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Introduction:
Frank Dukes, director of the Institute for Environmental
Negotiation at the University of Virginia, describes a communication technique that he
sometimes used in particularly tense consensus building processes. He arranges a
particular stakeholder group in a circle and encourages them to discuss what they take
to be central issues while the rest of the participants look on and listen. This
technique both allows parties to talk about what is really bothering them and helps observers
to better understand the feelings and perspectives of other groups.
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This rough transcript provides a text alternative to audio. We apologize for occasional errors and unintelligible sections (which are marked with ???).
Facilitation
Frank Dukes
Director, Institute for Environmental Negotiation, University of Virginia
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A: I do like processes that have people listening to
each other. For instance, one thing that we've done quite effectively is using
circles.
...We had the tobacco farmers sitting inside a circle surrounded by the
health advocates, people from public agencies, researchers, and public
officials. The farmers are talking amongst themselves, addressing what the
impact is, what are they facing now, what are the challenges they are facing
now, how does that make them feel, what are their biggest fears, what are their
biggest concerns, and so on. It's that chance to talk without interruptions to
each other, and generally as facilitator I'm not even in the circle either, and
so they're really starting to talk with each other. People inside the circle
find it powerful because they are able to voice what is inside of them, without
someone responding immediately, arguing immediately, questioning immediately,
and then you give people on the outside the chance to ask questions. For people
on the outside it's generally very powerful also. Lets bring in the health
community now: why do you do the work that you do, what's powerful about it for
you, what does that mean for you? My experience has been that most people want
to do the right thing, and they want to get their needs met, but they want to be
respectful of other people
Q: It sounds like a bit of a fish bowl experiment.
A: Some people call it fish bowl, its sort of a funny name for it. I would
like to think of it in terms of circles, but you can call it "fish
bowl" when it shifts. There are different ways of structuring it, you might
have preset questions or you might not have so many preset questions. You might
give people on the outside more of a chance to ask questions or you might not,
it might just be a time for us to sit and listen depending on what the level of
controversy is, which I find that helpful for.
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