Recent BI and Substack Posts

Jay Rothman shared his 2013 article in which "intersectionality" is seen as aiding intergroup cooperation, not harming it.

Reports from colleagues and others in allied fields about US democracy and related topics.

Colin Rule says that intersectionality means that all oppressed people should support each other in their mutual efforts to realize their basic human rights to live in peace and have self determination, and hence is good.

Both Israelis and Palestinians deserve safety, justice, and dignity. They will only find these basic human rights when they can give them to each other.

A summary of the Burgess's latest thinking about massively parallel peacebuilding and democracy building explaining how it is already taking place on a large scale.

More important ideas from our colleagues and writers in allied fields.

More articles from our friends, colleagues and others about hyper-polarization as well as the Israel/Hamas war.

A consideration of the factors that are making the Israel/Hamas war so exceptionally difficult even to talk about (civilly at least) let alone solve.

Reflecting on messages from readers about our Israel/Hamas writing and why we see this as differently as we do from many of our colleagues.

New comments from Israeli peacebuilder Julia Chaitin and U.S. psychotherapist Madeline Taylor about the Israel/Hamas war.

A review of what we've focused on and what we've learned since starting this newsletter 20 months ago, and a discussion of where we plan to go in the months ahead.

Colleague and context articles on U.S. hyperpolarization, Israel/Hamas, and other conflicts from around the world.

A compilation of the first comments we have received about our Israel/Hamas war discussion posts. There is much to think snd debate about here!

Risk and uncertainty are scary, and are often avoided by cognitive traps which pretend we have certainty when we don't. Better to remain flexible, so we can respond effectively as the situation clarifies.

A mixture of U.S. and Israel colleague and context posts for this week.

Chilling testimony from an Israeli peace activist living near the Gaza/Israeli border, and her thoughts about ways forward.

Polarization is afflicting both leaders and followers, and the feedback between the two makes the problem worse. Key to fighting that is reinvigorating the value of political pluralism and openness to divergent views of problems and solutions, starting first at the local and state levels.

A special edition of our colleague and context posts, all focused on the Israel/Palestinian war of 2023.

From a conflict resolution and peacebuilding perspective, reflections on Hamas' horrific attack on Israel and the role that our field has played and could play in shaping this tragedy.

Essential Partners has figured out both how to scale dialogue at least to the community level, if not beyond, and to make the relationship improvements dialogue engenders sustainable over the long term.

More interesting links from our colleagues and people allied with and of interest to the conflict and peacebuilding fields.

We need to distinguish between good-faith and bad-faith actors, and also between intentional and reluctant bad-faith actors, dealing with each in a different way.

More interesting and important articles from our colleagues and others in allied fields.

Citizens' assemblies are an ancient form of governance, used by the Athenians in the 5th Century B.C., whose time has come again. Daniel Stid reports on their increasing use and benefits around the world, including in the U.S.

Sorting out "real facts" from "fake facts" gets more difficult all the time. But there are ways to do it. And it matters. Because facts can "bite you," even if you don't believe they are true.