Listening Posts: What Are They?

Listening Posts - An Introduction

Since our foundation in 1975 we have worked at the development and application of adapting our psychosocial, reflective approach to gaining an understanding of society through a unique process called OPUS Listening Posts. Over the years, there have been several versions of OPUS Listening Posts; the most recent version being developed in 2000, this introduced a standardisation of the process which made available a greater degree of comparison across time and location.

Since 2000 Listening posts have been convened on a quarterly basis in London; at less regular intervals at various regional locations throughout the UK; and annually through the International Listening post Project.

We have always found the results to be highly significant and valuable but now that we have several years Listening Post material to compare it is becoming evident that this valuable data does not appear to be available from other sources. The International Project, which now (2008) involves thirty countries, seems to be developing a greater degree of importance as globalization continues to affect societies throughout the world. And the whole project is proving to be a most interesting piece of social science research.

Listening Post Methodology

Listening Posts are exemplars of the application of our stated methodology: They are a psycho-social process which encourages the reflective citizen.

The Listening Post process is not limited to social evidence gathering. The process goes beyond this simpler process of talking to people. The distinct and vital difference is that Listening Posts employ a much more rigorous methodology that provides analyses and hypotheses’ regarding what is happening in society.

Put another way, whereas social evidence gathering is solely concerned with and stops at the social level. Listening Posts go much deeper than this through analysing the social, and working to develop a further understanding at the psychological level.

The way we provide explanations for what is happening is to develop hypotheses. That is, we develop theories to account for whatever it is that we don’t understand.

What is a Listening Post?

A Listening Post provides a ‘snapshot’ of a society at a particular moment in time. They are regular meetings of 8-15 people which provide opportunities for participants to think about the society they are part of.

The concept of a Listening Post is based on the notion that a group of people meeting together to study the behaviour of the society, as a society, allows the unconscious expression of some characteristics of the wider social system; and the experience of the Listening Post is itself, therefore, relevant to an understanding of society beyond individual and personal preoccupations.

The aim of the Listening Post is to enable participants as individual citizens to reflect on their own relatedness to society and to try to develop an understanding of what is happening in society at any given moment.

Listening Posts provide an opportunity for participants to share their preoccupations in relation to the various societal roles they may have. Collectively they are invited to try to identify the underlying dynamics both conscious and unconscious that may be predominant at any given time.

The dynamics of the group may be such that even a small group may nevertheless act as if it is a microcosm of the large group that is society. So that, the themes that emerge through associative dialogue may legitimately be analysed for their societal content.
Themes that emerge are the work of participants taking up their citizen roles.

Listening Post Process

The Listening Post process is divided into three distinct parts:

Part 1. The sharing of preoccupations and experiences.
Here participants are invited to identify, contribute, and explore their experience in their various social roles, be these in work, unemployed, or retired; as members of religious, political, neighbourhood or voluntary or leisure organisations, or as members of families and communities. What might be called the ‘social’ or ‘external’ world of participants.

In this Part the group discussion is unstructured - no agenda is set or issue identified before hand. The aim is to obtain an authentic representation of society at the given time. The process enables participants to speak of their pre-occupations and experiences of society from their various societal roles in a free flowing and unhindered manner.

Part 2. Identification of major themes.
In this Part, participants collectively try to identify the major themes emerging from Part 1.

This Part acts as a sort of transitional space; and enables the members to put a boundary around the material from Part 1 which will be the subject of analysis in Part 3.

Part 3. Analysis and Hypothesis formation.

In this Part, working with the information resulting from Parts 1 & 2, participants collectively try to identify the underlying dynamics both conscious and unconscious that may be predominant at the given time; and, to develop hypotheses as to why they might be occurring at this moment.

In this Part members are working more with what might be called their ‘psycho’ or ‘internal’ worlds: The collective ideas and ways of thinking that both determine how they perceive the external realities and shape their actions towards them.

The role of the members is to analyse the material from Part 1 and to work at providing psychological explanations that can be developed into hypotheses that are theories assumed to account for something not understood.

London Listening Posts
UK National Listening Post Project
Regional Listening Posts
International Listening Post Project
Next Listening Post