• To solve pressing issues we need facts without favoritism.
  • And a framework for making a difference.
  • And a framework for making a difference.
  • Research that inspires problem solving.
  • Research that inspires problem solving.
  • To solve pressing issues we need facts without favoritism.

NIFI & NETWORK NEWS

A Thank You to Betty Knighton

Betty Knighton served as National Issues Forums Institute President from 2019-2022 and has also been the director of the West Virginia Center for Civic Life and a senior associate of the Kettering Foundation for many years. NIFI is committed to building on her contributions and we wish her all the best as she continues her work!
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Awards & Recognition for NIFI Board Chairman Dr. David Mathews

NIFI Board Chairman Dr. David Mathews was recently recognized for his lifetime of service to American democracy with the Freedom of Spirit Lifetime Achievement Award. The award "transcends political, economic, and religious views to honor exemplary individuals and institutions embodying that inner freedom that is the energizing source of human courage, creativity, and love in the world."

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ABOUT THE NIF

National Issues Forums (NIF) is a network of civic, educational, and other organizations, and individuals, whose common interest is to promote public deliberation in America. It includes civic clubs, religious organizations, libraries, schools, and many other groups that meet to discuss critical public issues. Forum participants range from teenagers to retirees, prison inmates to community leaders, and literacy students to university students.

NIF does not advocate specific solutions or points of view but provides citizens the opportunity to consider a broad range of choices, weigh the pros and cons of those choices, and meet with each other in a public dialogue to identify the concerns they hold in common.

DELIBERATIVE DECISION MAKING: WHERE CHANGE BEGINS

There is a way to tackle problems more directly. Deliberative decision making. Find out how to leverage the power of personal experience, different viewpoints, and the kind of intelligent exchange that leads to a shared purpose and acceptable solutions.

There’s a space between agree/disagree waiting to be discovered.

When it comes to society’s most challenging problems, our elected officials are often stuck between a two-party rock and a hard place. That’s because they aren’t getting honest input from the people they serve.

You can change that, by reviving a lost democratic practice: deliberative decision making.