Transpartisan Note #30
by A. Lawrence Chickering and James S. Turner
October 31, 2016, 499 years to the date after Martin Luther challenged the Catholic Church, Pope Francis traveled to Lutheran Sweden, to recognize Luther and lead off a yearlong acknowledgment of the Protestant Reformation that divided Christianity into feuding sects.
NPR reports that Gerard O’Connell, Vatican correspondent for the Jesuit magazine America, says the pope’s participation in commemorating the Reformation is proof of the extraordinary change in Catholic-Lutheran relations.
“A recognition,” it says, that “perhaps, both sides missed something at the time of the Protestant Reformation. The Catholic Church missed ways of reforming itself. Luther and those around him pressed in a way that just couldn’t be taken on board, so, in a way, both sides misspoke.”
They “misspoke” in a way that led to more than 130 years of unremitting warfare, concluding in the 1648 Peace of Westphalia, the treaty that ended the Thirty Years’ War. How we fight affects ordinary lives as much, and perhaps more, than what we fight.
Andrew Pettegree of Scotland’s St Andrews University writes on the history of communication. His book, Brand Luther, a reviewer says, tells “a story about Luther’s relationship to media fruitful for reflection on our own time of massive changes in how people come to see what they see and know what they know and finally to believe what they believe.”
Today we live in the midst of another media revolution altering how we come to believe what we believe. Printers fed off Luther’s pamphleteering battle with his critics. They made fortunes publishing both sides. Those who hold the coats and take the bets come out the real winners.
In 1801, at the first inaugural in the still under construction city of Washington, DC, Thomas Jefferson said,
Transpartisan sensibilities may help us navigate the treacherous road ahead. Much in the world besides our Presidential election will shape our future. Let’s avoid misspeaking.
(Centerpiece of the “Life of Martin Luther” from a print found at the US Library of Congress‘ Prints and Photographs division.)
We are proud to share the first issue of The Transpartisan Review, a digital journal of politics, society, and culture, exploring the apparent disintegration of the traditional political, social and cultural order from a transpartisan point of view. By choosing Inauguration Day 2017, we hoped to focus on a distinct moment of change — a transpartisan moment — when so many conversations across the United States focused on the future. A future, for many, in doubt. Our first issue explores many of the issues dominating these conversations and we encourage our readers to share their own perspective with us, with their friends & family, and, most importantly, with their neighbors.
Becoming internationally famous as the first civil society organization in the world to take on and defeat a violent terrorist organization without weapons but with property rights empowering Peru’s poor, De Soto’s point about ownership is a crucial transpartisan tool for empowering people, especially the disadvantaged and marginalized. In this article, De Soto offers, to our new administration, some lessons from Peru. 
Developing understanding, trust, and relationships makes space for greater creativity and generosity when solving problems. But in this time when our conflicts are paralyzing us, we are losing goodwill toward our fellow citizens and failing to address significant issues. Despite thirty years experience as a mediator, the MoveOn.org founder still struggles with this and shares her personal insights with us. 
When Sean McElwee reviewed Mark Gerzon’s latest book for Yes! Magazine he chose to ignore the distiction between “bipartisan” and “transpartisan”, instead arguing “the solution … to simply ‘get everyone in a room and work it out’ … presumes that politics isn’t fundamentally about power and who wields it.” Mark Gerzon responds in this piece reprinted from the Christian Science Monitor. 
It used to be that the Republican and Democratic parties competed for the votes of men, women, whites, minorities, church-goers, flag-wavers, environmentalists, and so on. Not anymore. Each voter and issue bloc is now practically owned by one party or the other. In this excerpt from a forthcoming book, Bill Shireman explores this new “monopoly power” and the purpose & mechanisms behind it. 
Foreign policy analysts are “trained” to think of international relations as proceeding from the ideal of peace to a condition of conflict to a state of war. However, if we embrace a model based on “conflict, cooperation, and competition,” we discover a far more accurate description of the complex nature of international relations, and end up with additional policy options and a new ability to respond creatively. 
