{"id":179604,"date":"2021-02-22T12:00:58","date_gmt":"2021-02-22T12:00:58","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/?p=179604"},"modified":"2024-11-26T21:25:29","modified_gmt":"2024-11-26T21:25:29","slug":"experts-use-this-trick-to-transform-conflicts","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/2021\/02\/experts-use-this-trick-to-transform-conflicts\/","title":{"rendered":"Experts Use This Trick to Transform Conflicts"},"content":{"rendered":"

When we see the other side as the problem, it limits our thinking.<\/em><\/p>\n

17 Feb 2021 – <\/em>A lot of the analysis<\/a>\u00a0we get of current events, like the attempted insurrection<\/a> in Washington, shares frightening details that can make problems sound impossible to address.<\/p>\n

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Riots in Paris, France, 2006.<\/strong><\/div>\n
Source: Tito Slack\/Flickr CC-BY 2.0<\/strong><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

Too much of the coverage of conflicts of all types avoids key questions<\/a> like \u201cHow might this conflict be transformed?\u201d or \u201cWhat efforts to constructively address this conflict are already happening?\u201d Journalists don\u2019t need to have answers to these questions, they just need to seek out and ask a range of people with relevant perspectives and expertise.<\/p>\n

Given that,\u00a0over and over, we\u2019re exposed to shallow and terrifying presentations of conflicts, it\u2019s no wonder that many of us are so good at evaluating others and figuring out what\u2019s wrong with them. We can (we imagine) judge what sorts of personality disorders<\/a> they have, or how their religion, race, or education<\/a> are to blame for the behaviors we don\u2019t like.<\/p>\n

I\u2019m not going to argue about whether these evaluations are factually right or wrong. Of course, they can be interesting and sometimes they give us important insights. There\u2019s certainly a place for them.<\/p>\n

All I\u2019ll point out is this: They\u2019re merely one possible approach. We can equally choose to interpret conflicts in endless other ways<\/a> that will also help explain them. That\u2019s because there are always many factors at play. So it\u2019s up to us what factors we choose to zoom in on and what we choose to ignore.<\/p>\n

When making this choice, an important question arises. Amazingly, this question is regularly overlooked as we try to understand conflicts: What will this get me? What\u2019s the result of this analysis I\u2019m making? What does it wind up doing?<\/p>\n

My answer, from following all sorts of bitter conflicts in various countries, is this: The most consistent result of the negative evaluations we make of people we disagree with is to make them the problem.<\/p>\n

But I believe that any time you see other people as the problem, your analysis has failed you. Why?<\/p>\n

Well if they\u2019re the problem, the first solution many of us think of is to get rid of them.<\/p>\n

This logic is reflected in a 2017 survey<\/a> done in the US. One question was \u201cDo you ever think we\u2019d be better off as a country if large numbers of [Opposing party] in the public today just died?\u201d Twenty percent\u00a0of Democrats and 15 percent\u00a0of Republicans said \u201cyes.\u201d (When it comes to actual policies they support, these folks aren\u2019t nearly as far apart as they assume<\/a>.)<\/p>\n

If getting rid of the other side seems a bit too extreme, then we at least want to silence and marginalize them as much as possible. We hope they\u2019ll just fade into the background. But in large-scale societal conflicts, that\u2019s never going to happen. The other side will not just disappear<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Even if we don\u2019t dehumanize<\/a>\u00a0and wish death on the other side, if we recognize that they aren\u2019t going to disappear, even if we try to be very careful and reasonable,\u00a0when our analysis leads us to see other people as the problem, there are only a few possible solutions. We can give up and disengage, quietly suffer along with the behavior we dislike\u00a0or, somehow or other, try to make them change.<\/p>\n

In trying to force people to change, we cite facts at them or shout\u00a0about why they\u2019re the problem. But I think these are mostly last resorts. We don\u2019t hold out much hope that they can work, we just lack ideas about what else to try. So we make ourselves feel better by feeling worse about them, assuring ourselves\u00a0that they\u2019re the problem (meaning we aren\u2019t the problem and don\u2019t need to change anything we\u2019re doing). Our moral outrage is also incentivized because it can win us points with our group<\/a>.<\/p>\n

No doubt if you could somehow force the other side to change their entire belief system the conflict wouldn\u2019t be what it is. If the person you can\u2019t stand and are sure has a mental health issue that\u2019s making them so intolerable went to therapy<\/a> and dramatically altered their personality<\/a>, that would transform your conflict. But that\u2019s a pretty naive expectation. It hardly seems likely in every disagreement you get into.<\/p>\n

So what other choices can we make when analyzing conflicts?<\/p>\n

Try this the next time you\u2019re upset with someone, whether it\u2019s a politician, a family member, or somebody on social media: Take the idea that they\u2019re the problem off of the table. Get rid of it.<\/p>\n

You don\u2019t get to focus on what\u2019s wrong with them as a person. You can easily come up with answers to that question (and they may be oh-so-satisfying answers!), but those are now off limits.<\/p>\n

With the simplistic explanation removed, what do you find? Try again to interpret the situation.<\/p>\n

What you\u2019re likely to discover is that you can, if you make an effort, find complexity at play<\/a>.<\/p>\n

When you aren\u2019t asking, \u201cWhat\u2019s wrong with this person?\u201d you can uncover many factors contributing to the conflict. That doesn\u2019t make what the other side is doing moral or acceptable. It doesn\u2019t remove the need for accountability. But it can make you<\/em> more creative.<\/p>\n

When you see the problem not as all about them, you\u2019ve got more options. You\u2019re more powerful<\/em>. This is a trick that experts in transforming conflicts use all the time.<\/p>\n

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Psychologist Marshall Rosenberg said<\/a>, \u201cAt the root of every tantrum and power struggle are unmet needs.\u201d With your new insights, you can find ways to get your needs, and those of the other party, met.<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

If we focus on this question of what are the unmet needs, we can regularly find ways to work together. I\u2019ve collected<\/a> many startling and successful examples\u2014even one of courageous gay people in Kenya successfully engaging with priests and imams who were wishing death on them!<\/p>\n

In short, changing\u00a0the framing of the issue can be incredibly effective. Drop the \u201cI\u2019m right and something about you makes you the problem.\u201d Move from this \u201cme versus<\/em> you\u201d to \u201cme and<\/em> you versus the situation to be transformed,\u201d and you will have powerful new levels of understanding at your disposal.<\/p>\n

Of course, not every need can be met and not every relationship can be healed. But pessimism<\/a> about how much is possible readily leads to <\/a>confirmation bias<\/a> and self-fulfilling prophesies<\/a>. We don\u2019t even try to find out what the other side\u2019s unmet needs are because we assume that \u201cthose people\u201d are just impossible-to-reach fanatics.<\/p>\n

But if you pause and shift from the mindset of \u201cme versus you\u201d to \u201cme and you versus the situation to be transformed,\u201d you won\u2019t feel as afraid and threatened. This will broaden your perspective<\/a>, and you\u2019ll benefit.<\/p>\n

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Matthew Legge is the author of <\/em>Are We Done Fighting? Building Understanding in a World of Hate and Division. He is a Peace Program Coordinator at Canadian Friends Service Committee.<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

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Go to Original – psychologytoday.com<\/a><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

17 Feb 2021 – Too much of the coverage of conflicts avoids key questions like \u201cHow this conflict might be transformed?\u201d or \u201cWhat efforts to constructively address this conflict are already happening?\u201d Journalists don\u2019t need to have the answers; they just need to ask a range of people with relevant perspectives and expertise. When we see the other side as the problem, it limits our thinking.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":179605,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[195],"tags":[120,1778,2628,680,442],"class_list":["post-179604","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-conflict-resolution-mediation","tag-conflict","tag-conflict-analysis","tag-conflict-mediation","tag-conflict-resolution","tag-conflict-transformation"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/179604","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=179604"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/179604\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":281374,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/179604\/revisions\/281374"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/179605"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=179604"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=179604"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=179604"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}