In this issue

The justices of the nation’s highest court have a bird’s-eye view of the nation’s discord. But Lee Epstein trains her binoculars on them as they do their work.

Using modern, high-tech analysis tools, anthropologist Michael Frachetti is leading groundbreaking research on an ancient city high in the Uzbekistan mountains. The site may hold clues to how medieval civilizations changed when diverse communities integrated — and even suggest how we might consider our own current initiatives of global community-building.