Former Massachusetts Governor Deval Patrick has been on a listening tour over the past several months hearing folks’ answers to the question of what it means to be an American today. He sees this as an opportunity to gauge how willing this country is to do the hard work of closing the gap between who we are and who we are meant to be.
Back in June, Patrick wrote an essay titled “America Is Awakening To What It Means To Be Black. Will We Also Awaken To What It Means To Be American?” This moment feels different, he wrote, describing a “torrent of truth telling” around police violence and racial injustice. He shared his personal experiences of ‘driving while black’, even when being chauffeured in the official governor’s car, and how he stopped attending baseball and football games years ago, exhausted by fans yelling racist epithets.
“What may be different today is that realities in the lives of Black Americans for generations—the economic uncertainty and social marginalization, the barriers to moving up and forward, the retreat from public education, the way these issues become urgent at election time and then vanish in between — are now shared by Americans everywhere,” he wrote. “Whether because of the coronavirus, the culmination of ‘trickle-down economics,’ or the general incompetence of the current administration, America’s unfinished business is exposed.”
Patrick urged the marchers to keep on marching and called on leaders in government and business to start listening and “reinvent not only the systems that keep us safe but also the ones that help us flourish.”
Patrick sat down—virtually—with Skoll Foundation CEO Don Gips during the recent Stanford Social Innovation Nonprofit Management Institute conference. The two talked about the state of the American Dream, cross-sector collaboration during times of crisis, and signs of hope in troubling time.
“We’ve never really made our peace with integration, with living and working and playing and loving together,” Patrick told Gips. “That is among the kinds of issues exposed by COVID. What I am hoping for is that this work won’t be viewed anymore as the business of one sector or office—this work belongs to everybody. I think philanthropy plays an important role in innovating in these areas.”
Patrick spoke of the collective responsibilities inherent in a free society and how that shows up in the era of COVID-19.
They also spoke of the current opportunity in the U.S. to create and reinvent a nation that is true to its ideals. “Nations of great wealth have come and gone with the winds of time,” Patrick told Gips. “What makes America great is real faith in creating equality and opportunity. If that’s what we’re about, there must be a place for the marginalized.”
Patrick recently launched the Together Fund to deliver progressive change for America through generational responsibility, servant leadership, and progress through collaboration.
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