Civic Engineering dialogue v1

The Motivation

Audio version: http://10kh.show/00121-civic-engineering-v1-plan-how-to-prevent-a-civil-war

The point of the gathering is to see the humanity beyond somebody’s positions, even with the most controversial and divisive issues of our time. Instead of avoiding conflict and confrontation, we will head right towards the issues with a radically different attitude.

The goal is not convincing or educating or informing. The goal is understanding how we got to the beliefs we have. And maybe even understanding how I might have your beliefs I had lived your life experiences.

This is a response to my recent “How to Prevent A Civil War” post.

The Event

I’m imagining a small-group facilitated event in a comfortable casual place, lasting around 3 hours.

Each event would deal with a specific controversial issue, but in a carefully structured way. I’ll get to that in a bit.

For a quick visual, imagine 12 people seated in a circle in comfortable chairs.

At any given point in time, only one person is talking and everyone else is listening.

If the event were to start at 5:00pm, the “doors would open” at 4:30 so people could get settled, have something to eat or drink, and make small talk with the hosts and other participants.

At 5:00pm, everyone would be seated and the host/facilitator would given an official welcome with ground rules and an overview of what will happen over the course of the evening.

TODO: Write the welcome script

The ground rules would include:

  • Confidentiality
  • Speaking from the “I”, sharing personal experience
  • Agreeing the facilitator can intervene to remind people of the ground rules

There would then be 4 rounds of sharing. Each round shares the following characteristics:

  • Each person has the same amount of time to speak (3-5 minutes, most likely)
  • No interruptions
  • Each person passes the “baton” to whomever they want when they’re done.
  • We could give the group a couple of minutes to reflect after asking the question, before anyone speaks. That way no one is thinking while someone else is talking.

Each round would have a different question. The prompts would get progressively deeper as trust and comfort grow over the course of the evening.

Round 1: What we share

I would pick a question that has to do with something the participants share. For my town, it could be:

  • What they love/value/appreciate most about living here
  • Why they chose to live here
  • What they miss most when they are not here

There’s an opportunity to go deep, but not much of a push. People are still feeling out the space, each other, and the facilitator.

Round 2: Going deeper

This is an opportunity for the participants to share a little more about their lives.

Possible questions:

  • What’s a tragedy/challenge you’ve experienced recently and how are you handling it?
  • Look at the list of values (on the wall): Pick one and tell a story about a time you’ve sacrificed something to uphold that value.
  • What’s a profound experience you’ve had that we could never tell just by looking at you?

At this point we are trying to build connection, compassion, and surprise. Commonalities will emerge as well points of empathy and compassion. This builds the groundwork for Round 3

Round 3: Addressing the conflict

Now that we have started to see each other as people, we want to approach the conflict in a way that reinforces that humanity.

I’ll use Gun Control / Gun Rights as an example.

We will not be asking:

  • Should there be a constitutional amendment for Gun Control?
  • What is the best way to protect children in schools?
  • What are the limits of gun control regulations?

It will be more in the direction of:

  • What does this issue mean to you?
  • When did this issue gain such importance to you?
  • What is at stake for you personally with this issue?
  • What are you most afraid of if this issue gets decided the other way?

I would want to watch people’s reactions closely during Round 3, remind them of the ground rules, and offer to pause in case people need time to process or calm down.

Again: The goal is not agreement or convincing, or even being exposed to arguments we could learn from. The goal is to be able to connect a stranger’s beliefs with their life experiences, and to understand what is at stake for someone else.

Round 4: The Future

There will likely be a short break after each round. I would prefer these breaks are held in silence. After Round 3, I would schedule a slightly longer break, with food or drink, and encourage people to journal a bit, but maintain silence.

Round 4 is really up to the participants, and the question would be something like

  • What would you like to do next?

It’s an opportunity to gain immediate feedback on whether they are interested in continuing to relate to each other differently or not.

If the goal is preventing a civil war, success for me would be every person saying: “I want to spend more time talking to X about their life,” where X is a person who would have been on the other side of the civil war.

The Preparation

There’s 2 pathways I’m imagining right now but both will have the same general trajectory.

One pathway is mailing something to everyone in my neighborhood. The other is setting up a website, maybe in coordination with local government.

Either way:

Step 1: People hear about the project and decide they are interested
Step 2: People hear about a specific event (and topic) and decide to sign up.

For Step 1, the messaging has to be very clear about what the event IS NOT.

TODO: Initial description of event

We have to address the fears of:

  • Judgment
  • Emotional Safety
  • Physical Safety
  • Confidentiality

And make it clear there is no:

  • Right Answer
  • Agenda
  • Teaching
  • Claim to Truth

Or verticality of any kind.

We should also be clear on the uninterrupted nature of the sharing, the lack of “debate”, and the presence of a moderator who will step in to safeguard the process, and the desire to accurately represent all sides so nobody feels overwhelmed or outnumbered.

A successful outcome of Step 1 is somebody says, “Yeah, I might like to try that” and gives us their email or phone number.

For Step 2, we send out announcements of upcoming events with the appropriate logistical information:

  • Date / Time
  • Topic

If people are interested in that specific event, they should:

  • Let us know which way they “lean” on the issue, so we can balance perspectives and nobody feels “ganged up” on.
  • Watch an intro video going deeper into the Why and the ground rules, so people know what is expected of them.

TODO: Make survey response form
TODO: Make intro video

If we get enough sign-ups balanced between the different sides of an issue, we could then send out confirmations with the location of the event.