A Model for an Introductory Dialogue on Abortion

Public Conversations Project.

The model described here was developed for the single session introductory dialogues on abortion that Public Conversations Project conducted in 1990-1992 (eighteen sessions) and 1995-1998 (ten sessions). Most of these dialogues took place on weekday evenings between 6:00 and 9:30 and involved four to eight participants who did not know one another ahead of time. Several participants were activists but few were highly visible leaders. All groups were evenly balanced with people who described themselves as ?“prochoice?” or ?“prolife.?”

Abortion Issue Guide

Public Agenda.

Where advocates on both sides see absolutes, the public seems to see conflicts and conditions, with solid majorities supporting a woman's right to an abortion if her reasons seem sound and if it's not too late in the pregnancy. On an individual level, medical technology is making the issue more complex. Public Agenda Issue Guides or ?“Citizen Choicework Guides?” contain background information on the topic and present three different approaches to the issue for people to deliberate.

Resource Link: http://www.publicagenda.org/issues/frontdoor.cfm?issue_type=abortion

Boston Prochoice and Prolife Leaders Dialogue

The Public Conversations Project.

Read about PCP's groundbreaking 7-year abortion dialogue involving pro-choice and pro-life leaders in the Boston area. PCP has been doing dialogue work with Prochoice and Prolife activists and others since 1989.

Resource Link: http://www.publicconversations.org/pcp/resource_details.php?ref_id=97

From Stuck Debate to New Conversation on Controversial Issues: A Report from the Public Conversations Project

Carol Becker, Laura Chasin, Richard Chasin, Margaret Herzig and Sallyann Roth. Journal of Feminist Family Therapy, 7 (1-2), 143-163, 1995.

This article presents the four guiding objectives of PCP's work and describes practices that support each of those objectives, drawing case examples from their introductory dialogues on abortion.

Resource Link: http://www.publicconversations.org/pcp/resources/resource_detail.asp?ref_id=69

Talking With The Enemy

Anne Fowler, Nicki Nichols Gamble, Frances X. Hogan, Melissa Kogut, Madeline McCommish, and Barbara Thorp. The Boston Globe, January 28, 2001.

For six years, Boston leaders on both sides of the abortion debate met in secret in an attempt to better understand each other through dialogue facilitated by the Public Conversations Project. This Boston Globe article enabled the group, which met together privately for over 150 hours, to publicly disclose their meetings and the impact those meetings had on them for the first time.

Resource Link: http://www.publicconversations.org