SUSI experience!! July 11, 2011

Monday, July 11: Conflict resolution & City Club

Missoula City Club

That day we had some very useful knowledge on Natural Resource Conflict Resolution from Dr. Matt McKinney, a Senior Lecturer at The University of Montana’s School of Law who teaches workshops, seminars, and courses on natural resource policy and public dispute resolution. During the past 20 years, he has designed, facilitated, and mediated over 50 public dialogues, including citizen participation and multi‐party. Together with Len, he shared with us his experiences in working with environmental disputes, how to manage people, and also how to do things in the right way using Thomas-Killman Conflict Management Assessment. Then we headed to the City Club meeting downtown, an assembly of people representing the Missoulian to discuss current issues related to the city. After introducing who we are, we join the discussion about The role of Civic Engagement in US Society with other people; there were professors, government, business owners, ranchers, artist, and more. It was a great opportunity for us to meet different kind of people and share our thoughts, although we did not really know what they are talking about but we got a lot of comprehension on how they see and solve their problems together effectively. This kind of forum is hardly found in Indonesia, no political interest, no government domination, and totally not quarrelsome.

After the City club finished, we went back to NAC to have a review on Personal Styles of Conflict Management with Dr. McKinney. Everyone got a bundle of very interesting and useful handout ob Benefits of and Need for Collaboration, Collaborative Approaches to Natural Resources Policy,

Phases of Public Dialogue, Place of Negotiation and Facilitation in Collaboration, Positional Bargaining vs. Interest‐based Negotiation. The discussion kept on rolling until we had to move on to the next topic at 3pm. Dr. Broberg and Dr. McKinney introduced the 'Crown of the Continent', an 18 million acre ecosystem.

at Natural History center

 

That cuts across international, provincial, state, tribal, county, agency, and other boundaries. Later that evening we biked to the Natural History Center. There we were accompanied by Mr. Brian Williams, the Assistant Education Director who gave us overview of the habitats and wildlife of Montana, with a focus on the unique quality and importance of Glacier National Park to the overall Montana landscape, using museum specimens to supplement the discussion.