A Panel on "Practical Examples of Promoting Civil Discourse" with Brad Heckman, CEO, The New York Peace Institute, whose drawings appear in the background; Professor Ben Davis, The University of Toledo, College of Law; and C.T. Butler, Author and Mediator.
Cardozo Journal of Conflict Resolution’s Annual Symposium on "Negotiating the Extremes: Impossible Political Dialogues in the 21st Century" Explored Negotiation and Political Gridlock
In November 2012, the nation was perhaps more politically divided than at any moment in its history. The United States had been through a nearly three-year-long campaign, from the divisive Republican primaries to the even more divisive general election. Negative advertising by anonymous SuperPACs became the norm. And in the meantime, the government was unable to compromise on pragmatic solutions to a laundry list of issues: the deficit, the budget, the debt ceiling, immigration reform and climate change, just to name a few. Even with the reelection of a candidate once synonymous with “hope,” the feeling of pessimism was pervasive.
In this context, the Cardozo Journal of Conflict Resolution held its 2012 Annual Symposium, “Negotiating the Extremes: Impossible Political Dialogues in the 21st Century.” Held on November 5, the day before the election, the conference explored whether the ‘classic’ model of negotiation—developed famously in the 1980s by the Harvard Program on Negotiation and explained in Roger Fisher and William Ury’s Getting to Yes—still applies to 21st century political disputes. That classic model requires that parties negotiate their underlying interests instead of positions and that they focus on problems rather than people. The Symposium examined two case studies where those basic rules now seem unimaginably difficult: American party politics and the intractable Israeli/Palestinian conflict. In both of these cases, our speakers showed how the traditional ways of thinking about collaborative bargaining no longer apply. Panels ran throughout the day and ranged from discussions of new ADR processes to solve current disputes, to discussions about civil discourse and decision-making more generally.
This year’s Symposium faced an unusual challenge: Hurricane Sandy had hit New York just one week earlier. Without power, classes were cancelled—power was not restored to the Law School until the day before the Symposium. Nevertheless, faculty and students persevered and saw record-breaking attendance of over 120 ADR practitioners and scholars from around the country