Diligence, Compromise and Trust: Creating a Journey of Persuasion

Social Movement Series, Part 2

In this series, we’ve been talking about reaching the moveable middle. To expand your base of supporters in today’s political environment, you must be willing to compromise enough to win the support of people who don’t agree with you 100%. Remember, in order to change minds, your movement must simultaneously shift the middle toward you.

To illustrate such a journey of compromise and persuasion, let’s look at the issue of gun violence and extreme protection/risk laws, or ERPOs.

As defined by the U.S. Department of Justice, ERPO laws “create a civil process allowing law enforcement, family members (in most states) and medical professionals or other groups (in some states) to petition a court to temporarily prohibit someone at risk of harming themselves or others from purchasing and possessing firearms for the duration of the order.”

Not everyone is in favor of ERPOs. Many mental health advocates fear that ERPOs will go too far, allowing law enforcement to (wittingly or not) target individuals with mental health issues, particularly since “people with serious mental illness are more than 10 times as likely to experience use of force in interactions with law enforcement than those without serious mental illness.” (NAMI) Some gun ownership advocates fear that ERPOs will be used without giving a gun owner the opportunity to be heard before access to their firearm is removed. (Rand) Others incorrectly assume that all people with mental illness are potentially violent and ERPOs won’t go far enough. (NAMI)?

With ERPOs currently codified by 21 states and the District of Columbia, social movements had an opportunity to reach some of the undecided individuals―the moveable middle―in their target audiences.?

To aid them and others in this endeavor, the Ad Council Research Institute published a research study in partnership with the Joyce Foundation to assess the public’s and police officers’ knowledge about ERPOs. We found that few Americans or police officers were categorically for or against ERPOs. Instead, the vast majority were somewhere in the middle; moreover, the most significant barrier to broader acceptance was a lack of understanding. (The Ad Council study includes a toolkit for educating audiences, fyi.)

NAMI creates a journey of persuasion with the middle

One organization that joined the ERPO discussion was NAMI, the National Mental Health Alliance, whose mission is “to educate, support, advocate, listen and lead to improve the lives of people with mental illness and their loved ones.” They built their 2020-2025 Strategic Plan on three pillars, one of which was that people with mental illness should get diverted from justice system involvement.?

As we know, the topic of gun safety is fraught with emotions on both sides. NAMI knew it would have to draw the middle and supporters together through diligence, compromise and trust to reassure all audiences of their loved ones’ safety.

And so, over the last five years, NAMI has:

• testified before Congress about the benefits and potential pitfalls of ERPOs,
• educated the public and law enforcement about the results of criminal justice involvement for people with mental illness,?
• actively helped create Crisis Intervention Teams with police, medical and mental health professionals, and people with mental illness and their families in more than 2,700 communities,
• actively promoted the 988 Lifeline for suicide and crisis intervention, and?
• offered educational programs about mental illness and treatment in person and online.?

Today, NAMI’s official position is “support [for] extreme risk protection orders that focus on specific, current behaviors and evidence-based risk factors for violence. NAMI opposes any ERPO laws that target, single out or discriminate against people with mental health conditions.”?

This compromise invites new supporters into NAMI’s circle (people who want to protect Americans’ rights to gun ownership and privacy) as it reassures its constituency that NAMI still prioritizes helping people with mental health challenges.?

NAMI isn’t trying to force anyone to change their basic opinions about ERPOs. Instead, they are identifying and moving people from both sides toward a common goal of reducing gun-related tragedies. As they do, they expose many more individuals to their core mission and to the topic of mental health―and, importantly, strengthen their organization’s base of supporters.

If you missed Part 1 in this trend series, it’s here. Part 3, the final article, will examine narrative creation and adoption.