Reclaiming Persuasion

• Lucinda Garthwaite, ILI Director

This week, I began reading a new book, The Persuaders, by journalist Anand Giridharadas.  In the prologue, he lays out his concern that, in the United States at least, a dangerous, pervasive culture has taken hold. He calls it “write-off” culture.

The defining characteristic of write-off culture, says Giridharadas, is the assumption that people who hold different socio-political beliefs are incapable of change.  That’s a serious problem because, he asks: Without the possibility of persuading others to change, how is it possible to change unjust and inequitable systems and structures? 

Though the answer to this question may seem obvious, the write-off culture persists.  Moreover, those who chose to act on the possibility that individual people can change face pushback from those with whom the persuaders are aligned, who work for the same kind of systems and structural changes.

The sad irony is that in dismissing the possibility of persuasion, that change becomes impossible.

Increasingly, as my colleagues and I push into innovative change strategies, I find myself wary of the push back Giridharadas describes.  We’re finding that it’s absolutely critical to lean into the possibility of individual change.  In fact, individual and relational change based on compassion, curiosity and restorative practice have become cornerstones to our successful work in schools, and as we move into working with organizations.

Honestly, I understand why some people see this as a risky strategy -- because it is.

There’s a fine line between preserving relationships for their own sake, and leveraging relationships for change. If I focus exclusively on compassion, curiosity, and restoration, only on the long game of persuasion, I can easily slide into the traps of niceness, conflict avoidance, and tolerance for the sake of unity and “peacefulness.”

So, I need to be very, very clear: the peace I seek is not defined by being nice, avoiding conflict and tolerating harmful behavior and systems.  It’s a peace defined by disagreement without violence or threat of violence; a willingness to compromise so that others don’t suffer, and behavior that makes it possible for all in the system to thrive.  

To get that kind of peace, I’m required to strike a balance: I hold tight to steely compassion and curiosity.  I allow myself to be persuadable.  At the same time, I also firmly reject violence, and behaviors and systems driven by bigotry. I focus quick, restorative attention on harm created by honest ignorance. When I have the power to build or help to build systems that prevent those behaviors and harms, I use that power. 

Heather McGhee, author of The Sum of Us, and chair of the Board for the racial justice non-profit, Color of Change, writes that The Persuaders offers the stories of “today’s most important movement builders. Then explains how they’ve gotten more people to buy in to their movements without selling out.”

The stories Giridharadas tells in The Persuaders makes it clear to me that movement builders and leaders achieve that balance only when they persuade in the context of liberatory relationship, which balances connection with insistence, and curiosity with boundaries.  

That this has clearly worked, over and over again, is an invitation to come back to persuasion, and it’s cause for hope.