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Skills for Bridging the Divide Workshop with Braver Angels

The Center for the Political Future is partnering with Braver Angels for this month's Listen In Session.

Learn skills for having respectful conversations that clarify differences, search for common ground, and affirm the importance of the relationship. This workship does the following:


  • Provides knowledge about what it takes to have constructive, non-polarizing conversations between people who disagree politically.
  • Gives you the chance to practice these skills to have these conversations
  • Motivates you to have these conversations with people in your social network

You will practice listening and speaking skills in a pair with someone of your own political persuasion - red or blue. "Reds" lean conservative and tend to vote Republican. "Blues" lean liberal and tend to vote Democratic. If you fall somewhere in the middle, you can choose a side for purposes of practicing the skills.

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When Democracy’s Symbols Get Hijacked: How the Far Right Co-Opted Classical Imagery
brown concrete building under blue sky during daytime
Photo by Darryl Low on Unsplash

When Democracy’s Symbols Get Hijacked: How the Far Right Co-Opted Classical Imagery

For generations, Americans have surrounded themselves with the symbols of ancient Greece and Rome: marble columns, laurel wreaths, Roman eagles, and the fasces. These icons, carved into our government buildings and featured on our currency, were intended to embody democracy, civic virtue, and republican ideals.

But in recent years, far-right movements in the U.S. and abroad have hijacked these classical images, repackaging them into symbols of exclusion, militarism, and authoritarian nostalgia.

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From Vision to Action: 
Remaking the World Through Social Entrepreneurship
blue and brown globe on persons hand
Photo by Greg Rosenke on Unsplash

From Vision to Action: Remaking the World Through Social Entrepreneurship

Social entrepreneurs are people who launch ventures aimed at promoting positive change in their community and in the world. I am such a person. In 1982, I founded a nonprofit organization called Search for Common Ground (informally known as “Search”). My bottom line was not financial gain but making the world a better place.

My credentials as a social entrepreneur grew out of my hands-on involvement in building Search from zero into the world’s largest nonprofit group involved in peacebuilding. My partner and closest collaborator wasand ismy wife, Susan Collin Marks. By the time we stepped down from Search’s leadership in 2014, we had a deeply committed staff of 600 employees working out of offices in 35 countries. In 2018, Search was nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize.

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