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Alan Ehrenhalt

Alan Ehrenhalt

Contributing Editor

Alan Ehrenhalt served for 19 years as executive editor of Governing Magazine, and is currently one of its contributing editors. He has been a frequent contributor to The New York Times Book Review and op-ed page, the Washington Post Book World, New Republic and The Wall Street Journal. He is the author of four books: The United States of Ambition, The Lost City, Democracy in the Mirror, and The Great Inversion. He was also the creator and editor of the first four editions of Politics in America, a biennial reference book profiling all 535 members of Congress. Alan Ehrenhalt is a 1968 graduate of Brandeis University and holds an MS in journalism from Columbia. He was a Nieman Fellow at Harvard from 1977-1978; a Visiting Scholar at the University of California, Berkeley, in 1987-1988; a Regents’ Lecturer at UCLA in 2006; an adjunct faculty member at the Jepson School of Leadership Studies, at the University of Richmond, from 2004 through 2008; and an adjunct faculty member at the University of Maryland Graduate School of Public Policy in 2009. In 2000 he received the American Political Science Association’s McWilliams award for distinguished contributions to the field of political science by a journalist. He is married, has two daughters, and lives in Arlington, Virginia.

He can be reached at ehrenhalt@yahoo.com.

For centuries, commerce and fresh air went together. They’re starting to again.
A look back at their evolution may offer some idea of what lies ahead.
Cities and states have very different ideas for fixing decrepit urban highways.
They vow to rev up the local economy all the time, exposing their misunderstanding of cities and political office.
The stadiums that cities invest in often end up losing money. There’s another, more profitable option: music festivals.
It's making a comeback in public schools. But to really make voters more informed, the curriculum could use an overhaul.
Cities are increasingly viewing parking in a negative light and rethinking its place in metropolitan America.
Cities love to boast that they're special. It's not always true, but it can be a useful myth.
There are lots of ideas out there. None of them are working very well.
There’s a common perception that the Establishment is disappearing. In fact, it died decades ago at all levels of government.