Conflict Resolution & Crisis Management
Definitions:
Conflict: Conflict is when two perspectives, personalities, values or opinions
contradict each other. In some cases, it is a natural contradiction.
Crisis Management: Crisis management is the application of strategies designed
to help an organization or government deal with a sudden and significant negative
event.
Concepts:
A crisis can occur as a result of an unpredictable event or an unforeseeable
consequence of some event that had been considered as a potential risk. In either
case, crises almost invariably require that decisions be made quickly to limit
damage to the organization.
Crisis management seeks to minimize the damage a crisis causes. However, this
does not mean crisis management is the same thing as crisis response. Instead,
crisis management is a comprehensive process that is put into practice before a
crisis even happens. Crisis management practices are engaged before, during and
after a crisis.
Types of Conflicts:
1. Intrapersonal
This level refers to an internal dispute and involves only one individual. This
conflict arises out of your own thoughts, emotions, ideas, values and
predispositions. It can occur when you are struggling between what you “want
to do” and what you “should do.”
2. Interpersonal
This conflict occurs between two or more people in a larger organization. It
can result from different personalities or differing perspectives on how to
accomplish goals. Interpersonal conflict may even occur without one party
realizing there was ever conflict.
3. Intragroup
This level of conflict occurs between members of a single group when there
are multiple people with varying opinions, backgrounds and experiences
working toward a common goal. Even though they may all want to achieve the
same goal, they may disagree about how to reach it. Intragroup conflict can
also occur when team members have differences in communication styles and
personalities.
4. Intergroup
This level of conflict occurs between different groups within a larger
organization or those who do not have the same overarching goals.
Emergence of Conflict Resolution as a field of Study:
• Kriesberg identifies 1914-1945 as a precursor period. World wars and fascism had
undermined people's belief that democracy and economic development would lead to
peaceful coexistence. Researchers began to study revolution and class struggles,
organizational conflict such as business-labor conflict, and to analyze the causes of
particular wars. Some of the first social-psychological analyses of conflict were made.
Human relations and collective bargaining models of conflict resolution were
developed.
• The period from 1946 to 1969 saw a rapid increase in conflict resolution research.
Game theory was developed. Quantitative studies analyzed the incidence of
international war and cooperation. Researchers examined traditional diplomacy, and
the uses of nonviolent action. Sociologists studied conflict processes, exploring the
similarities and difference between various types of conflict, and distinguishing
between constructive and destructive processes.
• From 1970 to 1985, the practice of conflict resolution flourished, and consensus was
reached on many of the core ideas of the field. Scholars agreed on the importance of
reframing conflicts as shared problems with mutually acceptable solutions, on the
usefulness of intermediaries in resolving conflict, and on the importance of training
for mediators and negotiators.
• In this present phase, the field has extended its focus to include conflict prevention
and post-settlement reconciliation. The nature of international conflicts is changed in
the post-Cold War world, and researchers have struggled to understand the new
world dynamics.
Different Roads to Conflict Resolution:
1. Resolving Conflict: Unilateral Decision
No, we’re not giving in, that’s it’.
2. Resolving Conflict: Persuasion
‘It’s a no-brainer, you should do it’.
3. Resolving Conflict: Haggling/Bartering
‘I’ll meet you halfway’.
4. Resolving Conflict: Arbitration
‘Ok, let’s ask them for their opinion’.
5. Resolving Conflict: Postponement
‘We’ll come back to this at the next meeting with a plan’.
6. Resolving Conflict: Problem Solve
‘I’ve got an idea, how about if we…?’.
7. Resolving Conflict: Total Surrender
‘Ok, we’ll agree to the deal’.
8. Resolving Conflict: Negotiation
‘If you…then I…’.
Conflict Resolution Research:
Negotiation research
Negotiation, the most heavily researched approach to conflict resolution, has mainly been studied in
laboratory experiments, in which undergraduate participants are randomly assigned to conditions.
These studies have mostly looked at antecedents of the strategies adopted by negotiators and the
outcomes attained, including whether agreement is reached, the joint benefit to both parties, and the
individual benefit to each party.
Negotiation research findings:
Here are some of the more prominent findings from these studies (see Pruitt & Carnevale, 1993):
Problem solving behavior, such as giving or requesting information about a party's priorities
among the issues, encourages high joint benefit.
Contentious behavior, such as making threats or standing firm on one's proposals,
encourages failure to reach agreement or, if agreement is reached, low joint benefit.
Conceding makes agreement more likely but favors the other party's interests.
The party who makes the first offer tends to achieve greater benefit than the other party.
Three states of mind discourage concession making: viewing concessions as producing loss
rather than as foregoing gain; focusing attention on one's goal rather than one's limit (i.e., the
alternative that is minimally tolerable); and adopting a fixed-pie perspective, in which one
views the other's gain as one's loss, rather than an expandable pie perspective.
Adopting any of the states of mind above diminishes the likelihood of agreement; but if
agreement is reached, it increases the likelihood of winning, especially if the other party
adopts the opposite state of mind (Thompson, Neale, & Sinaceur, 2004).
The type of conflict resolution method that is adopted will be influenced by the structure of the
agreements. In particular, the level of detail of the contracts affects the choice on conflict
resolution approach. This effect depends on the degree of coordination required in the
relationship. The contractual structure also affects the influence of cooperative relational
experience on negotiation strategy.
Cultural differences shown in research findings
Recent experiments have found cultural differences in negotiation behavior (Gelfand & Brett, 2004):
Negotiators from individualistic cultures tend to take a more contentious approach, while those
from collectivistic cultures are more concerned about maintaining positive relationships and
hence more likely to cooperate (concede or engage in problem solving).
Accountability to constituents encourages contentious behavior for individualists, it
encourages cooperative behavior for collectivists.
Research tells us that people with a high need for closure (for rapid decision making) tend to
think and act in accustomed ways. It follows that high need for closure should accentuate
contentious behavior in individualistic societies and cooperative behavior
in collectivistic societies, a hypothesis that has received support.
Conflict Resolution Workshop:
If people are in the workplace, at some point conflict is inevitable. Workshops addresses
communication skills for dealing with disagreements. It can help identify tools for defining
problems, choosing a strategy, following a process, showing respect for and listening to others,
appreciating cultural differences, and using an outside facilitator if the parties involved are
unable to reach a resolution on their own.
Workshop Objectives:
Identify factors that create conflicts in the workplace.
Choose a conflict-resolution strategy.
Implement a procedure to resolve disagreement.
Exercise listening skills taught in the program to improve the chances for open
communication.
Appreciate how cultural experience and diversity affect interpretations of situations.
Common ways of dealing with conflicts within a group
1. Avoiding - withdraw from the conflict situation, leaving it to chance.
2. Harmonizing - generally cover up the differences and claim that things are fine.
3. Bargaining - negotiate to arrive at a compromise, bargaining for gains by both parties
4. Forcing - push a party to accept the decision made by a leader or majority.
5. Problem solving - confront differences and resolve them on a collaborative basis.
Conflict-management styles
Collaborating - Conflicting parties jointly identify the problem, weigh and choose a solution.
Accommodating - Playing down differences while emphasizing commonalties.
Competing - Shows high concern for self-interest and less concern for the other’s interest.
Encourages ‘I win, you lose’ tactics.
Avoiding - Either passive withdrawal from the problem or active suppression of the issue.
Compromising - A give-and-take approach involving moderate concern for both self and others.
Each party has to give up something of value. It may include external or third party intervention.
Managing conflict
Allow time for cooling down.
Analyze the situation.
State the problem to the other person.
Leave the person for some time.
Use a win-win approach.
Factors affecting conflict
Personality traits affect how people handle conflict.
Threats from one party in a disagreement tend to produce more threats from the other.
Conflict decreases as goal difficulty decreases and goal clarity increases.
Men and women tend to handle conflict similarly. There is no ‘gender effect’.
Conflict Resolution Major Players:
United Nations (UN):
The United Nations plays an important role in conflict prevention, using diplomacy, good offices
and mediation. Among the tools the Organization uses to bring peace are special envoys and
political missions in the field.
The United Nations was created in 1945, following the devastation of the Second World War,
with one central mission: the maintenance of international peace and security. The UN
accomplishes this by working to prevent conflict, helping parties in conflict make peace,
deploying peacekeepers, and creating the conditions to allow peace to hold and flourish. These
activities often overlap and should reinforce one another, to be effective.
The UN Security Council has the primary responsibility for international peace and security. The
General Assembly and the Secretary-General play major, important, and complementary roles,
along with other UN offices and bodies.
North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO):
You know this organization for: Article 5, which establishes the principle of collective defense,
committing each members to defend any other that is attacked. While Article 5 has been
invoked only once, NATO has used the principle to intervene in conflicts many times over the
last several decades, including in Afghanistan, the Balkans, and Libya.
European Union (EU):
The EU helps its members by removing trade barriers, sharing a common currency (nineteen of
its twenty-seven members use the euro), and allowing EU citizens to move freely among many
member countries.
World Trade Organization (WTO):
You know this organization for: the products and services that you use on a daily basis—clothes,
for example—that are governed by international trade. The WTO creates global trade rules and
settles disputes among countries, which might disagree on the interpretation of those rules. The
WTO has its detractors, so you may know the organization from demonstrations like the 1999
Seattle protests, when thousands demonstrated during the WTO ministerial conference.
International Criminal Court (ICC):
International Criminal Court (ICC), permanent judicial body established by the Rome Statute of
the International Criminal Court (1998) to investigate, prosecute, and try individuals accused of
genocide, war crimes, and crimes against humanity and to impose prison sentences upon
individuals who are found guilty of such crimes.
Conflict Resolution in South Asia:
The South Asian region has some of the most intractable political conflicts of any part of the
world and at three levels: international, national and subnational:
South Asia Centre for Peace (SACP):
The South Asia Centre for Peace (SACP) was established in 2009 to promote peace
in South Asia. SACP is based in Islamabad and is establishing links with
organizations across South Asia and in other parts of the world with the aim of
establishing a network for peace in the region.
GPPAC:
