"The social values research that Ted Nordhaus and Michael Shellenberger presented offers new insight into how Americans think about government, society, and politics. Their presentation was fascinating to our members and generated a huge amount of conversation throughout the conference. Democrats and progressives ignore their research at their peril."

"We used American Environics' values-based segmentation methodology to recruit for focus groups on health care, and, frankly, all of us were blown away. The individuals in the groups were bound by values that went far deeper than political identity. This work led directly to the creation of four brand new Strategic Initiatives on health care, each of which flowed directly from the ways in which Americans experience the health care system, and think about solutions. At the end of the project we fielded a nation-wide survey with a battery of values questions attached. This allowed us to gain a rich, quantifiable perspective into which underlying factors were driving opinion on health care."

"We have failed in health care reform for years by approaching it the same way — over and over. We need to connect with the majority of voters in terms they understand and feel passionately about. AE offered the Herndon Alliance, a coalition focused on health care reform, unique insights into how people reason and beliefs they hold about health care including opportunities there are for better communications. In the Workshops, AE and Lake Research Partners pushed us to set aside our own assumptions and consider a much wider range of possibilities for developing sound public policies. We are better for it-and hopefully more successful."

"The American Values Survey as well as focus groups conducted by American Environics helped Earthjustice fully understand the current base of public support for environmental protection and identify what values this ecological base holds in common with other Americans. By looking at social values in addition to the typical ways we understand segments of the public (gender, race, political views, etc.), we were able to get a much richer and more accurate view of what motivates people to care and act to protect the environment. This research, in combination with a cognitive analysis of key environmental frames and messages, also done by American Environics, is already being put to use in the development of a strategic plan for Earthjustice and a set of new program initiatives."

"We've committed ourselves, as a nation, to a kind of stupidity in our political discourse. Each side, left and right, maintains a set of postures and positions that must, by some strange and fragile sense of self, deny the value in the others' perspective. It's this "either/or" culture we've developed, this inability to hold "both/and," the failure to appreciate or deal with paradox, that strikes me as a bigger threat than those imagined by either the left or the right.

The American Environics values data reveals the complexities, paradoxes, and contradictions we'll need to grapple with in order to solve the big problems — not by creating something dominant, homogenous and partially blind, but by developing an integrated perspective that includes and engages our many particularities and unique insights. Over the next five years, this approach — which also offers foundations the tools to quantify social change and measure the effectiveness of philanthropy — will produce breakthroughs and new understandings that will make today's insights pale by comparison."

"The California Alliance has chosen for itself a tough political challenge: solve California's fiscal crisis in a way that advances economic opportunity and environmental quality, especially for low-income communities and communities of color. We knew that if we were to achieve social change breakthroughs on tax and fiscal policy we needed to dig beneath the surface to understand fundamental worldviews — not just day-to-day political opinions. The values research has been enormously useful in achieving that goal. We have learned a great deal both about our base and those we need to win over, from their shared Bridge Values to their differing ways of reasoning about tax and fiscal policy. We have even started using American Environics' micro-targeting tools to very good effect in our grassroots organizing."

"Anyone who cares about the evolution of environmentalism needs to pay attention to the social values research that American Environics is doing. They presented a fascinating look at the values and psychological motivations for political attitudes, how they've been changing, and what opportunities they offer to those working on everything from global warming to land conservation."