Non-Inflammatory Communication

Civic Knowledge and Skills That We All Need to Constructively Handle Intractable Conflict

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This introductory article was written by ChatGPT at the direction of Heidi Burgess, who reviewed, edited, and approved the final content.
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May 22, 2025

People in conflict often say things that make their opponents feel attacked, shamed, or threatened. This is understandable, especially when the issues are serious and the emotions are strong. But inflammatory communication often backfires. It makes the other side less able to hear the speaker’s real concerns and more likely to respond with denial, counterattack, or withdrawal. Escalation-limiting language is designed to do the opposite. It does not require people to hide their concerns or soften their values. It asks them to say hard things in ways that others have at least some chance of hearing.

One common tool is the use of I-messages instead of you-messages. A you-message says, “You are selfish,” or “You don’t care what happens to us.” An I-message says, “I am worried that our concerns are not being taken seriously.” The second statement may communicate the same basic problem, but it does so without forcing the other person to begin by defending their character. This matters because people can sometimes acknowledge a problem more easily if doing so does not require them to admit that they are bad, stupid, or malicious. A good I-message is not a disguised accusation. It is a clear statement of how a situation affects the speaker and why it matters.

Another important shift is from blame to contribution. As our Frontiers video on "The Blame Game" explains, blame looks backward and judges who is at fault. Contribution asks how different actions, decisions, and misunderstandings helped create the present problem, and what can now be done differently. This does not mean that all parties are equally responsible. It does mean that a conflict is more likely to improve when people look for the pattern that needs to be changed, rather than only for the person or group that deserves condemnation.

Non-inflammatory communication also means focusing on interests rather than fixed positions. The principled negotiation approach associated with Getting to Yes emphasizes that positions are what people demand, while interests are the underlying concerns that make those demands important. A position might be “we will never accept this plan.” The interests underneath might involve safety, cost, dignity, religious commitment, environmental protection, or fear of being ignored. Some values and rights really are non-negotiable. But when every preference is framed that way, parties leave themselves little room to solve problems creatively.

Good communication also requires saying what one actually means. Slogans can mobilize supporters, but they can also invite opponents to hear the most extreme possible version of a demand. The phrase “Defund the Police” is a useful example. As the Brookings Institution explained, many advocates used the phrase to mean redirecting some police funding toward other services, not abolishing policing altogether. At the same time, a Yale study found that many people opposed the movement because they feared that its policy goals would endanger public safety. Whatever one thinks about the substance of the proposal, the case illustrates the danger of overstating or compressing a complicated concern into language that opponents are almost certain to hear as threatening. Non-inflammatory communication is not weaker communication. It is more accurate, more strategic, and more likely to move a conflict toward constructive engagement.

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This page was created by ChatGPT in response to this prompt. It was then reviewed, edited, supplemented and approved by Heidi Burgess. More information about how and why we are using AI in this way, and about the growing number of ways in which Beyond Intractability is using ChatGPT, Claude and other AI systems to generate content and build out the BI system, is available on our BI/AI Overview Page.