This series of articles are aims to enrich the concept of "how to conduct a dialogue” by laying down a number of procedural steps needed for understanding, participating and investing in the dialogue process for the benefit of the individual, society and the whole nation.
Let’s begin with:"How to become familiar with the topic of the dialogue”?
The guide from King Abdul Aziz Center for National Dialogue states that there are many information sources for various topics including the following:
— Your personal experiences and information: the advantage of the source becomes quite evident in the discussion of your homeland’s customs and traditions, matters of everyday such as education, the main industrial and cultural products…etc.
— Books: They are the oldest and most reliable source of information to which you have easy access inside your homeland, unlike scholars studying abroad, tourists or businessmen. Thus, you can choose between two or three books that include topics to be discussed. If the books are quite a load to carry around, you can save all the related information on a CD or flash memory to be used while conducting a dialogue.
—Last but not the least, do not start a dialogue if you are not familiar with the conversation topic. A successful dialogue necessitates ample background knowledge: the dialogue skills that you have only constituted the general framework through which information is present….will continue!
Dr. Mohsin Shaikh Al-Hassan is a Saudi writer.