Conflict in community

[Vliex, Carla (cvl)]

Chris
 
Karen reply about 'needs'made me reflect. I once did an 'sort' of
Appreciative Inquiry with as many of the people involved who want to
come and asked them just a few questions. coming form the AI theory. We
ended with thequestion:
'what do you want more of....'  Every single individual got the
opportunity to write his answers and reflections on a very big and long
brown paper. As we stood in fromt of the big brown paper the question
and invitiation became clear (and was a common ground!). Afther this
event we had an Open Space. 
 
warm regards
Carla
 
Met vriendelijke groet,
 
drs. Carla Vliex
Adviseur Organisatie Ontwikkeling 
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Internet www.twynstragudde.nl <http://www.twynstragudde.nl/>  
 
 
 
 
 
 

 

________________________________

From: OSLIST [mailto:OSLIST at LISTSERV.BOISESTATE.EDU] On Behalf Of Chris
Corrigan
Sent: maandag 20 maart 2006 17:17
To: OSLIST at LISTSERV.BOISESTATE.EDU
Subject: Conflict in community


Hi Folks:

An inquiry for you.

I've had a couple of conversations this week with people involved with
local school boards in the United States.  The common themes in these
conversations include high degrees of local conflict, positional
politics, an extreme lack of resources over which no one locally has any
control and labour relations that are best described as toxic. 

IN a conversation today, one man said that he wanted to try Open Space
simply as a way to have all the parts of the system understand each
other.  I suggested that this might not bring the peace he was looking
for, as people who would come to that kind of meeting hoping to convince
others of their righteousness would feel at the end of the day that they
were either winners or losers.  I thought that result wouldn't
necessarily be transformational.  When I asked him if instead we
couldn't issue an invitation to invite people essentially to answer the
question "how can we BE together differently in this system" he balked a
little at the notion of a smaller group of "like minded" individuals.
Of course I don;t see this as starkly black and white, but nevertheless,
he thought an "airing of the issues and a shared understanding" were
most important. 

So my question goes to people who have worked in this situation, with
groups that are highly wedded to positions.  What are the kinds of
invitations that allow for "airing," generated shared understanding, and
perhaps lead to transformative relationships? 

By the way, I told him I would do this for less than 1.5 days.

Thoughts and reflections welcome.

Chris

-- 
CHRIS CORRIGAN
Consultation - Facilitation
Open Space Technology 

Weblog: http://www.chriscorrigan.com/parkinglot
Site: http://www.chriscorrigan.com
Open Space Resources:   http://tinyurl.com/r94tj
<http://tinyurl.com/r94tj>  * *
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