Recent BI and Substack Posts

Curiosity will get you SO FAR. …Never underestimate the power of being curious and likeable!  It will get you so far in life! And it’s massively, massively underestimated.

To really do bridge building work credibly, you can't assume an outcome. You have to move upstream. and you have to be about means and not about ends. You have to trust that the ends will go where the universe wants them to go. (Full interview)

A discussion of ends and means, incentives, interventions, scale, challenges, successes, visions--Kristen's vision is clear and exceptionally wide ranging at the same time. (Summary of full interview)

Defusing the hyper-polarization spiral is an extremely large and complex task. This newsletter introduces a promising strategy for working at this level.

A comparison of three conflict roles, all of which are needed to successfully confront challenging and complex social problems and issues.

A review of Louis Kriesberg's seven elements of constructive conflict, as illustrated in the closing chapter of his new book Fighting Better: Constructive Conflicts in America.

A review of a new (December 2022) book looking at the struggle for class, status, and power equity in the United States from 1945- 2022, drawing lessons about what strategies work and which don't.

Just as a body needs coordination between its different parts, so does the democracy ecosystem. Everyone has a role to play!

Transforming democracy is an adaptive challenge requiring flexibility, adaptability and intentionality in organizing to enable organizations and millions of Americans to work in unison.

Fixing democracy is everyone's responsibility: we can't leave it to our leaders or the other side. Everyone can -- and must -- do their part.

Issue polarization can help people come closer to understanding "the truth" about controversial events or issues. How information is presented to parties in conflicts makes a big difference to the quality of the conflict that ensues.

Boulding's First Law is ""If it exists, it must be possible." All of the essential elements of democracy exist--though sometimes in other contexts. We need to implement them in our governance systems.

Rising heat is not necessarily bad--it shows changes are needed. But we need to pursue those changes constructively, as attempts to overpower or destroy the other will also destroy ourselves.

The language used to refer to the right is just making things worse, not better. The substance of the left's arguments matters too.

Successful democracies control destructive escalation, promote respectful communication, use verified facts for decision making, and balance power among constituency groups fairly.

Attacks on the rule of law in the U.S.A. are having an impact on the political mores of other democracies. The U.S. badly needs to update its own democracy to preserve the safety and prosperity of all around the world.

The primary role of bridge-builders in America at this time is to "call in," not to "call out." That this does not make us irrelevant, it makes us essential.

This metaphor leads to a binary assumption: I'm right, they are wrong. We'd be well served dropping that assumption, and listening to others to learn how they might, actually, be right, and we are wrong.

We cannot change anyone’s opinions, values, ideas, attitudes, judgments, or viewpoints, but, we can understand each other better through learning conversations and use those to find common ground.

While the worst anti-democratic outcomes may have been averted, this election was still not good for hyper-polarization, and perhaps not good for democracy either.

This process focuses on five questions examining the nature of the different beliefs and opinions, and how they might be dealt with most constructively depending on whether they are fact-based, moral, or both.

A visioning exercise yields a credible plan for significantly reducing political polarization -- with many additional benefits to individuals, organizations, and society as a whole as well.

This newsletter focuses on the importance of continuing our efforts to strengthen democracy, and considers one obstacle to doing that: being too sure of oneselves (the QED trap).

The QED trap locks people into a win-lose struggle for power that eliminates any chance of learning, compromise, or collaboration.

Julia Roig, Lisa Schirch, Colin Rule and Duncan Autrey examine the meaning of, and the benefits and costs of polarization, and what could be done to limit the costs and improve our democracy.