As the University of Washington prepared for the arrival of Dr. Paul
Farmer, a global health doctor and the subject of the campus common book,
Mountains Beyond Mountains (New York: Random House, 2003), a team
of faculty, administrators, and community leaders promoted ideas of global
citizenship both on and off the territorial boundaries of the campus. The
book, selected for its resonance with issues of general interest to the
campus (interdisciplinary approaches, student engagement, a new global
health initiative, the power of ideas, the role of entrepreneurship, and
the capacity for non-state actors in world politics to shape agendas), had
acquired a following more like a social movement than an administrative
initiative. Coffee shops adjoining the campus featured copies of the book,
and honors students coordinated and invited faculty members to come to
evening discussion sessions. As University of Washington Professor
Jonathan Mayer commented, “I have seen this book change careers and
change lives.”