Applying the de Bono tools and ideas to mediation

Abstract

Thinking in general and creativity in particular are central factors in human development and human affairs. Edward de Bono dedicated his career to the development of these special human activities. He first sought to understand and explain their basic mechanism, and then to improve their general performance through practical tools. Mediation, like any other human endeavour, involves the sometimes covert, sometimes overt, activity of thinking. It cannot afford to ignore the process that takes place, whether it takes place consciously or subconsciously. This work has two aims: to investigate whether the work of de Bono has any relevance to International and Inter-ethnic mediation, and how it can be variously applied. In this way this work seeks a synthesis between the work of de Bono and international and inter-ethnic mediation. More generally defined, this work tries to make the practice of mediation a bit more self-conscious; i.e. conscious of the possible thinking processes that can take place during mediation. The conclusions of this work can be grouped into two sets: those which do not deal directly with the synthesis of de Bono to mediation, however still relevant to such a study, and those which deal directly with the mentioned synthesis. An example of the former is that de Bono 's corpus in general ignores the social aspect of thinking and creativity; an example of the latter is the assimilatory potential between the de Bono ideas and Kelman's workshops and many other similar potential workshops and discussion groups which can be on during all the phases of the mediation process.