Brokering dialogue with the Tea Party

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Last week was my spring break from UCLA, and instead of going to a tropical locale with umbrella drinks, I decided to get a jump on earning course credits and learn new skills through taking a class on public mediation.  For those of you not familiar with mediation as a form of dispute resolution, the basic concept is that two parties (referred to as "disputants" in our training course) will agree to meet with a neutral mediator, and the mediator will work to facilitate a dialogue between the disputants to foster an understanding of each other's interests between them.  The mediator will attempt to structure the dialogue so that the disputants can come to a resolution between each other that is mutually agreeable, not a resolution that is imposed by a judge  or arbitrator, as in other dispute resolution approaches.

The key aspects of the mediation strategy are in active listening, where the mediator seeks to give full attention to each disputant to hear their side of the story, and then, through active listening, to discover what each disputant's interests are.  "Interests" in a dispute can range from the purely economic, as in unpaid wages owed a worker, to the purely emotional, as when a person feels disrespected by his/her spouse.  Mediation is an attempt to deal with not only surface-level concerns, such as money issues, but the deeper feelings that may lie underneath those issues that conspire to prevent the disputants from reaching a mutually satisfactory resolution.  In mediation lies the idea that conflicts can be an opportunity for greater understanding and better relationships between individuals, not just power struggles where the winner takes all.

When I entered the class, I figured that I would simply learn some new skills for conflict resolution, skills that would be especially handy for me since I am a person who fears conflict with others.  What I discovered, however, was a new approach towards dialogue and communication, and a new framework through which to view political and policy debates.  By attempting to "hear" the other's concerns - to not judge the other immediately, but to give them an opportunity to feel heard and respected - I found that the disputants would be able to give voice to the feelings underlying their side of the dispute.  Once the two parties' emotions were acknowledged, resolution became more possible.

Since President Obama's inauguration, and especially with the raucous health care reform town hall meetings last August, I have been troubled by the rise of the Tea Party movement in American politics.  Beyond the basic inconsistencies of the Tea Partiers' main messages (if they're so concerned with government spending, where were they during the 8 years of the Bush Administration's unprecedented deficit-spending?  If they're so concerned with increasing taxes, why are they protesting when the Obama Administration just gave tax cuts to 95% of Americans (okay, maybe 92%)?  If they're worried about Big Government, why didn't we hear a peep out of them when President Bush presided over the largest expansion of government since the days of FDR?) I have puzzled over what is uniting all of these generally white, older, lower- to middle-class conservatives in such strident opposition to a government that is seeking to make their lives better.  Are they just mad that "their guy" lost the election?  It's doubtful that such resentment would still sustain such a large movement a year and a half after the election ended.  Are they all just racist?  I have to admit that I've certainly thought and expressed that belief in recent months, but again, it's hard to believe that such a large swath of the population would be motivated solely by racial issues.  No, I believe that race plays a significant role, but it's something more subtle than that.

Yesterday, a classmate forwarded me a link to a post by Steve Benen of Washington Monthly magazine that helped to clear up my thinking on the Tea Partiers and their sympathizers across the country.  Benen discusses a fascinating Dallas Morning News article profiling a family that is suffering under the strain of breast cancer, unemployment, and high out-of-pocket health care expenses; in other words, exactly the kind of family that the health insurance reform bill is intended to help.  But the family opposes the health reform bill, fearing government inefficiency and death panels, which Benen states

...makes the response all the more fascinating. Amy Townsend appears to have heard the right-wing propaganda, and seems inclined to believe it. "Every government program," she told the paper, "none of them work very well." 

The Townsend family is, however, currently getting by on unemployment benefits (a government program), and is holding onto some coverage through COBRA (another government program), which they can afford thanks to federal subsidies (through another government program). 

The point isn't to mock the Townsends or to question their judgment. The point is to appreciate the power of conservative political rhetoric in 2010. Many of those who stand to benefit from a stronger safety net have been led to believe they want a weaker one. Many of those who'll finally be able to get better care under a health care system that's been screwing them over have been convinced that they won't, or can't, benefit from reform.

There's a lot to unpack here.  I have thought a lot about an idea that many Democrats subscribe to (and that Benen represents well here), which is that the GOP convinces people through "rhetoric" or "propaganda" to vote against their own "interests," as if their interests are strictly economic in nature.  It's an essentialist argument on its face, that people can be defined solely by their economic concerns, and it gives credence to the widespread conservative critique of liberal conceit; that liberals believe they "know" another person's interests better than the people themselves do.

My contention is that the Tea Partiers are protesting mainly against the "face" of the government that is supposed to represent them, and the changing of American culture that has been going on for decades, but the evidence of which had been remarkably suppressed by the Bush Administration and its overwhelmingly white male leadership (with the notable exceptions of Condoleeza Rice and Colin Powell, of course).  Now we have not only a black President, but a female Speaker of the House, female Secretary of State, black Attorney General, Asian-American Secretary of Energy, etc.  This is not the government that many Americans are used to, and I think that, while one can call the Tea Partiers' reactions "racism" (and I certainly have!) I have come to believe, as noted above, that it's more subtle than that.  People feel that their government no longer represents them - they can no longer "see themselves" in the government, and they can't trust those "other people" to handle their tax money, help them afford health care, protect them from terrorism, etc.  As noted above, the vast majority of Tea Partiers are conservative and white, and would likely not vote Democratic anyways.  But then watching Fox News increases peoples' levels of fear and distrust by Fox speaking directly to their feelings of being unsettled with the "new order" running the government, and telling them that those feelings are widespread and that people should act on those feelings rather than hearing what the other side actually has to say.

So all this to say that I think that people also have an "interest" in feeling that their government represents them and their interests, and that speaking to their intellects, rather than their gut feelings of disorientation, will not ultimately be very productive for Democrats.  While this family in the article quoted may be going directly against their own economic interests, they are choosing instead to act on their interest in being represented by a government they "recognize," I suppose.  I'm not at all trying to justify the Tea Partiers, and I certainly do believe there is a strong racist element in the Tea Party movement, I've just been trying to imagine what it is that people react to so viscerally, and these last few paragraphs are what I've come up with thus far.

So how does one have a productive dialogue with the other side?  I'm not really sure yet, but through my basic studies of mediation I came to this point in my understanding of the Tea Party movement, and I believe that mediation represents a potentially useful tool for engaging in that dialogue.  How one engages a national dialogue is far beyond me, but I believe that initially at least it comes down to showing respect on an individual level, and an understanding that another's experience of the world is not your own.  So if you encounter a person who holds diametrically opposite views to your own, and there is not a fear of physical violence ensuing between you, I'd say take a moment to really listen to their concerns, you might be surprised what they tell you.

I plan to revisit this topic in future posts, and I'm in the process of formulating a major research project for next year that just might involve mediation...stay tuned.  In the meantime, if you're interested in learning more about the power of engaged dialogue, take a look here.