Equity is not just an ideal to admire. It can be defined, measured, and mapped. Visualizations are an increasingly important medium to communicate our values in a digital era. We have compiled some of the best visualizations that came our way this past year that featured measures of inequality and equity. We commend the researchers and institutions for their commitment and investment to this work.

The presidential election that was too vulgar for us to write about, with accusations too inarticulate to describe policies, and an intimidating atmosphere of racist, nativist and sexist extremism inflaming every imaginable social division, finally received the emotional outcome it created. Donald Trump beat Hillary Clinton in a historic upset destined to be known as the ultimate political demand for change.  For those dedicated to working against structural inequality, this may be the transformative change we …

Fifty years ago, Martin Luther King Jr. wrote “Why We Can’t Wait“ to dispel the notion that African Americans should be content to proceed on an incremental course toward full equality under the law and in the wider society. King observed, “Three hundred years of humiliation, abuse and deprivation cannot be expected to find voice in a whisper.” Yet waiting and whispering, rather than raising their voices for genuine inclusion, is what many seem to expect of the children and grandchildren of King’s generation even today.

The death of Freddie Gray, a 25 year-old black man, in the custody of Baltimore police appeared to be just another suspicious death of an unarmed black person in what had become a litany.  It followed the deaths of Walter Scott in South Carolina, and before him Eric Davis in Mississippi and before him Akai Gurley, John Crawford, Tamir Rice, Michael Brown and Eric Garner going back to last summer.  The country was not numb to acts of apparent police brutality anymore—far from it.  But we had begun to study and protest its occurrences with the conviction of …