Nonviolent Communication Research
Founded in 1984 by far-sighted, innovative psychologist Marshall Rosenberg, the Center for Nonviolent Communication has grown into an international nonprofit organization that provides expertise in the NVC approach through a network of “well over 150 certified trainers worldwide” (Cox and Dannahy, 2005, p. 41). Given its longevity and increasing internationalization, NVC has been tested in varied contexts.
According to Thomas P. Caruso (personal communication, November 2, 2005), research was conducted in Costa Rica in 2004 on the impact of NVC training at the Elias Castro School of Excellence; in the United States in 2002 as A Step toward Violence Prevention: NVC, part of a college curriculum; in the Netherlands in 200l on NVC as a way to reduce violence in kindergartens; in Finland in 2001 on how NVC reduces bullying by 26 percent at the International School of Helsinki; and in Yugoslavia in 1996 as “Mutual Education: Giraffe Language in Kindergartens and Schools” (the giraffe, the land animal with the largest heart, is the symbol for the compassionate language advocated by NVC practitioners). Researchers in conflict resolution can gain a sense of the high quality of empirical research on the effects of NVC by reading a 2005 paper by Cox and Dannahy in which they use the Rosenberg model “as a way of developing the openness needed for successful communication in e-mentoring relationships.” According to those researchers (one from the United States, the other from the United Kingdom), “there is evidence to suggest that the use of NVC, with its focus on feelings and needs, encourages trusting relationships characterized by openness.” Interestingly, they continue, “Case study research was undertaken with students participating in an online coaching and mentoring module that formed part of a Masters degree at a British university.” In their conclusion, they state that “the most noteworthy indication of NVC’s ability to facilitate electronic dialogue is illustrated through the speed at which in-depth relationships were forged with students.” (For insights into applied research possibilities by NVC for individual and group practice, Nonviolent Communication: Companion Workbook by Leu, 2003, is well worth reading.)
Appreciative Inquiry
This approach places “language at the center of human organizing and change” (Whitney and Trosten-Bloom, 2003, p. 53) and characterizes that system as “the vehicle by which communities of people create knowledge and make meaning” (p. 56). Four key concepts of appreciative inquiry (AI) are positive change, meaning making, freedoms, and power. Positive change emphasizes the positive potential of people and organizations by focusing on “the best of what has been, what is, and what might be” (p. 15). From a peace linguistics perspective, AI authors believe that “words create worlds” and that language has the power to create social change and reality (p. 53). The term meaning making means the sharing of interview data—stories, quotes, and inspirational highlights—for deeper interaction. Freedoms, “six conditions for the liberation of power” (p. 238), include the freedom to be heard. In AI, “having no voice . . . is the experience of the oppressed. To be heard is to have a recognized and credible voice”(p. 241). By power the authors mean “the capacity to create, innovate, and positively influence the future” or “an unlimited relational resource” (p. 236). Also of possible applicational interest is AI’s “Positive Principle: Positive Questions Lead to Positive Change”(p. 66). Such formulation is similar to the philosophy underlying the checklist for asking questions positively proposed by Gomes de Matos (1996).
Although Whitney and Trosten-Bloom (2003) do not deal explicitly with the core concept of conflict, examples are provided of communicative conflicts in the workplace. Of additional interest, especially to researchers in typologies of conflict, is Whitney and Trosten-Bloom’s mention of AI meetings of people experiencing conflicts of a cultural, generational, or religious nature. Those researchers in organizational change acknowledge the relevance of the field of positive psychology and claim that the approach initiated by American Psychological Association president Martin Seligman in 1998, “along with Appreciative Inquiry, may well revolutionize the way that we live, work, and organize our families, communities, and businesses” (p. 85). For applied peace linguists, it is gratifying to learn from Whitney and Trosten-Bloom that “psychologists, like organization development consultants, believe that, to contribute constructively to human and societal well-being, they need to develop a vocabulary of joy, hope, and health” (p. 85).
Research on AI
Appreciative inquiry, a process for positive change, had its beginnings at Case Western Reserve University in 1985. It is being used by businesses, educational institutions, health care systems, governments, and communities in the United States and abroad. As Whitney and Trosten-Bloom state, “Appreciative Inquiry (AI) is a bold invitation to be positive. . . . Over and over people have told us that AI works, in part, because it gives people the Freedom to be Positive” (2003, p. 250). The positive impact of AI comes from its capacity to bring together and liberate the power of diverse groups of people. In a personal communication (November 2, 2005), Whitney clarifies that
research into why AI works shows that its 4-D Cycle (discovery, dream, design, and delivery) is effective as a change process for five reasons: 1) it lets people meet and be known to each other in relationships rather than in roles; 2) it enables people to be heard for what they value and care about; 3) it creates opportunities for people to share their dreams in a broader community of colleagues and friends; 4) it fosters an environment in which people are able to choose how they want to contribute; and 5) it builds systems and structures through which people are supported in taking risks to create and to innovate.
Ríos and Fisher (2003) provide an example of the use of AI as a tool for conflict transformation in which they explore how the positive features of AI might help bring about reconciliation between conflicting parties in the long-standing maritime conflict between Bolivia and Chile. In their conclusion, the two researchers say that “although AI applications in corporate and community settings have been successful in addressing complicated issues, scenarios of deep-rooted and longstanding conflict within or between countries can bring quite different challenges” (p. 247). According to Whitney, “It is AI’s relational, narrative approach to the cooperative discovery of what matters to people that is at the heart of its success as a process for creating positive futures in human organizations and communities” (personal communication, May 2, 2005). (On other uses of AI methodology, see Sampson, Abu-Nimer, Liebler, and Whitney, 2003.)
Powerful Nondefensive Communication
This approach shares with NVC the use of the negative prefix non, which has been universalized in such foundational concepts as Gandhi’s nonviolence, a term coined in 1915, meaning “the policy or practice of refraining from the use of violence, as in protesting oppressive authority” (Random House Webster’s College Dictionary, 1997, p. 891). When asked why she used a negative hyphenated word, non-defensive, powerful non-defensive communication (NDC) author Ellison explains that she “couldn’t find a word in the English language that describes how to communicate without (a) being dependent on the other person’s cooperation and (b) joining in the power struggle” (personal communication, April 21, 2005). She adds that “most of the words like peaceful, cooperative, and so on, inspire most people to think of the cooperative.” She continues, “My process allows people to speak with power regardless of whether s/he cooperates.”
On Ellison’s combining power and non-defensiveness in her book’s subtitle, The Art of Powerful Non-Defensive Communication, she clarifies that people respond strongly to those two adjectives together and want to know more about being powerful and non-defensive at the same time (personal communication, April 21, 2005).
The core concepts in powerful non-defensive communication (PNDC) are power, the war model (a traditional system of communicating), and the powerful nondefensive model (tools instead of weapons). Although the term peace is conspicuously absent from the book’s index, it is given prominence
in its conclusion: “Peace and Power.” In another personal message, Ellison sums up her approach to power, language, and peace in this way: “The tendency toward power struggle among individuals and groups of people and conflict in epidemic proportions is often seen simply as human nature. It seems to be the story of recorded human history. I believe that we have used a particular understanding of power as the foundation of all human communication and if we were to change how we conceive of power and use it, we could change human destiny” (August 10, 2005). Ellison states that “the war model reflects a unilateral view of power, with subsequent need to control and manipulate expressed in how we use language, asking questions that are interrogating, making statements of opinion as fact, and trying to convince others to agree, as well as making predictions designed to threaten or punish others.” She clarifies that in the war model, reciprocity is seen as being effective only if others cooperate and argues that the alternative is what she call reciprocal power: “where I choose how to respond to you based on how you treat me, but I do not try to control you, or convince you to be different. I call the language for this system powerful non-defensive communication.” She goes on to explain,
In this system, reciprocity is not dependent on anyone else’s cooperation. I simply judge how much I do for you and with you based on how you treat me. Of course, there is still oppression and many circumstances where one person or group can use violence to take control. However, my belief is that in millions of personal interactions, reciprocal power expressed through a powerful non-defensive system of language not only has more power for the individual using it, but the other person is very likely to disarm their own defenses. This non-defensive system of language addresses the human need for connection, love and respect.
In Ellison’s concluding remarks, she speaks of what I call communicative peace: “If we change how we communicate in our own families and communities, it will begin to change our human mindset and someday, when one more person changes to a non-defensive way of listening and speaking, using power in reciprocal ways, . . . our wisdom can guide us in finding peaceful solutions to the global issues that we all face.” Of special interest for applied peace linguists in Ellison’s applicational insights might be her description of questions, statements, and predictions as tools of PNDC; her formats for NDC (content- or process-based questions, descriptive statements, if-type predictions); and a list of individual reactions in interactions.
Constructive Communication
My approach, described in greater length in Portuguese (Gomes de Matos, 1996, 2002a) and briefly in English (Gomes de Matos, 2000, 2001, 2002b, 2005b), reflects the assumption that communicating well is communicating for the good of humankind. In my 1996 book, I provided several checklists and guidelines on how to communicate constructively. The following sample guidelines are translated from the text in Portuguese:
How to Interact Positively
Help integrate seemingly conflicting points of view (yours and your conversational partner’s).
Be cordial to your linguistic neighbor.
React responsibly, in a spirit of dignifying reciprocity.
Interact for mutual good and kindness.
Find out as much as possible about your interactive neighbor’s beliefs and values. Remember: People are more important than problems.
Ask for constructive feedback.
Form questions positively.
Another checklist is centered on how to write constructively. It was first used by undergraduate students of Portuguese at the local Federal University of Pernambuco, then by police officers in a community policing program sponsored by the Pernambuco State Department of Social Defense and by the Center for Applied Social Sciences:
How to Write Constructively
In writing texts for academic or administrative/management purposes, be sure to foster constructive interpersonal relations.
In closing a personal exchange (traditional mail or e-mail), enhance interaction with your communicative friend by creating variants for the complimentary close: go beyond sincerely, and depending on prevailing weather conditions, wish your addressee sunniest regards, and so on. Exercise your right to be communicatively creative.
In writing to friends, wish them health, peace, friendship, faith, development, and so forth as established by your culture and theirs, or boldly go beyond conventions. Underlying such constructive writing-centered guidelines is the belief that writing well is writing for the good of writers and readers and more broadly, one’s group, as well as national, regional, or international communities.
Peace linguists might be interested to know that in my workshops aimed at positive or constructive writing, self-monitoring checklists such as the following are shared:
What constructive knowledge do/did I have about my readers?
How can/could I contribute to their individual or collective well-being?
What constructive values do/did I communicate/enhance/prioritize? How?
What constructive vocabulary and phraseology do/did I have to change to communicate more constructively? How?
What can/could my text contribute to my readers’ (and my own) communicative, cultural, ecological, economic, ethical, moral, political, social, and spiritual well-being?
My constructive communication (CC) approach capitalizes on the applicational possibilities of checklists. Also included in the 1996 book are guidelines on how to read and listen positively (this adverb is often used instead of constructively), how to criticize positively, how to interact with older persons positively, and how to use linguistics at the service of positive communication.
Constructive Communication Research
In more recent work (Gomes de Matos, 2012), I refer to my approach to peace linguistics as LIF PLUS: the life-improving force of peaceful language use. In that work, I provide two applications of my technique rhymed reflections (RRs): a set of four stanzas and a set of twenty-one couplets. Here is one of the four-line RRs:
When with their parents teenagers interact
Disagreements and even conflicts may take place
How could those persons begin to learn to react?
By putting on a smiling friendly face
Following are two of the two-line RRs (slightly adapted for this chapter):
If a conflict we want to manage constructively
Let’s do our best and cooperate creatively
In mediation, Peace can be a conciliatory Power
In meditation, Peace can be a spiritualizing Flower
I also recommend that RRs be considered as the textual component of artistically designed posters. Here is an example: the third stanza of a three-stanza RR produced at the Design Department of Associação Brasil América, Recife, Brazil:
What is meant by being educated for Nonkilling?
It is a globally needed type of educational right
It involves Life-supporting-saving-and-preserving
and serves Humankind as a peace-promoting light
And here is my reason for using RRs as a psychoeducational-communicative technique:
Cognitively, rhymed reflections are mnemonic
but they can have a deep function: being solomonic
Phonetically, they are pairs of reflections that rhyme
Semantically, they are vocabulary mountains for us to climb
Creatively, RRs are imaginatively wrought
and provide us with more alternatives to be sought
To languages as meaningful mental marvels, RRs pay tribute
To the VERSEtility of language users, such reflections contribute
Rhymed reflections, from the mind and heart, human dignity will elevate
Rhymed reflections, for constructive conflict resolution purposes, will educate
Given its relatively young age and the fact that its two foundational works were published in Portuguese (Gomes de Matos, 1996, 2002a), the constructive communication approach has experienced somewhat more diffusion in Brazil, but it is slo
wly becoming known in English. (For two examples, see Gomes de Matos, 2001, in which the pedagogy of positiveness is applied to diplomatic communication, and Gomes de Matos, 2005b, in which uses of peaceful language are discussed and exemplified.)
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