey, 66 percent of Americans felt that the nation’s economy needs major reforms, while just 6 percent felt it should remain unchanged. Coupled with the current challenges facing American democracy, these trends contribute to the growing distrust of political and economic institutions. While it often seems that the nation cannot agree on much, there is widespread agreement that changes are needed to bolster opportunity and to allow more Americans to share in the nation’s prosperity.

Immigration is not only where the people come from, and why they come, and whether they are forced to come; it's also how and, in the long run, whether they are received.