Beyond Intractability: A Free Knowledge Base on More Constructive Approaches to Destructive Conflict

Introduction: Tamra d'Estrée, of the University of Denver, cautions that changes take a long time; improvement comes in little steps.

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Incrementalism
Tamra d'Estrée
Conflict Resolution Program, University of Denver

Interviewed by
Julian Portilla
2003

I think when I first started doing this, some of the first workshops I did, you'd come out of it and have a real high because you'd seen such discoveries in your participants. Like I said, they'd come out of it and be holding themselves physically differently because of a sense of either some new hope that would come out of hearing something new or making relationships with people from their antagonists. That had given them a new view on things, and they take on life, almost, and that can be really exciting. Any time you work with these kinds of human relations and you see change that can be really inspiring.

But, I guess where I was heading is that over the course of years of doing this now, even though I recognize that each of those individual two- or three-day workshops can be really exciting, that it's kind of a temporary high and that it doesn't necessarily translate into any long lasting change. I mean these are like little drops in the bucket, that look bigger at the time, but when people go back to their communities and things settle down, they're maybe little drops in the bucket of change.

...

But after seeing the same dynamic and getting inspired and then seeing that it's a temporary high, it's like a chocolate high, it comes up and then it dissipates, and then you're back to where you were, hopefully with a little bit of change.

Disappointment, failure, and frustration are the main agents of change. Success is a poor teacher, for it usually only confirms us in what we thought we already knew. -- Kenneth Boulding

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Beyond Intractability Version IV
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