Brookings Today, 10/20/14

A roundup of some of the content published today by Brookings.

• The new challenge to market democracies. Bill Galston explores the difficulties market democracies face in an era of diminished growth and a weakened middle class.
• Why the 2014 midterm elections will matter, or not. Tom Mann, writing as part of FixGov blog’s new 2014 midterm elections series, provides an overview of the upcoming midterm elections. “We have known for some time that the stars were aligned for a good Republican election year,” Mann writes.
• Nine economic facts about water in the U.S. The Hamilton Project presents nine economic facts that provide context to the water crisis in the U.S.
• Dangerous tensions in South Asia. Bruce Riedel explains why tensions between Pakistan and India are rising and why the “politics on both sides … leave little room for compromise or dialogue.”
• Changing the default on family planning. Isabel Sawhill and Joanna Venator examine why long-acting reversible contraception (LARCs) may provide the solution to unintended pregnancies by changing the default from getting pregnant if you do nothing (i.e., use contraception “in the moment”) to not getting pregnant if you do nothing.
• U.S. must respond to Islamic State threat (on Twitter). Darrell West and Josh Bleiberg say that the U.S. government must engage the so-called Islamic State in the online propaganda war.
• Building bridges in health care. There’s been considerable discussion recently about building a “Culture of Health” in communities across the nation. Mark McClellan discusses health care reform and the continued challenges.

Charmaine Crutchfield contributed to this post.