Welcome to the Third Side Website

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As the old African proverb goes,
"When spider webs unite, they can halt even a lion."

No more critical challenge faces each of us, and all of us together, than how to live together in a world of differences. So much depends on our ability to handle our conflicts peacefully - our happiness at home, our performance at work, the livability of our communities, and, in this age of mass destruction, the survival of our species.

The Third Side offers a promising new way to look at the conflicts around us. The Third Side is the community - us - in action protecting our most precious interests in safety and well-being. It suggests ten practical roles any of us can play on a daily basis to stop destructive fighting in our families, at work, in our schools, and in the world. Each of our individual actions is like a single spider web, fragile perhaps but, when united with others, capable of halting the lion of war. Although the Third Side is in its infancy in our modern-day societies, it has been used effectively by simpler cultures for millennia to reduce violence and promote dialogue.

What is the Third Side?
Find out what it means to take the Third Side and who are the thirdsiders in any conflict.

Third Side Roles Everyone Plays
Discover the 10 roles that thirdsiders can play to help transform any conflict. Here you will find the descriptions for each role, actions often taken by the roles and resources to support each of them.

3S Toolbox
Find tools that can help you teach and educate yourself and others on the Third Side; disseminate and share Thirdside information; and assess and work conflicts you are interested in looking at.

3S Forum
Connect with other practitioners and students to weave a web of inquiry, knowledge and experience developing a community of support for the development and mobilization of Third Side perspective and expanding our ability to face and transform conflict together. Visit the forum and join the forum mailing.

Audio 3S Stories
Listen to stories about the Third Side from the radio program "A World of Possibilities". These stories bring the Third Side to life and highlight how the Third Side emerges in conflict riddled societies. When you click on the link above you will be taken to a search page -- type Third Side into the search box to get a list of all the programs.

Share 3S Stories
Find and share stories about the Third Side. Stories are a powerful way to understand the roles thirdsiders play in transforming conflicts.

3S Video
Watch video of William Ury addressing a conference on the role of The Third Side in Venezuela, "Strengthening the Third Side in Order to Achieve Peace," sponsored by the Carter Center, USAID's Development Alternatives, Inc., the Organization for American States (OAS), and the Central University of Venezuela.

Read more about the Third Side
The Third Side: Why We Fight and How We Can Stop is available in English, Spanish, Portuguese, French and Thai. It will soon be published in Greek. All author's profits from the sale of this book is used for peace education.

Third Side Additional Resources

International Mediation in Venezuela, (Jennifer McCoy and Francisco Diez, 2011), discusses the Third Side in detail.