SLU news
Seminars on dialogue and disagreement
Published: 14 May 2020
It is important, but also difficult and challenging, to articulate disagreements in dialogue while maintaining constructiveness. This was the theme of two seminars with the Swedish Forest Agency (Skogsstyrelsen) and the Swedish Environmental Protection Agency (Naturvårdsverket), facilitated by Mistra-EC’s Hanna Bergeå and Lars Hallgren.
The forestry agency has initiated dialogue processes with forestry companies and nature conservation and outdoor recreation organisations to jointly develop descriptions of favourable status of nature and heritage objects after forestry interventions, such as trails or remnants of charcoal kilns. Drawing on our research on dialogue in natural resource management, we explored in this seminar the importance of being able to articulate disagreement and how conversation norms may give rise to difficulties and uncertainties in communication processes. We also discussed how the resistance towards clarity and constructivity can be overcome that may be embedded in language and interaction.
A similar seminar was carried out with employees working with collaborative processes at the environmental protection agency, ranging from international climate agreements to the designation of new national parks.