FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS
Dialogue
PCP sees dialogue as a structured conversation, or series of conversations, intended to create, deepen, and build human relationships and understanding.
In PCP dialogues, people who have regarded each other as adversaries or threatening strangers engage with each other in new ways. As dialogue proceeds, fresh angles and options emerge and participants often realize they can work toward shared goals without compromising their deeply held values, beliefs, or positions.
No, and participants’ core beliefs rarely change. Dialogue surfaces new information that softens stereotypes and leads to more accurate understanding of participants’ hopes, fears, life experiences, and values. Participants often say their views have been deepened and enriched through dialogues with those who think differently. Without changing their core beliefs, participants’ views of one another do typically change.
How do you know if a dialogue has been successful?
In many situations, what makes a dialogue significant is what it leads to. Dialogue transforms communication and relationships in ways that make other kinds of change possible. It can lay the groundwork for making decisions or significant collaborative actions. In most conflicts, action can not be taken without first improving mutual understanding and relationships.
Written feedback and follow up interviews indicate whether participants’ objectives were achieved. Collaborative actions taken by opponents post dialogue have included initiatives to prevent escalation of an ongoing conflict, bipartisan recommendations for policy changes, jointly sponsored research, co-authored publications and public testimony about the value of their dialogue, and the deliberate omission of stereotypes and inflammatory rhetoric from public speaking.
What role does PCP play in making a dialogue happen?
PCP collaborates with participants at every phase, playing a guiding role in planning, designing, and facilitating dialogues.
How is PCP distinctive?
PCP’s work is grounded in family therapy and in the belief that better communication and relationships are critical to long-lasting amelioration of conflicts that involve identities, core values, and worldviews.
In what situations is dialogue valuable?
Dialogue is useful in situations where peoples' differences are preventing them from connecting and communicating with one another. It is likely to be especially valuable when relationships among those involved in a conflict are so affected by anger, hurt, blame, and distrust that engaging in an outcome-oriented process such as mediation, problem-solving, or coalition-building is unthinkable or too risky. PCP’s dialogue facilitation, training, and consultation have proven especially effective where:
- efforts to address an important issue have ended in stalemate or sharpened animosity.
- distrust or cynicism has created a climate hostile to problem-solving or a community’s ability to function.
- the presence of different values, world views, or identities has impeded the development of important collaborations or policies.
