Track Record

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  • Working Group on Faith-Based and Community Initiatives
  • Working Group on Health Care Coverage for the Uninsured
  • Leadership Group on Changing Course: A New Direction for U.S. Relations with the Muslim World
  • Founding of Convergence

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Working Group on Faith-Based and Community Initiatives

Members of our staff and Leadership Council worked on a project called the Working Group on Human Needs and Faith-Based and Community Initiatives. It provided valuable experience and a sense of possibility of what could be achieved by bringing diverse stakeholders to a common table for dialogue and deliberation.

The Working Group was conducted under the auspices of Search for Common Ground (www.sfcg.org) and was chaired by one of the founding Leadership Council members of Convergence, former Senator Harris Wofford (D-PA).

The purpose of this Working Group was to forge a consensus on appropriate ways of increasing the opportunities for people in need to get help from community-based organizations, including those inspired by religious faith.

Participants forged agreement on 29 recommendations which in very significant ways were reflected in the Charity Aid, Recovery and Empowerment Act of 2002. [Click here to read the full report.]

Working Group on Health Care Coverage for the Uninsured

From 2004-2006, a process organized by Robert Fersh under the auspices of Search for Common Ground (www.sfcg.org) brought together 20 leading stakeholder groups in health care to develop a broad agreement on health care coverage. Many of the participants had known each other for years. As Stuart Butler of the Heritage Foundation noted, “few thought, at the outset, that they would make much more progress.”

“A remarkable process developed over several months. Participants learned more about each other’s hopes, fears and values, and began to trust each other. That led to a significant change in tone and helped them reach an historic agreement around health policy initiatives that are today consensus reforms.” [quote, Letter from Stuart Butler, Heritage Foundation, Board Member, Convergence, 2011]

This group met for 12 two-day meetings across 22 months, and became known as the “Strange Bedfellow” coalition on health. They were influential in the passage of legislation in early 2009 to expand the State Children’s Health Insurance Program which provides health coverage to children of low-income families. Additional elements of their agreement became part of the Affordable Care Act passed later in 2009.

HCCU participating organizations included: AARP, America’s Health Insurance Plans, American Academy of Family Physicians, American Hospital Association, American Medical Association, American Public Health Association, Blue Cross and Blue Shield Association, Catholic Health Association, Families USA, Federation of American Hospitals, Healthcare Leadership Council, Johnson & Johnson, Kaiser Permanente, Pfizer, United Health Foundation and U.S. Chamber of Commerce.

Leadership Group on Changing Course: A New Direction for U.S. Relations with the Muslim World

“Changing Course: A New Direction for U.S. Relations with the Muslim World”, the report of the Leadership Group on U.S.-Muslim Engagement, released on September 24, 2008, presents the consensus of 34 American leaders in the fields of foreign policy, national security, politics, business, religion, education, public opinion, psychology, philanthropy, and conflict resolution. These individuals represent diverse faiths, political perspectives and professional disciplines.

The primary objective of the report is to provide new strategies for reducing tensions with Muslim countries and communities around the world. The core point of the report is that it is possible to meet both U.S. interests and the interests of the vast majority of Muslims around the world who seek peaceful coexistence, by addressing the main sources of tension in new ways.

The report was generated through a process of dialogue and research co-led by Robert Fersh, then Executive Director of Search for Common Ground, U.S.A and by David Fairman, Managing Partner of the Consensus Building Institute. The report was widely praised on Capitol Hill and is credited with having a direct influence on numerous policy decisions in the Obama Administration’s first six months.

From the inaugural through the Cairo “New Beginnings” speech in June, the Obama administration took a number of actions that were strikingly consistent with the major recommendations of the Report. From January to June, the President and his team implemented all of the following top-line recommendations of the Report:

  • Spoke on the importance of relations with the Muslim world in the 2009 Inaugural Address, and re-affirmed the US prohibition on torture
  • Appointed high-level envoys for the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and Afghanistan-Pakistan, and sought direct engagement with Iran
  • Renewed the U.S. commitment to stop the spread of extremism in Afghanistan
  • Called for a major international event on business and economic development partnerships (the Summit on Entrepreneurship now scheduled for late April 2010)
  • Called for a major expansion of educational and people-to-people exchanges between the U.S. and Muslim majority countries (in the Cairo speech)

The Changing Course report was, according to several members of a foreign policy and communications team in the White House, a key document in the preparation process for the President’ speech in Cairo, June 2009.
The project generated numerous public and constituency briefings on the Report, including:

  • A major event at the Council on Foreign Relations Washington D.C. office on January 30, 2009, with former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright and former U.S. Representative Vin Weber
  • A presentation by Secretary Albright before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee
  • A dinner for 35 ambassadors from Muslim majority countries hosted by the Ambassador of Morocco.
  • Several university presentations.
  • Distribution of e-copies of the Report (including an Arabic translation of the Executive Summary) through the USME website and through Amazon.com.
  • A U.S. Chamber of Commerce co-sponsored conference on Business Opportunities and the Muslim World conference

The project also supported citizen dialogue on the issues raised in the Report through a Citizen Dialogue Kit (prepared with assistance from Viewpoint Learning), new web site developed by Intersections International called ChangeTheStory.net, and through to “20,000 Dialogues”, a project of Unity Productions Foundation.