Todd Gitlin (“A Gathering Swarm”) is a professor of journalism and sociology at Columbia University and a contributing writer for Mother Jones. His most recent book is Letters to a Young Activist.

Michael Kazin (“Life of the Party”) passed out leaflets for Adlai Stevenson on the streets of Englewood, New Jersey, at the age of eight and now teaches history at Georgetown University. He is currently at work on a biography of William Jennings Bryan.

Marla Cone (“Dozens of Words for Snow, None for Pollution”) is a Los Angeles Times staff writer who has come to know the Arctic as “a paradoxical place of ancient traditions and modern amenities.” Her book, Silent Snow: The Slow Poisoning of the Arctic, will be published in May.

Peter Maass (“A Touch of Crude”) so angered the dictator of Equatorial Guinea while reporting this story—about that country’s questionable dealings with U.S. bankers and oil companies—that he was deported and had to file from Nigeria. (He was later invited back with an apology.) Maass’ book, Love Thy Neighbor: A Story of War, is an account of the conflict in the former Yugoslavia. He is working on a book about oil.

Paul Fusco (“Coming Home”) is a New York-based photographer who has been documenting social issues for more than 40 years for magazines such as Look, Time, Life, Newsweek, and the New York Times Magazine. His photo essay on New York women mourning police brutality ran in the September/October 2000 issue of Mother Jones.

Gary Greenberg (“The Condemned”) is a psychotherapist, college professor of psychology, and occasional journalist. His writing on science and public policy has appeared in The New Yorker, Rolling Stone, and Harper’s.

Wyatt Gallery (“The Condemned”) is a regular photography contributor to Mother Jones. His work last appeared in “Down Upon the Suwannee River” (September/October 2003), a story about the threat to wetlands in Florida.