4 S’s showcase how dialogue fits and where other approaches work best

In my previous article, I explained the “4 R’s” that should cause people to reconsider the extremely strong emphasis on civil discourse in efforts to reduce political divides in the United States. I also promised suggestions for how to use dialogue most effectively, in specific circumstances, and when non-dialogue approaches may be best.

A brief overview of the 4 R’s to reconsider such a heavy focus on dialogue reminds us that it is difficult to get many people to attend events (recruitment), civil discourse is not inherently effective (reliability), even a successful 1:1 interaction may not generalize to the entire out-party (representativeness) and getting people to repeatedly use skills learned is challenging (repetition).

I made it clear in that article not to despair. While there are 4 R’s to reconsider dialogue and civil discourse, there are also 4 S’s showing the way forward: schools, slogans, stories and structures. They involve emphasizing civil discourse where people can have repeated interactions that build trust and competence (schools), simple ways to remember how to best have a conversation and listen (slogans), approaches that draw from successful conversations and other approaches into digestible content (stories) and issues well beyond dialogue including structural reform (structures).

Schools: We need to increase emphasis on schools as a more effective location for teaching interpersonal civil discourse. My organization, More Like US, has found intense desire for civil discourse among attendees at national- and state-level conferences focused on K-12 civics education, such as those held by the National Council for the Social Studies and the CivxNow Coalition. While providing enough support for teachers is not easy — a well-known professional development program with this emphasis lasts four to five days — it avoids issues with at least half of 4 R’s: recruitment and repetition (since students have to attend class daily with each other for months) and potentially reliability as students have more opportunities for successful conversations over a semester or year.

Slogans: While slogans often get a bad reputation for being overly simplistic, it helps for Americans to have simple ways to remember how to best have conversations, and they can reach many more people than those inclined to attend small-group events. Think of an analogy to fire safety: Most of us know the phrase “stop, drop and roll,” but I doubt many of us have attended an actual fire safety workshop. Efforts to reduce political divides can have their own “stop, drop and roll” messaging. Urban-Rural Action teaches its ABCs to having a conversation: Ask to understand their perspective, Break down our view so they understand our reasoning, and Check our understanding of their perspective. I am partial to my own mnemonic, SVL (pronounced something like “civil”) to share Stories, relate to their Values, and Listen, an approach that goes beyond understanding of cognitive arguments, based on recommendations from Stanford’s Robb Willer.

Other details for three-step approaches (so they can be remembered and repeated) are possible, such as University of Michigan professor Amie Gordon’s suggestions to give the benefit of the doubt, seek understanding and find common ground. This approach largely overcomes the 4 R problems of recruitment, because nobody needs to be encouraged to attend a workshop, and repetition, because it is much easier to hear simple phrases in the midst of everyday life than to decide to attend a workshop or have a cross-partisan conversation.

Stories: As New York University social psychologist Jonathan Haidt wrote in “The Righteous Mind,” “The human mind is a story processor, not a logic processor.” Many Americans will not have the time, interest, energy, confidence, etc. to engage in (m)any cross-partisan conversations, but they may end up watching enticing content that includes such interactions. Existing efforts — such as StoryCorps’s One Small Step and Resetting the Table’s PURPLE — and future civil discourse efforts can also be seen as opportunities for content creation. Additionally, stories do not need to solely be about conversations; they can transform how Americans see one another directly.

We at More Like US have a mnemonic to CAST those across the political spectrum in a better light as more Complex, Admirable, Similar, and worthy of Togetherness than expected. Organizations such as Bridge Entertainment Labs are engaging with Hollywood to share better cross-partisan stories about each other. Compared with the 4 R’s, recruitment is not necessary, reliability and representativeness can be ensured in terms of the content seen or heard, and repetition is much easier with short content.

Structures: While conversations and adding new messages to the information environment are vital, efforts are essentially Sisyphean if the underlying information environment is rife with content that further negatively distorts our perceptions of each other across politics. I previously wrote of the necessity to add cross-partisan trust and subtract factors that worsen it. One of the most important factors involves reversing the current perverse incentives in news media, social media, electoral systems and even special interest groups. Divisive rhetoric and actions often perversely lead to more followers, clicks, revenue, donations, fame, etc.

Changing these incentives is not easy or obvious, but some progress is possible. The Trade Desk and Ad Fontes are providing data about news reliability to advertisers. The Council for Responsible Social Media works in part to address perverse incentives in social media, and many electoral reform organizations such as those in the National Association of Nonpartisan Reformers are working hard. These approaches avoid all of the 4 R’s because no 1:1 contact is needed.

Perhaps in an ideal world, millions of American adults would attend workshops focused on reducing political divides. Yet we must recognize that Americans live busy lives, and reducing political divides may never rise to the top of their agendas. We can meet Americans where they are with a whole variety of approaches beyond the standard civil discourse workshop. Let’s pursue the 4 S’s successful solution set: schools, slogans, stories and structures.

Coan is the co-founder and executive director of More Like US. Coan can be contacted at James@morelikeus.org