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NEWBERG, Ore. (Newberg Graphic) — Even amid great political divide in the United States, some people still have faith that a return to civil discourse is possible.

One of these individuals is Ron Mock, a professor emeritus of politics and peace at George Fox University, former Newberg school board member and a familiar mediating figure in the Newberg-Dundee community.

The Civility Project, of which he is the director, is an extension of that faith. Formed during the 2020-21 academic year, Mock described his project as an “effort by the university to try and help the communities the college serves overcome political polarization and alienation.”

In recent years, Newberg, like the rest of the country, has witnessed many instances of incivility. Mock listed the recent school board controversies and the fraught 2017 schism at local Quaker churches as examples.

To Mock, disagreements are “resources” and “gifts” that can help communities grow and succeed. When people are not able to deal with disagreements “creatively and effectively,” communities suffer, Mock said.

“We’re not making decisions that are optimal,” he said. “We’re making poor decisions because we’re not working together.”

While the Civility Project does not hold regular meetings, it has hosted many different events since its inception.

Last fall, for instance, the project invited Braver Angels, an organization that encourages people at opposite ends of the political spectrum to begin conversations, to speak. Mock said he hopes they will return for another event in the spring.

“We’re not making decisions that are optimal,” he said. “We’re making poor decisions because we’re not working together.”

— Ron mock

In the past, Mock also has invited David French, a moderate political commentator, to share his concerns about political polarization and how he is trying to work across political lines.

As of right now, the Civility Project is helping Newberg Mayor Rick Rogers and Polly Peterson, executive director of the Newberg Downtown Coalition, organize a community conversation in Newberg, where citizens on opposing political sides can come together to talk about their similarities, rather than differences, and collaborate on solutions for the city.

Mock also has plans to create a Civility Inventory, a rating instrument that the project will use to rate politicians on a scale from one to five on various aspects of civility while engaging with one another. After calculating a politician’s civility rating, Mock intends to provide the individual with feedback on their progress.

“We can do it whether they like it or not,” Mock said, but added that he hopes the politicians “would welcome it as an opportunity for self growth.”

To complement the Civility Project, Mock is teaching a course on conflict resolution. Overall, Mock said the Civility Project has received “highly positive” reviews from students and people who have attended the events.

“People seem to think of it as a sign of hope in the community,” he added.

Mock has noticed that most students interested in the Civility Project are not political science majors, but rather have a diversity of majors.

In areas with lots of political conflict like Newberg, students are “interested in how to deal with it,” Mock said, adding that “it’s troubling to them that the community has become so polarized.”

As for whether he believes the Civility Project has made significant progress, Mock said that the project’s visibility on campus is still small, but that it is “already changing the culture” by “having people talk about problems when they didn’t before.”

Bigger picture behind project

Mock’s interest in civil discourse began 40 years ago after he graduated from law school. His first job out of school was as a staff attorney at the Michigan Court of Appeals. As part of his work, he reviewed cases as they arrived at the court, some of which had been going on for five to 15 years.

One particular case stood out to him. It involved three sisters who were suing one another over their parents’ estate. The case had been in process for years.

“It broke my heart,” Mock said, adding that the case file told a “story of three sisters whose relationships had been destroyed.”

Inspired, Mock helped form and served as the first director of the Christian Conciliation Services of Southeastern Michigan, which provided people with an alternative to court cases, so “people could work through conflict without hurting their relationships,” he said. The program has since shut down.

In the 1990s, Mock helped establish a similar program in Yamhill County, called Your Community Mediators, to help mediate and solve disputes between neighbors and members of the community.

The goal when creating both programs was to “get people through conflict without them becoming enemies,” Mock said.

“Conflicts should be chances to grow and know each other better,” he said. “To grow together to solve problems and to get on the same side of the table.”

In the past 10 years, Mock focused mainly on bringing diversity of opinion to the school board, of which he was a member from January 2012 to May 2021, when he lost to Trevor DeHart, one of the controversial school board directors.

“My approach on the school board was to help the board take advantage of differences and make better decisions,” Mock said. “It was why I voted for Brian Shannon in 2019. I didn’t think we had enough of a range of opinions on the board.”

However, Mock’s goals did not pan out.

“Brian never got to the point where he trusted the rest of the board, and the board never trusted him either, so it wasn’t very productive,” Mock said.

When a conservative majority took over the board in May 2021, Mock described it as a “missed opportunity of having diverse opinions and not taking advantage of it.”

The Civility Project’s mission, he said, is to counteract community division and help opponents see that the entire community benefits when people who disagree find a way to collaborate.

Doing so, Mock said, creates a “fairer and more just community.”

To sign up for the Civility Project’s weekly newsletter and keep updated on the latest events, email civility@georgefox.edu