Conflict in community

Wed Mar 22 22:06:58 PST 2006

Colleagues:

This list continues to inspire and amaze and give so generously of its time
and energy.  Thanks to all who have offered nuggets into this conversation.

I will bring these insights together (and others, as they are offered) and
host a space on my website where this wisdom can be collected and I will
also have a conversation with my client with the weight and wisdom of this
work beside us, so thank you.

What has struck me about the responses to this inquiry is the modalities
they have appeared in: some of elegant complexity and some of deep
simplicity.

I'm deeply appreciative to all of you,

Chris

On 3/22/06, Claudia Haack <claudia at kairosalliance.com> wrote:
>
>  Chris,
>
>
>
> I had the doubtful pleasure to be the project planner (city
> representative) on a "Keep Wal-Mart Out" project many years ago.  People
> were very positional, to the point of threatening each other and on both
> ends of the spectrum.  At the time I didn't know about open space – or lets
> just say I didn't know that there actually was a thing with a name.  What I
> did know was that I had only 6 months (the time of the development
> moratorium) and not a clue how to deal with this.  So, I started with some
> public hand-wringing (as in : gosh, this is really complex, isn't it? ),
> basically feeding the "positions" back to everybody and letting each of them
> really "see" the other.  Open Space is much more elegant at this than I was
> then, but it is a similar concept.  I gave them a lot of "airtime", at the
> same time gently reminding them of the concept that indeed, we are all
> sitting in the same boat, this is as good as it gets, and if this group of
> talented, dedicated citizens cannot come up with a reasonable (or maybe even
> inspired) solution, who could?  Well, they did come up with a very inspired
> (award – winning) solution which was unanimously adopted by the City Council
> (!).
>
>
>
> More directly to your question, I think I would not focus on the
> positional aspects of this, but the complexity.  I believe that some of the
> frustration and anger in situations like this actually comes from not being
> able to "hold" the complexity long enough to be able to re-align and
> identify actionable next steps.  Sharing the acknowledgement that indeed,
> this is complex and that that is in itself frustrating is a great step
> forward and possibly a positive outcome for a "first" Open Space.
>
>
>
> Claudia
>
>
>
> Claudia Haack
>
> *KAIROS* Alliance Inc.
>
> tel. 608.288.8315
>
> fax.480.247.4824
>
> -----Original Message-----
> *From:* OSLIST [mailto:OSLIST at LISTSERV.BOISESTATE.EDU] *On Behalf Of *Chris
> Corrigan
> *Sent:* Monday, March 20, 2006 10:17 AM
> *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 * *
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--
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

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