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Caption icon Image credit: More in Common

In a time of heightened national tension, there is a powerful and growing network of Americans ready to move beyond “us vs. them” to solve shared problems together.

In January 2025, New Pluralists, alongside partners More in Common, Over Zero, the Greater Good Science Center, the Center for the Science of Moral Understanding, and DPICT, hosted the Pluralism in Action convening in Atlanta, Georgia. We brought together more than 175 researchers, practitioners, communicators, and funders from across the country who have different approaches and perspectives but share a deep commitment to renewing our civic culture. The goal was to break down the silos that usually separate these groups and find places where they could learn from each other. Over two days, we created a space to connect the science of human behavior with practical strategies for cultivating pluralism in communities, ensuring that our collective efforts to bridge divides and solve shared challenges are as effective as possible.

Convening Through the Noise

The hosting team set out with a clear aspiration: to align knowledge, evidence, and practice to strengthen the pluralism ecosystem. Pluralism in Action took place just one week after the presidential inauguration in January 2025, during a period of intense emotions and political transition. With the national conversation shifting daily, the need for long-term strategic alignment felt both essential and difficult to achieve. Part conference, part strategy session, the convening pursued five goals:

  1. Showcase cutting-edge research and real-world case studies that bring pluralism to life. 
  2. Strengthen relationships among a diverse network of researchers, practitioners, communicators, and funders.
  3. Strategize around the ecosystem’s needs and priorities.
  4. Generate breakthrough ideas to sustain and scale pluralism efforts through an interactive Ecosystem Hackathon.
  5. Equip participants with new insights, relationships, and momentum to advance pluralism in their work and communities.

The agenda included keynotes, interactive sessions, and collaborative problem-solving exercises. While topics were wide-ranging, we heard a few cross-cutting lessons and insights: 

  • Mindsets shape everything. How people approach pluralism is deeply shaped by their feelings, personal identities, and cultural backgrounds. In a polarized moment, we need to lean into this complexity — to make room for the reality that we don’t all mean the same thing when we talk about “unity” or “diversity,” to connect stories of pluralism to people’s everyday lives, and to find ways to normalize pluralism in cultural life (e.g., through entertainment, sports, holidays, and public rituals).
  • Build comfort with conflict. While many practitioners focus on “finding common ground,” this doesn’t get us far enough. We must learn to wade into divisive topics and navigate core conflicts productively, as this is the path to durable relationships, robust solutions, and resilience.
  • While creative energy is high, the ecosystem remains fragile, demanding sustained, long-term investment and intentional coordination to prevent burnout and resource gaps.
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Caption icon Image credit: More in Common

Turning Insight into Action

The ideas and collaborations sparked at Pluralism in Action immediately translated into a number of concrete actions designed to scale, connect, and strengthen the pluralism ecosystem. To help the broader field have insight into the learnings from the event, we created the Pluralism in Action Toolkit that includes evidence-based insights, targeted recommendations, and examples to help you apply lessons to your work.

Building on the insights from Pluralism in Action, New Pluralists also invested over $1 million in grants to strengthen and grow the critical infrastructure that connects and supports organizations across the pluralism landscape. These investments include creating a more aligned measurement framework to understand “what works,” building communications capacity across organizations, and generating a richer understanding of how to apply evidence to solve real-world problems. Through these grants, we hope to help the ecosystem move beyond fragmented efforts toward a more coherent, collaborative, and evidence-informed future.

Finally, this event showed us that the pluralism space urgently needs more dedicated conveners. While the Pluralism in Action event created good momentum, it highlighted the necessity for more targeted convenings that serve different purposes. For example, we need events focused on translating critical advances into evidence and research; practice labs focused on learning and refining methods; and events that welcome new allies into the ecosystem. Additionally, we need more gatherings centered on building deeper relationships, sparking collaboration, and identifying areas for coordination. New Pluralists remains committed to its role as a convener, and we encourage other organizations to join us in establishing this vital connective infrastructure.

“The message from this convening was clear: People are hungry to do this work together. They want more spaces to connect, collaborate, and experiment across lines of difference”

More in Common (from the Pluralism in Action Toolkit)