Description
We tend to approach conflict from the perspective of competing interests. A farmer’s interest lies in preserving water for crops, even as an environmentalist’s interest is in the usage of that same water for instream habitats. It’s hard to see how these interests intersect. But what if there used to be a different way to bear in mind each party’s needs?
Aaron T. Wolf has spent his career mediating such conflicts, both in the U.S. and around the globe. He quickly learned that in negotiations, people don’t seem to be automatons, programed to defend their positions, but are driven by a complicated set of dynamics—from how comfortable (or uncomfortable) the meeting room is to their deepest senses of self. What approach or system of understanding may be able to untangle most of these complexities? Wolf’s answer may be surprising to Westerners who are accustomed to separating religion from science, rationality from spirituality.
Wolf draws lessons from a diversity of faith traditions to become conflict. True listening, as practiced by Buddhist monks, as opposed to the “active listening” advocated by many mediators, can also be the key to calming a colleague’s anger. Alignment with an energy beyond oneself, what Christians would call grace, can change self-righteousness into community concern. Shifting the discussion from one about interests to one about common values—both farmers and environmentalists share the value of love of place—can also be the starting point for real dialogue.
As a scientist, Wolf engages religion not for the purpose of dogma but for the practical process of transformation. Whether atheist or fundamentalist, Muslim or Jewish, Quaker or Hindu, any reader involved in difficult dialogue will find concrete steps towards a meeting of souls.
Aaron T. Wolf has spent his career mediating such conflicts, both in the U.S. and around the globe. He quickly learned that in negotiations, people don’t seem to be automatons, programed to defend their positions, but are driven by a complicated set of dynamics—from how comfortable (or uncomfortable) the meeting room is to their deepest senses of self. What approach or system of understanding may be able to untangle most of these complexities? Wolf’s answer may be surprising to Westerners who are accustomed to separating religion from science, rationality from spirituality.
Wolf draws lessons from a diversity of faith traditions to become conflict. True listening, as practiced by Buddhist monks, as opposed to the “active listening” advocated by many mediators, can also be the key to calming a colleague’s anger. Alignment with an energy beyond oneself, what Christians would call grace, can change self-righteousness into community concern. Shifting the discussion from one about interests to one about common values—both farmers and environmentalists share the value of love of place—can also be the starting point for real dialogue.
As a scientist, Wolf engages religion not for the purpose of dogma but for the practical process of transformation. Whether atheist or fundamentalist, Muslim or Jewish, Quaker or Hindu, any reader involved in difficult dialogue will find concrete steps towards a meeting of souls.
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