Document Type
Article
Publication Date
Spring 2018
College/Unit
WVU College of Law
Abstract
Americans are experiencing a communication crisis in public policy-a crisis that has become especially acute since the November 2016 elections. Research shows that Americans increasingly treat their policy views as constitutive of their identities and separate themselves from other groups based on these identities. New solutions are needed in the lawmaking process to soften participants' hardening of their own identities and negative characterizations of other groups. This Article studies one controversy that has proven to be entrenched, if not yet intractable, in many jurisdictions: hydraulic fracturing. The Article examines advances made by scholars of conflict resolution and peace and conflict studies in the late 20th and early 21st centuries that focus on dialogue and softening of frames to move entrenched conflicts towards resolution. Based on this case study of the legislative and regulatory snarl over hydraulic fracturing in Pennsylvania, the Article proposes a new process, marshaled by a Special Committee for Public Policy Dialogue, that would implement the insights of peace and conflict studies researchers allowing the legal system to address and move past identity-based conflicts that threaten to bring lawmaking to a standstill.
Original Publication Title
University of Pittsburgh Law Review
Digital Commons Citation
Peck, Alison, "Identity-Based Conflicts in Public Policy: The Case of Hydraulic Fracturing Policy in Pennsylvania" (2018). Law Faculty Scholarship. 54.
https://researchrepository.wvu.edu/law_faculty/54
Source Citation
79 U. Pitt. L. Rev. 437
Included in
Communication Commons, Oil, Gas, and Mineral Law Commons, Public Law and Legal Theory Commons