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Turning to another theme, the panelists expressed varying degrees of concern about whether some of the necessary balances in exercising American citizenship have been breaking down, particularly in light of the bitter 2016 presidential election. Johann Neem, a Western Washington University historian of civil society and author of Creating a Nation of Joiners, noting that he was an immigrant, said that some of the abrasive language on both sides of the political divide made it “harder to have a home politically” in contemporary American society.