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Ted C. Fishman is an award-winning journalist, cultural critic and bestselling author whose work explores the forces shaping our world: economics, demographics, the built environment and the human stories behind global change. His critically acclaimed books include China, Inc. and Shock of Gray, which have been translated into dozens of languages and featured in major media worldwide. His newest book on the material world of concrete is expected in 2027. As a public intellectual, Ted's interests and writings are wide-ranging—from theater criticism to future trends to business analysis. His work has appeared in Bloomberg BusinessWeek, the New York Times Magazine, Harper's, Fast Company, The Atlantic and more. Ted delivers sharp analysis and compelling narratives on business, society, and culture. This archive features his journalism, criticism, essays, book reviews, and media coverage spanning decades of reporting from every corner of the globe.
Sep 9, 20231 min read
Journalism
The New Face of Law and Order
Cook County’s New No-Nonsense Top Prosecutor From Chicago magazine Eileen O’Neill Burke was elected Cook County State’s Attorney by vowing to get tough on crime. But her approach to making Chicago safer is more nuanced than you might think. Read more ...
Jan 22, 20251 min read
Worried about the future? History proves it's hard to predict.
From Fast Company Fifty years ago, 20 of the world's brightest people tried to predict life in 2024. They got an awful lot wrong. Read more ...
Nov 9, 20241 min read
How Swiss giant Holcim is creating more sustainable cement and concrete
From Fast Company Holcim is one of Fast Company’s Most Innovative Companies in the manufacturing category. Source: Fast Company The construction industry has been slow to innovate, reluctant to tinker with materials and methods designed to keep people safe from structural failures. But the building sector is also the source of 40% of the global greenhouse gas emissions that threaten the planet’s ecology. Holcim, the giant Swiss cement and concrete manufacturer (the largest ou
Mar 19, 20241 min read
Home Delivery: My Father and the Midcentury House Contest that Launched His Career
S. Guy Fishman’s 1951 Better Rooms Competition first prize entry. Entry detail of a view toward the terrace showing sleeping area at left and sitting area in right foreground. From NewCity Lit Between 1945 and 1946, when the end of World War II spurred the demobilization of 7.6 million Americans who were in military service, Chicago veterans returned to a city short by more than 100,000 homes. Homes affordable to young adults starting anew were especially lacking. The G.I. Bi
Jan 22, 20241 min read
This new cement could become America’s next big bumper crop and help save the world as we know it
Colorado-based Prometheus Materials and other emerging companies are developing new biocements that could help meet the world’s growing concrete demands and avert climate catastrophe. [Photo: Dave Burk/©SOM] The Bio-Block Spiral is a small, short wall, but it may be a bulwark against a giant threat: climate change. The curved, mud-colored structure is part of the current Chicago Architecture Biennial, entitled “Rehearsing the Future.” Unlike the artists’ installations filling
Dec 10, 20231 min read
Concrete Faith: How the Creation of the Bahá’í House of Worship Changed the Course of Architecture
The temple, a masterpiece of intricate, shimmery, seemingly delicate decoration.
Nov 1, 20231 min read
How China’s shrinking population is making it less competitive
From FastCompany In his latest book, not yet published in English, Trip.com founder and author James Liang sounds the alarm and calls for new government policies to encourage larger families. [Photo: vasiliki/Getty Images] China today is a tech giant, in large part because it is a giant. The country is home to the world’s largest population of capable young tech workers, all potential innovators. But China’s shrinking and aging population is on course to halve by the year 210
Sep 9, 20231 min read
Lofty History: Architectural Historian Thomas Leslie Offers a New History of Chicago’s Ever-Evolving Tall Buildings
Civic Center with “Untitled” (Pablo Picasso, 1965-1967). View from the south. (Author’s collection) From NewCity Design Thomas Leslie’s latest, deeply researched, visually handsome book on the history of Chicago skyscrapers took root in a long-ago moment of wonder and revelation beneath the Hancock building. His family was visiting the city. “I remember when I was twelve or thirteen and saw the John Hancock Tower for the first time and realized ‘Oh, that’s about the wind.’ Yo
Jun 12, 20231 min read
Solving the concrete paradox: How rebuilding Turkey could pave the way to a more sustainable future
From Fast Company By using a common form of clay as a supplement in the production of cement, manufacturers might reduce their carbon emissions by as much as 75 percent. [Source photo: Hakan Akgun/dia images/Getty Images] In the early morning hours of February 6, 2023, Turkey experienced its most powerful earthquake in more than 80 years. The quake, 7.8 on the Richter scale, together with strong aftershocks, killed more than 50,000 people, left one and a half million people
Jun 7, 20231 min read
The road to climate hell is paved with concrete
Concrete has profoundly improved the quality of human life, but the same material that shelters us from the elements wreaks havoc on the environment. This is part one of a series examining how the materials and construction industries are racing to reduce concrete’s environmental impact. [Photos: zhaojiankang/iStock/Getty Images Plus, Dmitrii Balabanov/iStock/Getty Images Plus] If you’re reading this, chances are you are now either touching concrete or touching something that
Dec 23, 20221 min read
Why the world’s most efficient cement plant needs to continue to innovate
From Fast Company The massive Ste. Geneviève complex on the banks of the Mississippi is the most efficient cement plant in the world, but can Holcim and others in the materials industry innovate fast enough to save us from climate catastrophe? This is part two of a series exploring the environmental impact of concrete. [Source Photo: Ted Fishman] I’m standing about 275 feet above the banks of the mighty Mississippi, watching scores of black buzzards circle and soar and swoop
Dec 10, 20221 min read
We Booked Jeff Deutsch: The Director of the Seminary Co-Op Talks About His New Volume Celebrating Bookstores, Including The Hyde Park Institution
Jeff Deutsch/Photo: Anne Ryan From NewCity Lit The Seminary Co-op Bookstore in Hyde Park is one of the world’s great academic bookstores. It has tens of thousands of volumes in stock. In 2018, the Sem Co-op sold 28,000 books. Of those, over 16,000 were titles that sold only one copy that year. “That means it’s one book, one title to one customer for the year,” says Jeff Deutsch, the director of the Seminary Co-op who steered the flagship shop and its sister store, 57th Street
Apr 28, 20221 min read
Best of Chicago 2021: Ted C. Fishman’s Personal Best
Photo: Ted C. Fishman From NewCity There’s nothing like emptyheadedness to clear the mind. Bobolink Meadow, a lush bit of fields, woods and water in Jackson Park, is where I go for a good lobe scrub. Over the last two anxious, sullying years the way the Meadow purges my intelligence has been just the ablution I’ve needed. I’m not alone. Mental health professionals have been heavily prescribing doses of wilder spaces for the afflictions of our era. The New York State Departmen
Nov 1, 20211 min read
The Conversation: Elly Fishman Discusses “Refugee High” (with her Dad)
Elly Fishman photographed in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. /Photo: Alyssa Schukar From NewCity Lit When NewCity asked me to interview my daughter, Elly Fishman, in advance of her upcoming book, “Refugee High,” I knew I wanted to ask about the drama in making the book. When Elly talked about her work she related what she was learning about the people she was getting to know. And “Refugee High” focuses so completely on them that I still didn’t know how she got so close to them and on w
Aug 5, 20211 min read
Midway to Java: The Forgotten Javanese Village in Chicago that Once Thrilled America
A panorama of the Midway at the World’s Columbian Exposition with the Java Village featured in the bottom left corner, 1893 Chicago. From Harper’s Weekly, May 1893. From NewCity From its dawn, Newcity has been a kind of world’s fair. I was on the cultural and culinary beats when the publication began, shortly after I moved back to Chicago after living in far-off alien places such as Japan and New York City. About a year before, I finished a happy two years in Indonesia where
Feb 8, 20211 min read
State and Local Governments Are Plunging Into Crisis
From The Atlantic State and local governments are being hit hard by the pandemic, and the consequences could be dangerous for democracy. The stakes couldn’t be higher. The loss of essential services hurts a community’s health, safety, and quality of life. It is also politically dangerous. Read more ...
May 21, 20201 min read
“The Shape of Water”
Can Chicago Survive Climate Change?
Apr 23, 20181 min read
Imperial Lamian’s Quest to Bring One of the World’s Great Cuisines to Chicago
Journey From Jakarta: Imperial Lamian’s Quest to Bring One of the World’s Great Cuisines to Chicago.
May 15, 20161 min read
The Scariest Threat You Didn’t Know About
Bomb Trains: The Scariest Threat You Didn’t Know About
Apr 25, 20161 min read
What Happened to Motorola
How a culture shift nearly doomed an iconic local company that once dominated the telecom industry. From Chicago magazine A big, silver-haired man wearing a dark suit, a Silicon Valley–style open-neck shirt, and a high-wattage smile steps up to the podium. Rick Osterloh has been the president and COO of Motorola Mobility for all of 10 days, the fourth man to run the place since its split from the mother ship. Read more ...
Aug 25, 20141 min read
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