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The Challenge
The foundation of fairness principles and the willingness to work together as a community is still not enough to assure good governance. One must also be able to successfully work through complex negotiations on difficult issues that are complicated by past tensions and the danger of misunderstanding. This requires sophisticated negotiation skills and the ability to take advantage of outside "third-party" assistance where appropriate. Among the issues that need to be addressed are:
- Miscommunication – Communication, especially with respect to emotionally charged issues, is fraught with opportunities for serious misunderstandings – misunderstandings that can make working together impossible and undermine fragile new relationships. The challenge is to design and teach people how to use communication skills that really work among people with diverse backgrounds.
- Cross-Cultural Considerations – Different cultures approach the problems of working together in very different ways. Negotiating across cultures requires that the parties understand one another's cultural orientations and that they identify and pursue some sort of mutually- acceptable plan for spanning those differences.
- Facilitation – Prospects for successful communication can often be enhanced by obtaining the services of skilled facilitators capable of helping the parties communicate more clearly.
- Mediation, Arbitration and Related Processes -- In addition to helping improve communication, mediators, artibrators and other types of "third parties" can help disputants move beyond apparent impasses. Effective third parties need to understand what processes are useful in what contexts, however. They must be able to adjust to cultural differences, and design processes that are effective in complex, deep-rooted, and escalated conflicts. Improving the quality and availability of such services is critical, as is developing a track record of success so that parties in need will know to seek such assistance and be willing to work with the third parties effectively when they arrive.
| The Commons does not have definitive answers to these tough problems. We do, however, think that we've started to pull together ideas that will be part of the solution. Still, what we have is only a start. Success will require contributions from people like you. Find out what you can do. |
Other Governance Challenges
- Improving Security
- Promoting Cooperative Relationships
- Assuring Efficiency and Effectiveness
Commons Resources
To help limit violence and intimidation the Commons offers the following:
Join / Contribute to the Commons
The Commons provides a broad range of tools which allow people from all backgrounds to join the Commons community. Commons members are invited to help make the Commons a better resource and, more importantly, to join the team of people actively working together to meet the challenge of Limiting Violence and Intimidation. Participation tools include opportunities to:
To help limit violence and intimidation the Commons offers the following:
- The Chronicle -- a frequently-changing "news and feature" page focused on goverance issues, analyses, and creative responses,
- Education Portal -- providing access to core knowledge needed to understand the challenges and potential solutions,
- Practitioner Portal -- with "actionable," practical advice for those dealing with particular governance problems,
- Research and Development Portal -- with information about efforts to advance the frontier of the field,
- Browse Page -- with browsable links to more in-depth information on dozens of violence-related topics,
- Search Page -- with simple and advanced searching of the many thousands of resources in the Commons knowledge base,
- Particpation Portal -- with information about how to use the Commons to advance your own goals (see more below).
The Commons provides a broad range of tools which allow people from all backgrounds to join the Commons community. Commons members are invited to help make the Commons a better resource and, more importantly, to join the team of people actively working together to meet the challenge of Limiting Violence and Intimidation. Participation tools include opportunities to:
- Provide comments and feedback on existing resources (follow the comment links at the bottoms of every Commons page),
- Suggest additional challenges (and sub-challenges) to cover using the comment page,
- Post announcements of governance-related activities and publications,
- Post challenges to the Commons community and suggest responses to challenges posed by others,
- Participate in (or convene and facilitate) working groups on specific governance related topics,
- Help edit Commons pages on particular topics (submit a comment form describing your areas of interest and we will send you details),
- Suggest others who should be invited to participate in the Commons initiative using the comment form,
- Publish materials on Commons-related topics through the Commons (use the comment form to explaining your areas of interest and request more information )
