James Fallows, founding Chairman of New America’s Board of Directors, is an acclaimed author, journalist, editor, and media commentator. Currently a staff writer for the Atlantic and formerly Editor of U.S. News & World Report, Fallows is also known to public radio listeners through his commentaries on Morning Edition in the 1980s and 1990s, Weekend All Things Considered in the 2000s, and more recently on Marketplace.
Fallows has authored several influential books, including Looking at the Sun, More Like Us, Blind Into Baghdad, and National Defense, for which he won a National Book Award. His reporting on the Iraq war won a National Magazine Award in 2003. His 1996 book, Breaking the News, helped spark a much-needed national debate about the profound problems in American journalism. Two recent books, Postcards from Tomorrow Square and China Airborne, are based on his years of reporting from China, from 2006 to 2008. In 2018 he and his wife, Deborah, a former New America fellow, published their bestselling book Our Towns, about economic and cultural resilience in small and medium-sized towns. Their book was the basis for an HBO documentary film in 2021, and for their new Our Towns Civic Foundation.