The Third Side: Bridge Building Strategies

Bridge-Building Strategies

Bridge builders rely on a number of different activities to bring parties together, so that they can communicate about their problems and work together to find some common ground. The following essays explore the strategies most often used by bridge builders:

• Establishment of Personal Relationships - Human relationships have the power to defuse conflicts, and are often an integral component of peacebuilding and reconciliation. This essay describes how establishing relationships can be a forerunner to official negotiations and conflict resolution.
• Channels of Communication - One of the factors that cause conflicts to escalate quickly is the absence of communication. Often, there is little sharing among parties of information, intents, and beliefs. This essay describes how to reestablish lines of communication.
• Dialogue - Dialogue's goal is not to resolve disputes, but rather to improve the way in which people with significant differences relate to each other. Because it emphasizes the development of shared understandings, dialogue can help parties to develop stronger, more positive relationships.
• Creating Safe Spaces for Communication - Due to misunderstandings, hurt feelings, and prejudice, inter-group communication can often be very difficult. This essay looks at how to overcome the obstacles to constructive communication, and create a safe atmosphere that encourages open and honest dialogue.
• Humanization - Humanization is a matter of recognizing the common humanity of one's opponents, and including them in one's moral scope. This essay describes strategies for fostering empathy, and encouraging parties to sympathetically imagine how their "enemies" must feel.
• Trust Building - Insofar as trust is associated with enhanced cooperation, information sharing, and problem solving, building trust is often crucial for constructive social interaction. This essay explores various ways in which trust can be developed.
• Joint Projects - Favorable contact among members of different groups and nations, that allows them to work together on some project, can heighten their sense of shared humanity.
• Focus on Commonalities - Understanding the differences between parties, and finding ways to move forward on the basis of their shared interests is often the best way to make significant progress. This essay explores how discovering commonalities can pave the way for joint action.
• Narratives and Storytelling - Recounting personal stories can help to reduce inter-group tension, and promote unity and reconciliation. This essay describes the transformative role that narratives sometimes play in conflict situations.
• Envisioning - One way to bring parties together is to encourage them to imagine their peaceful future together. This essay describes several approaches to envisioning that help such positive images of the future come alive.
• Empathic Listening - This is a way of listening and responding to another person that improves mutual understanding and trust, and creates a safe environment that is conducive to collaborative problem solving. After highlighting the importance of empathic listening, this essay sets out guidelines for how to listen effectively.
• Problem Solving Workshops - In these workshops, carefully chosen representatives from all sides meet with a third party panel to analyze the fundamental sources of conflict and develop possible solutions. They provide an informal, low-risk, noncommittal forum in which unofficial representatives of the parties can engage in problem solving. This essay explores how such workshops lead to constructive collaboration, and outlines possible ways to organize them.

For More Information

• Where and Why Bridge Builders Are Needed
• Resources for Bridge Builders
• Exercises
• Third Sider Roles
• Main Third Side Page

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