Barry K. Weinhold, Ph.D.
“There are those who would quickly love each other if once they were to speak to each other; for when they spoke they would discover that their souls were only separated by phantoms and delusions.”
Ernest Hello
19th Century French Philosopher
Most of the major systems--banking and finance, health care, education, food production and distribution, water distribution, government infrastructure--in the US are in breakdown or collapse. So are some of our religious structures. In addition, the price of petroleum-based fuels is now crimping a lifestyle we have become accustomed to having. On top of that, the political “grid-lock” in Washington prevents our government from reforming not only these systems, but from addressing infrastructure problems such as the destruction of New Orleans and the collapsed interstate bridge in downtown Minneapolis. With elections approaching, many people are losing hope that real change is possible. We face the prospect of being further divided into red states and blue states, which makes taking corrective action seem even more remote.
After the primary election season and the lead up to the fall general elections, you may be feeling sick of the ping-pong match format used in political debates. I suspect this debate format may become even more prominent with the Presidential and Vice-Presidential debates scheduled in September and October. In a debate, one candidate responds to a question from the audience or a panel of moderators, and then the other candidate attacks back in an attempt to demean his or her opponent. In this format, the real issues never become part of a debate. Rather, each candidate attempts to score points with the viewing audience by attacking the other’s character, amount of experience or voting record. They never seem to focus on where each stands on a particular issue such as health care, energy, global warming, the war in Iraq, social security or the economy. Debates leave voters feeling confused, frustrated and turned off to politics-as-usual because these formats do not help people resolve their internal ambivalence.
Limitations of the Debate Format
Here are some of the limitations I see with a debate format.
• Candidates do not really listen to each other as they are focused on how to respond to their opponent through an attack or rebuttal.
• The purpose of a debate is to have one person’s view, beliefs or values seen as correct and the other person’s view, beliefs and values as seen as incorrect. (The purpose of a debate format is to show that one person’s view, beliefs or values are “right” and the other’s is “wrong.)
• The goal of a debate is to win and turn your opponent into a loser.
• In order to achieve victory, candidates stretch the truth and embellish certain facts, while ignoring others.
• The candidates use verbal “spin” techniques to make their position seem more attractive, right, or acceptable than their opponents.
• Candidates often present partial solutions to problems or have not carefully thought through or are not prepared to discuss all the obstacles they have to face in attempting to implement their solutions.
Our research on conflict resolution at the Carolina Institute for Conflict Resolution & Creative Leadership has repeatedly shown that debates are one of the most ineffective formats for resolving conflicts of values and beliefs. We found that political debates involving values and beliefs between groups, cultures, religious institutions, and nation-states tend to escalate into violent cycles of actions and reactions. Trying to change the values and beliefs of others by claiming they are wrong or misguided for their values and beliefs never works. What we learned is that attempts to change other people’s values and beliefs just make people more angry so they defend their values and beliefs even harder.
John Murray pointed us toward another approach when he wrote, “A republic is made up of people locked in civil argument and the point of the argument in neither to win nor to end the diversity of opinion and power. Peace means keeping the argument going ad infinitum.” In the same vein, Sam Keen wrote, “…peace is fierce men, women and nations struggling together to define their boundaries and enhance self-respect with love and politics as a playing field. I see rival facing each other not as incarnations of evil, but as worthy opponents.”
Our Research On The Source of Your Values and Beliefs
Few people realize that our values and beliefs are created in early childhood, some say as early as age three. They get created in collective or cultural contexts that involve our family, church, community and ethnic backgrounds. Our research shows that these values and beliefs create something known as the “internal working model of reality,” which usually does not change over our lifetime. Only by examining the source of our beliefs and deciding which ones no longer serve us, can we really change them.
We also discovered in our research that the formation of values and beliefs often involve early intense emotional experiences and developmental traumas. These experiences create a sensitivity to certrain cues or triggers that can get activated when our beliefs or values are challenged or when we consider changing them. Because of their highly emotionally nature, values and beliefs are actually neurologically hard wired into our central nervous system.
I’m sure you have noticed how sometimes you get very emotional or stirred up when discussing certain topics and you may have no idea why you feel so upset. Sometimes it is the way the other person addresses you or it might be the content of their remarks. These moments are opportunities to look at your reaction and examine the reason for it. In order to change or modify your values or beliefs, you need to “revisit” the formative events from your past and identify the meaning you gave it in the past.
The Advantages of Dialogue
In order to promote the peaceful resolution of conflicts of values or beliefs, we recommend one very specific tool: dialogue. We cannot use logic to “talk” people out of their belief or value or prove that it is wrong. In short, we cannot change the values or beliefs of another person unless they are ready to change them. This is why resolving conflicts involving political values and beliefs is so difficult. People tend to “dig in their heels” and the debates go nowhere. Only by examining our values and beliefs with those who are wiling to respect them rather than try to change them can we achieve positive outcomes in our lives.
Candidates know this and deliberately appeal to the voters’ “core values” in order to get elected. This may be why many of the working poor still vote for wealthy candidates who clearly are not going to support policies and programs that would help them. Voters will also look at candidates to see how much they look like them, think like them and have lives like them. Those candidates who are the most successful at looking similar to the voters and appealing to voters’ core values get elected. Candidates try to convince voters they are electing someone just like them and that this will support and preserve their values. When these “like me” candidates get elected and don’t vote as they promised, the voters who elected them feel tricked and become disillusioned and skeptical of the political process.
Many voters, sadly, have simply adopted the values and beliefs of their family of origin without examining whether or not these values and beliefs still serve them when they vote for a candidate. You hear things like, “Well, I’ve always voted Democrat because my family has always voted . . . . .” So they vote for whomever their party selects to run for office, and they don’t even look at what the candidate stands for. The use of dialogue can help people examine their family’s political values and beliefs and discover where they are still helpful and where they need to change them.
Basic Agreements For Utilizing Dialogue As An Effective Tool To Resolve Conflicts of Values and Beliefs
In order to utilize dialogue as an effective tool for resolving conflicts of values and beliefs there are a few basic agreements we have to make:
1. Both parties have to agree to listen to each other with respect and not try to change the values or beliefs of the other person.
2. Both parties may need to agree to use a neutral facilitator if they lack experience in using dialogue to address their conflicts of values or beliefs.
3. Both parties must agree to openly explore the assumptions and experiences that have contributed to their value or belief.
4. Both parties need to be willing to agree that their value or belief positions may be incomplete and are willing to explore ways to make them more solid or complete.
How To Determine If Your Conflict Involves Values or Beliefs
When two people have a conflict, it is important to determine whether it involves values or beliefs or wants and needs. You can do this by determining whether or not the conflict situation has direct, tangible consequences on either person. Being upset that another person doesn’t see something the way you do is not a tangible consequence.
For example, if someone borrows something from you and does not returned it or returns it broken or damaged, that has a tangible effect on you and you have a conflict of wants and needs. If your teenage son doesn’t clean up his room in a way that meets your standards, then you probably have a conflict of values or beliefs. Your value of having a room looking a certain way is different from how your son values it. You can choose to shut his bedroom door so that you will not see his dirty room and it does not have an immediate, tangible effect on you. If he leaves food in his room and that draws ants or creates an odor in the rest of the house, however, this would have a tangible effect on you. This conflict would then be about wants and needs rather than values and beliefs.
Political debates involving abortion rights or school prayer, gay marriage, government policies on energy, health care, fiscal issues, foreign affairs, etc. are clearly about values and beliefs. For example, the issue of universal health care can involve different beliefs where some regard it as a “human right’ and others believe it is a “privilege to be earned.” If someone holds a different value or belief from yours, there really isn’t an immediate tangible effect on you except that you are upset that they don’t value or believe what you do. The issue could have an unknown tangible effect on you in the future, but not immediately. To resolve a conflict that clearly involve values or beliefs, you can use the dialogue skills outlined below as long as both of you are willing to abide by the assumptions listed above.
Our Seven-Step Method for Resolving Conflicts of Values and Beliefs
Based on our research, we have developed a seven-step method for resolving conflicts of values or beliefs that involves the use of dialogue skills. Much more detail on how to resolve conflicts of values and beliefs is found in our book, Conflict Resolution: The Partnership Way (2009). We describe each step below, along with an explanation of its outcome.
Step One: Taking Turns Listening to Each Other’s View of the Conflict. In this step each person agrees to reflect back what the other person says and gets an agreement its accuracy before stating his/her views. It is very important to reflect back not only the content, but the feelings the person expresses. For example you might say, “What I am hearing is . . . and you seem to be feeling . . . . Is that correct? Once the first person experiences being heard on both levels, then the second person takes a turn expressing his/her views and the first person feeds back what he/she hears. Step One is very important because it creates a safe and respectful environment where trust can be built, which almost never happens in a debate. After several rounds of this dialogue where each person feels heard on his/her main points, move on to Step Two.
Step Two: Take Turns Finding the Sources of Your Values or Beliefs. If you completed the first step effectively, participants will feel safe enough to explore the sources of their values or beliefs. Each person responds to the following question: “What experiences have you had in your life that contributed to the formation of this value or belief? Think back as far as you can to early formative experiences that might have influenced what you value or believe today about this topic.”
Use the same alternating format that you used in Step One to reflect back what the first person says and get an agreement that you accurately heard him/her before you can state your views. This step helps each person connect the dots between past experiences and current beliefs and values. Our research indicates that people who are able connect their present values and beliefs to past experiences where they may have been formed are most able to change or modify them as they deepen their understanding of how they formed the value or belief.
Step Three: Take Turns Finding the Source of Your Feelings. Begin by asking the following question: “What do you remember feeling during your early experiences related to forming this value or belief?” Again, reflect back the feelings that the first person shares and make sure you heard her/him accurately before you begin sharing your own feelings. This important step helps the participants reconnect with intense feelings often associated with values or beliefs. If the value or belief was formed during a trauma state, present-time emotions are often greater than might be expected. When a person gets more upset than what would be normally expected in the situation when talking about a value or belief, this is a signal that the emotions are tapping into experiences anchored in the past, possibly early trauma associated in some way with the situation, the value or the belief.
Step Four: Determine Any Shifts in Awareness. In this step, take turns looking for shifts in perception and allow yourselves to explore new ideas and perceptions of your value or belief that are emerging from the dialogue process. You might ask: “Based on looking at the sources of your values and beliefs, did you have any new awareness? Often people will often say, “Gee, I never thought about that aspect of the issue. I can see now why I feel so strongly on this issue.”
In this step, the person who is listening also often experiences a shift in perception. Often there is an inner experience of the heart opening as judgments lessen and biases disappear. The listener often responds with compassion saying, “Gosh, if that had happened to me, I might have the same value or belief.”
Step Five: Look for Areas of Agreement and Disagreement. A question that either person might ask is, “Based on what we have shared here, where do you find that we agree and where do we still disagree?” This step involves a search for common ground on the value or belief. Typically, if the above steps were done well, areas of agreement will emerge from the dialogue. It is also typical that areas of disagreement will remain, which naturally leads to the next step.
Step 6: Make Plans to Handle Any Areas of Disagreement. You might ask each other the following question: “Is there anything you want or need from me in the future regarding our areas of disagreement?” This step allows both people to negotiate how to handle any remaining areas of disagreement in their relationship. Typically, so much respect and compassion gets generated in dialogue that both parties want continue the dialogue and remain close even though they recognize that the differences still exist.
Step Seven: Determine How to Handle Any Strong Feelings or Reactions. The dialogue process can cause strong feelings or reactions to emerge. If resolving this conflict brought up strong feelings or reactions in either of you, it is important to dialogue about how to handle them in the future. You can use the same dialogue process presented above to process them. Generally, strong feelings are related to painful memories of past experiences in which you formed your values or beliefs or from times when you expressed your value or belief and were put down or not respected.
For example, one person in the dialogue may erupt with angry feelings that are more intense then the situation might evoke. This is a signal that those angry feelings may be a defense against feeling deeper feelings of sadness or fear. By responding with respect and reflecting back what you are hearing, you may help the other person process through the defensive feelings and connect with the deeper core feelings that may not have surfaced previously. Allowing people to experience these deeper feelings is a way of helping them to heal the trauma from the past that was connected to the value or belief they expressed.
Facilitating A Group Demonstration On the Use of Dialogue
If you are facilitating or demonstrating this dialogue process with a group of people, I suggest using the following method:
1. Make a list of strongly stated value-laden issues such as, “It is a women’s right to choose whether or not to have an abortion,” or “Gay marriages should be legalized.”
2. Then ask the people to stand and position themselves on an imaginary continuum, with one end of the room representing “Strongly Agree” and the other end representing “Strongly Disagree” as you read each value statement.
3. After you have read a number of statements, notice which statements caused the most polarization in the group. This issue becomes the focus for a demonstration. If you have several statements that polarize the group, ask the people which they would like to focus on in a demonstration.
4. Have the group form two sub-groups, one containing those who strongly opposed the statement and the other containing those who strongly agreed with the statement.
5. Have each sub-group discuss why they are in favor or oppose the value statement, and then ask each to select a representative. These two people will participate in a demonstration showing how to resolve a conflict involving a value or belief.
6. Have the two people stand facing each other a comfortable distance apart. Facilitate the demonstration using the seven-step dialogue process described above. When a participant feels his or her partner accurately reflect back what was said, he or she might stand fast or take a step forward. If the listener does not accurately reflect back the content and feelings, the person who is speaking can take a step backwards. I call this part of the process the “Values Tango.”
7. Continue the demonstration by completing each of the seven steps. Noticing the shifts that take place. Ask each of the participants in the demonstration to discuss the impact it had on him/her. Ask how they feel toward each other as a result of the dialogue.
Then talk to those who observed about what they noticed. This step is important because it reveals how powerful the demonstration was. People report having never seen a conflict of values and beliefs resolved in this way. Often they are blown away by what they witnessed and experienced and are eager to try this approach with a friend or co-worker. They also were likely processing how they formed their own values and beliefs during the demonstration.
If you have time, ask the others in the group who were on different sides of the issue demonstrated or to pick another issue to pair off and use the dialogue process with each other. It is helpful to have the steps and the questions under each step written out for the participants. They then can select a value or belief to dialogue. A word of caution, is to make sure that you get an agreement from the other person to adopt the assumptions stated above and be willing to use the steps in this process as listed above.
Conflict Resolution: The Partnership Way (2009)
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