Beyond Intractability
Hyper-Polarization Blog
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Things You Can Do To Help | Conflict Frontiers | Conflict Fundamentals
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- Julia Chaitin, Israeli Peacebuilder, on the Israeli-Gazan War -- Chilling testimony from an Israeli peace activist living near the Gaza/Israeli border, and her thoughts about ways forward.
- Daniel Stid Talks about Ways to Strengthen Democracy by Replacing Polarization with Pluralism -- 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.
- Special Edition of Colleague and Context Posts: The 2023 Israel-Hamas War -- A special edition of our colleague and context posts, all focused on the Israel/Palestinian war of 2023.
- Israel, Hamas, Evil, and the Bad-faith Actor Problem -- 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.
- Katie Hyten Explains how Essential Partners is Taking Dialogue to Scale -- 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.
- Colleague and Context Posts for the Week of October 15, 2023 -- More interesting links from our colleagues and people allied with and of interest to the conflict and peacebuilding fields.
- Bad-Faith Actors and the Red/Blue/Gold Divide -- 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.
- Colleague and Context Posts for the Week of October 8, 2023 -- More interesting and important articles from our colleagues and others in allied fields.
- Daniel Stid: Citizens’ Assemblies: An Idea Whose Time Has Come (Again) -- 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.
- Fact, Value, Lie, or Uncertainty? How Do We Tell? -- 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.
- Colleague and Context Posts for the Week of September 17, 2023 -- More insightful articles from colleagues and journalists from around the world.
- Does the Power-With Approach Include Justice? Comments on Our Power-Over/Power-With Essay -- Colleagues ask power-with and power-over whom, for what purpose, and when? All good questions--and starts of answers.
- A Further Discussion of Dialogue -- Dialogue has no fixed goal or predetermined agenda. The emphasis is not on resolving disputes, but rather on improving the way in which people with significant differences relate to each other.
- Jay Rothman on Large Scale Interventions -- In this interview, Jay Rothman continues to reflect on strategies for scaling up small group processes in ways that enable whole communities to develop "both-and" solutions the common problems.
- Colleague and Context Posts for the Week of September 3, 2023 -- More interesting and important ideas from our conflict resolution/peacebuilding colleagues and others in allied fields.
- Daniel Stid: Four Ways To Reframe Democracy in America -- How loneliness and isolation are contributing to our political malaise--and four ideas for changing that.
- Zach Elwood on the Belief that "Polarization is not the Problem" -- Polarization is hurting both sides, and both sides should be concerned about reducing it if they want to achieve any of the high-priority goals.
- Zach Elwood on the Belief that "Polarization is not the Problem" -- Polarization is hurting both sides, and both sides should be concerned about reducing it if they want to achieve any of the high-priority goals.
- Colleague and Context Posts for the Week of August 20, 2023 -- Another set of links to interesting articles from our colleagues in conflict resolution, journalism, and allied fields.
- More on Constructive Conflict Communication -- Empathic (active) listening and I-message are two very powerful communication strategies that work at the societal as well as interpersonal levels.
- Talking with and Listening To People on the Other Side -- Most of us have unrealistic images of "the other side." If we talk with, and most importantly really listen to, some of those people, we will usually find out they are not nearly as different from us as we think.
- Colleague and Context Posts for the Week of Aug. 13, 2023 -- More of our weekly links to informative and provocative readings from colleagues and others in allied fields.
- Anne Leslie: Know Thyself -- A reflection on the role and choices we all make that will influence not only ourselves, but our society and planet as well.
- Colleague and Context Posts for the Week of Aug. 6, 2023 -- Our weekly suggested readings from colleagues within and outside of the conflict resolution field relating to polarization, democracy and other issues of importance.
- Constructively Navigating the World of Media Bias -- A look at the forces, including our own cognitive preferences, that produce a biased information environment and thoughts about what to do about it.
