Indianapolis readers, next Wednesday the 29th at 6:00pm, First Things magazine and American Reformer will be hosting a northside event with Andrew Walker of Southern Baptist Theological Seminary and me. We will be discussing how to faithfully publicly engage in the negative world, drawing on my three worlds of evangelicalism article of course. This will be a small, intimate event - and it’s also free. See all the details and
I agree and have made the same observation on many occasions. My 46 year career has been in economic development and development-related roles in all three sectors in the Midwest. I have watched this trend emerge and influence the way local decisions are made. I've also been a part of that as the "corporate guy" following a consolidation/roll-up in the utility industry. The impact of the trend is seldom positive. Now, there are project or initiative-specific advantages - the new, corporate level influencers do have access to larger pots of capital or support funding sources, so the support amounts can be larger than the locals could afford to supply IF it aligns with corporate goals/sympathies. However, the local decision making, risk taking, leadership, are all sacrificed. We make weaker local decisions than in the past, and when we do make a decision, the "leaders" are usually corporate types who look at whatever "woke" sympathies they need to appeal to in order to maintain the corporate good and their career path, while simultaneously writing a check to some charity to clearly display they "really do have the best interest of the community" in mind. I could write my own blog post on this topic - maybe I will - but I appreciated reading your take on it.
I agree and have made the same observation on many occasions. My 46 year career has been in economic development and development-related roles in all three sectors in the Midwest. I have watched this trend emerge and influence the way local decisions are made. I've also been a part of that as the "corporate guy" following a consolidation/roll-up in the utility industry. The impact of the trend is seldom positive. Now, there are project or initiative-specific advantages - the new, corporate level influencers do have access to larger pots of capital or support funding sources, so the support amounts can be larger than the locals could afford to supply IF it aligns with corporate goals/sympathies. However, the local decision making, risk taking, leadership, are all sacrificed. We make weaker local decisions than in the past, and when we do make a decision, the "leaders" are usually corporate types who look at whatever "woke" sympathies they need to appeal to in order to maintain the corporate good and their career path, while simultaneously writing a check to some charity to clearly display they "really do have the best interest of the community" in mind. I could write my own blog post on this topic - maybe I will - but I appreciated reading your take on it.
Timely read today given this morning's news that Kellogg seems to be abandoning Battle Creek to hang out at Grant Park in Chicago.