Fellow Posts

Lauren Collver ’25 (DCI Fellow)

There are many clear takeaways one expects from participating in a deliberation. New perspectives, deeper understandings, and opportunities to exercise constructive discussion. When going into my first facilitation experience, I prepared for disagreement, miscommunication, and heated discussions. In my mind, the biggest challenges I would face would be finding common ground, keeping track of a multitude of ideas and views, and keeping deliberators on time. These challenges turned out to be barely issues at all… 

• Finding common ground? Almost the entire group was connected to the Davidson community, and excited to celebrate our differences.
• Keeping track of ideas? I quickly developed a note-taking method to easily keep track of people’s main points and primary values.
• Keeping people on time? Participants were often grateful for interruptions and reminders to keep us on time (a very pleasant surprise).

With all of my main concerns out of the way, I found myself confronting the most unexpected challenge of all: agreement. With all of my preparation having gone towards preparing for disagreement and focusing on finding common ground, I found myself unexpectedly lost when in my first D-Team meeting the conversations continually came to a lull, with an increasing frequency of comments such as “my thoughts are very similar to the previous person” or “I’m not sure I have much more to add to the conversation, all of my thoughts seem to have been said.” The problem here was not so much the presence of agreement; it was my underlying sense that people had not actually found common ground so simply but were relying on the convenience and comfort of agreement.

This problem makes sense in the context of a formal deliberation where a diverse group of people across a wide range of generations and experiences find courtesy and politeness more comfortable than disagreement. The statement “sure, that makes sense / I can see why you feel that way” is far more comfortable than statements like “I actually disagree with you on that” or “I’m not convinced that your point is entirely fair.” 

It was here that I was able to fully realize my value as a facilitator. As someone without a stake in the deliberation or a point of view to defend, I was in a position to demonstrate paths towards constructive disagreement. I started using statements such as “If i might push you on that point a little bit there” or “So, I’m hearing that you think X because of Y, and I’m wondering if others in the group may have different perspectives on this point?” With this strategy, I was able to both invite deeper discussion and demonstrate to participants how they could do the same while maintaining the courtesy they found comfortable.

With deeper discussions underway from our first meeting, the second two D-Team meetings led us to a great perspective on agreement. We realized that a lot of those initial statements expressing passive agreement came from a reflexive focus agreeing upon the existence of problems, rather than discussing the historic and cultural causes of such problems.

For example, participants could agree that confidence in election security is an issue that the American government is currently facing, but could fundamentally disagree on the causes of the lack of confidence in the first place. When we realize that we can agree on the existence of problems while disagreeing on the root cause of the issue, we can focus on exploring solutions rather than getting caught in circles of disagreement.

Clyde Dwyer ’25 (DCI Fellow)

Over the past couple months, the DCI Fellows have held deliberations with students, faculty, community members and alumni on a range of topics from election accessibility to free speech and inclusion. As a Fellow, I’ve deliberated with both familiar and unfamiliar faces, people younger and older than me from a wide range of backgrounds and experiences.

As Daniel, a fellow DCI Fellow, pointed out in his blog post, deliberation that pushes people towards new ideas serves society. I came to Davidson from New York City, a political echo chamber where it’s often difficult to find ideological diversity. Working with DCI, I’ve recognized the importance of engaging with views that challenge your own

One of the most important elements of deliberation is also one of its greatest downsides. Deliberation is based upon individuals’ voluntary participation in political dialogues, without compulsion or coercion. This is great. In my D-Teams, some members mention how the loss of civil disagreement and the rise of hyper-partisanship has motivated them to become more engaged in democratic processes like deliberation.

On the other hand, people with strongly differing viewpoints are more likely to oppose deliberation. Outside of the DCI, I’ve heard people say, “I could never be friends with a Republican,” as well as “All Democrats are crazy.” The act of deliberation, where mutual respect and thoughtful engagement are key, is something that could help soften these biases. People enter deliberations not as “Democrats” or “Republicans,” but as people with ideas, values and feelings. After all, much of the political polarization in society has been fueled by people from opposing ends of the ideological spectrum not engaging with one another, or at best, talking past one another.

Certainly, there are valid reasons not to engage in deliberation. Some individuals may feel isolated due to their identity in the conversation. Others may not want to engage with people who they don’t feel respect them. The political and personal realms are not mutually exclusive, and political beliefs are often heavily intertwined with personal values and considerations. Not everyone has to engage on every issue, especially those that are particularly personal and sensitive to them.

On other issues, however, that are not so personal, the question still remains: How do we encourage people with drastically different perspectives to deliberate with one another? One way might be to emphasize that those perspectives are indeed welcome and important for everyone to hear. Deliberation’s necessary emphasis on mutual respect and civility does not preclude strong opinions and even passionate arguments but welcomes and even requires participants to engage with them, as long as everyone is treated as equal participants in the conversation.

The goals of the DCI extend far beyond our campus and the town of Davidson. But the scope of our program will remain limited if only people on opposite sides of the political center are willing to come to the table. I have just suggested one possibility, but we need to find multiple ways for people with vastly different viewpoints to feel like they belong in these conversations. No doubt this task is easier said than done. But before we talk about restoring democracy or restoring our institutions, it is important to restore our willingness to talk with people we strongly disagree with. 

By Peyton Carter ’23 (DCI Fellow)

Oftentimes in today’s world, we are surrounded by wildly different viewpoints. Fighting about contentious issues has become a mainstay in this climate, whereas in decades past it may have been taboo to even talk about your politics in a public setting. If we look at which groups are ­­­­butting heads, most of the time we focus on the polarization between liberal and conservative parties, but when looking past those differences we see an even bigger divide between different generations of Americans.

The generational gap in what people believe and stand for has been quite apparent to me for many years now and even more so in recent years. I am only 21 years old, but I feel that even within the past 6 years, I have seen so many changes in the way people in the United States have handled contentious topics. I often see people my age, with a lot of passion and engagement with social or political topics, taking charge and using their voices to advocate for what they feel is important. Alternatively, the older generations (often known as the Silent Generation, Baby Boomers or Gen Xers) are generally more reserved with their opinions and beliefs on such topics, frequently with an emphasis on ‘traditional’ ways of doing things instead of adapting to changing times.

With the DCI’s semester-long D Teams, I have been able to witness firsthand the immense benefits that come from gathering different people from different walks of life, and specifically from different generations. Rather than resulting in demeaning clashes, our D Teams productively bring together students, staff, alumni, and community members. When my D-Team  gathers, we have a mix of different generations with about half of us being college students and the other half much older. I have frequently found that during these deliberations, our older community members are always intrigued and interested in the perspectives of those of us who are younger members. This is not to say that young people do not hold an equal amount of interest in older members’ perspectives as well, but rather that each group is able to learn from each other.

After each meeting or deliberation that I do with the DCI, I always take away the same thoughts – how nice it is to talk with people that have different backgrounds and perspectives. It is a rare opportunity for people around my age to get together and talk about important issues and topics that surround us today, and even rarer to be able to do so with people older than us. Usually, when these conversations arise, it is because we are in class and our teacher tells us to have a discussion about it, or our parents bring it up at dinner.

I have found it to be a rare yet refreshing experience to talk about these topics with people whom I barely know and who have a diverse set of life experiences and outlooks on the world. I find that when we are all in the same room sitting down deliberating rather than debating about these issues, we all learn something from one another. As we talk, you can see both generational groups of participants begin to drop whatever preconceived notions they may have about one another. We start to see that in addition to all our contrasts, we also have some similarities.

Despite all these positive outcomes, these conversations don’t take place if people are not willing to engage in deliberating. You must be willing to give a little of yourself and drop any prejudgments to gain new outlooks on life. The only way to bridge the gap between separate groups – whether it be by age, race, gender, and more – is by sitting down with one another and openly sharing our thoughts and opinions in a respectful manner.