Better Ways to Live: Honoring Social Inventors, Exploring New Challenges

Everybody knows what a physical invention is, but what is a social invention? On the community level, it can be as simple as a story-telling evening or an “abundance swap,” both among the many examples described here. On the global level, the Peace Corps was a social invention. "Better Ways to Live" celebrates many successful social inventions, and explores challenges that invite new ways of working together. It’s a form of creativity, inventing the social forms that enrich our lives. The great thing about social inventions is that anybody can borrow the ideas. During his famous trip to the U.S., Alexis de Tocqueville, author of "Democracy in America," praised our right of free association and community empowerment. Through stories of notable social inventions, and exploration of new challenges, "Better Ways to Live" invites us to extend our communal success.

When in college, Craig K. Comstock urged JFK to propose in his presidential campaign what became the Peace Corps, and in the 1980s he worked with an entrepreneur and philanthropist to support efforts to end the Cold War, including citizen diplomacy. Both of these initiatives involved social inventions. A graduate of Harvard College, the author worked as co-director of the William James Center in Berkeley, as a book creation coach, and as director of a foundation. Recently he wrote The Gratitude Trilogy, consisting of Gift of Darkness, about a friend who grew up under Nazi rule in occupied Amsterdam; Enlarging Our Comfort Zones, a memoir of a decade, mainly about remarkable people whom he met and in some cases worked with; and now Better Ways to Live, about social invention. These books are self-contained, united not by subject, but by an attitude.