  We present a method to extract the redshift-space distortions beta parameter
in configuration space with a minimal set of cosmological assumptions. We show
that a novel combination of the observed monopole and quadrupole correlation
functions can remove efficiently the impact of mild non linearities and
redshift errors. The method offers a series of convenient properties: it does
not depend on the theoretical linear correlation function, the mean galaxy
density is irrelevant, only convolutions are used, there is no explicit
dependence on linear bias. Analyses based on dark matter N-body simulations and
Fisher matrix demonstrate that errors of a few percent on beta are possible
with a full sky, 1(Gpc/h)^3 survey centered at a redshift of unity and with
negligible shot noise. We also find a baryonic feature in the normalized
quadrupole in configuration space that should complicate the extraction of the
growth parameter from the linear theory asymptote, but that does not have a
major impact with our method.
