Larry D. Lauer

What is the consequence of arguing against ideas or programs without providing alternative solutions? Simply put, you are leaving your audience hanging with the most constructive part of your message missing. Such an approach might gain support from sympathizers in the short run, but it is likely to prove insufficient in the end.

Republican legislators have spent the last several years objecting to the president’s initiatives and policies without offering specific alternative solutions. Now the new speaker of the house said this week that this will change. This new development is important, but for practical reasons it might be easier said than done.

While the politics of “no” leaves the communication loop incomplete and audiences ultimately unsatisfied, it still is much easier to rally people around their common dissatisfaction with a situation than it is to get them to agree on a solution.

This dilemma has also appeared in foreign policy matters. There was widespread support for the rhetoric to oust the Iraqi government, but there was no agreed upon plan to replace it. In Egypt it was easy to rally people against the government  but impossible to find agreement on who and what should replace it. The situation has been the same in Libya and elsewhere.

Now we are facing the same dilemma in Syria. Even if the US engineers the ouster of the current government, what will follow. What kind of government? Who will lead it? What will it cost? Who will pay?

This is both a political and communication reality. The lesson is that in the long run it is impossible to have success by only  objecting to the current state of affairs. In the short run it might seem to work, but over time it will become apparent that tearing down without a plan for what follows can leave entire nations in endless turmoil.

On this issue, political leaders with a truly international education might ultimately be our only best hope. This is because a global  education will feature multicultural forums for both the systematic nonpartisan examination of ideas and programs, and for finding pragmatic workable solutions.