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Constructive Conflict Guide > Civic Knowledge and Skills That We Can Use to Help Ourselves and Our Society More Constructively Handle Intractable Conflict > Constructively Handling Disputes That Can't Be Resolved with Mutually Acceptable Agreements
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BI Article
Rule of Law
Particularly since the end of the Cold War, the rule of law has increasingly been recognized as an important aspect of international conflict resolution and post-conflict peace building. Similarly, the absence of the rule of law is often implicated as a source of violence, human rights violations, and intractability.
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Effective Checks on Corruption and Individual Power
To be successful, 21st-century democracies need much more effective mechanisms for combating the tendency of power concentrations to lead to even greater (and more corrupt) power concentrations.
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Fair Processes for Making Win-Lose Decisions
When win-lose choices are unavoidable, they can still be acceptable (and accepted) by the losers, if the losers believe that the process used to make the decision was fair. That means that it protects the losers rights, follows generally accepted procedures, allows all voices to be considered, and is consistent with the rule-of-law.
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The Continuum between Legitimate and Illegitimate Types of Power
Politics means jockeying for and utilizing power to make decisions. But power can be obtained and used legitimately -- through free and fair elections, and by following the rule of law, or it can be obtained and used illegitimately. The former usually leads to better decisions and more stable democracies.
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Power Balancers
For disputes that cannot be resolved through mutually beneficial agreement, there is a need for people and institutions with the responsibility to make hard, but fair, decisions about who wins and who loses and by how much in each specific case. Power balancers try to implement equitable ways of balancing power in such processes.
Colleague Activities
The Global State of Democracy 2023: The New Checks and Balances
A report from International IDEA observes that the global state of democray is "complex, fluid, and unequal", but that democracy has continued to contract worldwide.
Colleague Activities
The Nature of Our Power: A Conversation with Political Scientist Erica Chenoweth
Institutions really can't save us; civil society and mass mobilization are a more potent check on backsliding democracy in the long term. rather than relying on institutional checks and balances alone.
News and Opinion
No Labels group raises alarms with third-party presidential preparations
An update on the promise and the potential pitfalls of an effort to empower the more compromise-oriented political center.
News and Opinion
What the Supreme Court Does in the Shadows
A look at the disturbing ways in which the Supreme Court's "shadow docket" is undermining public trust in the rule of law.
News and Opinion
The Left's War on the Rule of Law
An argument that the left is attempting to advance its political agenda by undermining the democratic institutions that it claims to be defending.
News and Opinion
How to Know When a Prosecution Is Political
A practical guide for determining when political prosecutions arise from legitimate efforts to equitably enforce the rule of law and when they are disingenuous tactics used to weaken a political rival.
News and Opinion
Ignore the Histrionic Attacks on the Supreme Court
Amid attacks from the left on the legitimacy of the Supreme Court, an argument that the court has, in fact, been fulfilling its responsibilities under the US system of checks and balances.
News and Opinion
The Supreme Court Isn't Rogue
An article about the Supreme Court that makes an important distinction between conflicts over differing legal philosophies and attempts to subvert the rule of law.
News and Opinion
The High Price of Democrats' Anti-Trump Lawfare
Concern that the Democrat's complex array of not yet successful efforts to hold President Trump legally responsible for his actions, may, over the longer-term, undermine support for the rule of law.
News and Opinion
Limiting Executive Overreach
From the Project on Government Oversight, a report on the ways that executive overreach is weakening our system of governmental checks and balances.
News and Opinion
Government Overreach: The Cause & Solution
From the National Center for Constitutional Studies, a report on the problem, along with suggestions about ways in which everyday citizens can help bring about change.
News and Opinion
Abortion in America: How Legislative Overreach Is Turning Reproductive Rights Into Criminal Wrongs
This Report outlines current legal statutes that criminalize abortion and the impact overturning Roe v. Wade would have on laws to prosecute and incarcerate those providing, receiving, or assisting with abortions.
News and Opinion
How to harden our defenses against an authoritarian president
A call for taking the steps needed to close the legal loopholes that could allow an unscrupulous president to bypass our system of checks and balances.
News and Opinion
Chuck Schumer's plan to create a constitutional crisis
An overview of worrying Democratic plans to dramatically transform the role of the Supreme Court (and the role of the judiciary, more generally) in US society.
News and Opinion
Beware the Trifecta: History Shows Full Control of Government Is Fleeting
A reassuring history for those worried about the possibility that Republican control of Congress may give President Elect Trump a long-term lock on power.