Recent BI and Substack Posts

The second of two posts by Stories Change Power CEO Piper Hendrix offering lessons on how we can strengthen our democracy, while simultaneously strengthening our relationships and ourselves.

The first of two posts by Stories Change Power CEO Piper Hendrix offering lessons on how we can strengthen our democracy, while simultaneously strengthening our relationships and ourselves.

Catching up from the holiday--lots of New Year's reading.

Daniel Stid applies the "Willie Sutton Rule" to governance reform. Work (and provide funding) where the action and motivation is--at the local and state levels, not the federal level.

Another set of important readings to give us all much to ponder over this holiday break.

Highlights from the webinar announcing the launch of the Phase II Civil Rights Mediation Oral History Project website -- including 11 new interviews added to 19 original ones, all telling amazing stories of how CRS "did the impossible."

Catching up, we have a lot of interesting readings to share today.

Excerpts from a conversation we had with computer scientist/journalist/peacebuilding and AI expert Jonathan Stray about all of that and how AI might actually be able to help us reduce polarization and heal U.S. democracy.

A list of questions we need to answer as we consider how the democracy we are working for should be structured and should function.

The 7th installment of our "Big Picture Series," this post explains why "massively parallel" action--in peacebuilding, problem solving, democracy building, and civic renewal is the best way to deal with the staggering complexity and scale of society-wide conflicts.

More important readings we want to share.

An obituary for the U.S. Department of Justice Community Relations Service, reflecting on its important work and what is being lost with its closure.

Thoughts on how to have good holiday conversations, not angry ones.

A pre-holiday set of readings. We have much to think about.

In his Better Conflict Bulletin, Jonathan Stray asks his readers how to stop our serious democratic backsliding. We respond that decoupling partisan politics from "saving democracy" is key.

Another sobering set of articles to highlight the importance of Veteran's day and what it commemorates.

The scale and complexity of society-wide conflicts make them unmanageable with small scale, technical fixes that work with interpersonal disputes. We need large scale complex processes to address such conflicts constructively.

Longtime Israeli/Palestinian peacebuilder talks about living in Israel during the war, some causes and outcomes of the war, and what she hopes for now.

More important readings we want to share.

Constructive confrontation takes the lessons from conflict resolution and peacebuilding and applies them to advocacy. The result is a strategy that is less likely to provoke backlash, and hence is more likely to succeed.

If we are going to succeed at the Great Reframing, we need to reclaim our "information agency" and alter our business-as-usual information feeds.

Highlighted links, reader suggested links, and our usual Colleague, News and Opinion links for this week.

Jay Rothman explains why he has been quiet for two years, and why he is emerging now. He also issues a call to all peacebuilders to rise to this important moment for the Middle East and the world.

Those working to save democracy must decide whether they want to work toward the Grand democratic Bargain, or if they want to continue to pursue IFYFI rules to overpower the other side. The first will actually help save democracy. The latter, likely, will not.

Articles on political violence in the U.S., the potential end of the Israel/Hamas war and much more.