City on the Edge

A particular scene in San Francisco, late in 2023, offered a study in the city’s civic dissonance. As the APEC summit approached, a painter meticulously applied gold leaf to the ornate doors of City Hall, preparing for the arrival of world leaders, including Chinese President Xi Jinping. Mere blocks away, municipal crews dismantled homeless encampments, relocating their inhabitants away from the planned routes of diplomatic motorcades. Such juxtapositions, gleaming preparations for diplomatic steps from stark degradation, reveal San Francisco as a microcosm of broader American contradictions. Its extremes mirror America’s own fissures: great wealth beside abject poverty, innovation alongside bureaucratic stasis, progressive yearnings actively thwarting effective governance. The Bay Area has long incubated cultural and technological shifts, yet remains far from a utopia. San Francisco’s acute difficulties unfold at an accelerating pace, offering a concentrated view of the choices that confront the country.