ICAR Students and Alumni Participate in Dispute Resolution Conference
ICAR Students and Alumni Participate in Dispute Resolution Conference
ICAR was represented at the University of Massachusetts conference, "Conflict Studies: A New Generation Of Ideas," October 4-5, with papers presented by doctoral students Jayne Docherty, Robert Harris, and Susan Allen-Nan; by ICAR alumni Rachel Goldberg and Dana Milburn; and by Alma Abdel-Hadi Jadallah, who recently completed a master of arts in Interdisciplinary Studies at George Mason, with a concentration in conflict resolution.
Susan Allen-Nan's paper, "Examining Cumulative and Interactive Effects of Multiple Conflict Resolution Activities in Intergroup Conflict," was awarded an honorable mention for the best paper presented at the conference.
The theme of the conference was reflected in Jayne Docherty's graduate student address, "Moving Forward by Circling Back: Revisiting Our Roots in Search of New Horizons." Jayne Docherty says, "I [am] concerned about the gap between our theoretical models of the person as an actor in conflict settings and my experience of the way people really do act in conflict situations ... [while] books talk about People as motivated by their positions, interests, basic human needs, and values, [we] sometimes seem to be driven by a desire to identify the most fundamental source of human behavior during conflict.
"Positions, needs, interests, and values are often discussed in an 'archeological' fashion ... [with] positions ... seen as the most superficial motivator. If we can peel away that layer, we get to the parties' interests. And on the basis of interests, we can craft better, longer lasting, more satisfactory resolutions to a conflict. John Burton, who greatly influenced...[our] program at George Mason, adds another layer-basic human needs, [arguing] that real resolution depends on meeting the parties' 'ontologically given basic human needs' and not just their interests. Others claim that the behavior of parties in conflict cannot possibly be understood without first explaining their values. [In my view] people are not motivated by any single factor such as positions, interests, needs, or values...In real life, people make complex decisions based on their 'naming' of the world. Their understanding of how things in the world are categorized and organized, the values they place on a wide variety of things and relationships, and their assumptions about what constitutes valid and meaningful knowledge all combine to impact their decision-making and actions in conflict settings.
"...on the basis of interests, we can craft better, longer lasting, more satisfactory resolutions to a conflict."
"The Image: Knowledge in Life and Society, by Kenneth Boulding, anticipated by almost 40 years [this] theoretical and practical puzzle...What does this imply for explaining conflict? First, and most obviously, that no interactions among the parties can be understood separately from their respective and combined images of the world...Image is even more complicated than this, however. It involves beliefs or subjective knowledge about 'what is,' but it also includes a great deal of 'normative knowledge'...what many people try to capture under the term values.... An image of the world includes 'knowledge' or 'beliefs' about what ought to be as well as what is. The emotional or affective attachment to this image of how things ought to be forms an essential 'connector' between image and action. We act to bring the world into compliance with our normative image of how the world ought to be. In this respect, Boulding anticipated a great deal of the recent research on the active dimensions of cognition.
"The human fascination with conflict...reflected in literature, art and drama, is not simply a matter of academic interest, [it] may be traced to the fact that conflict exposes our images of the world. When the other party to a conflict does not share my fundamental understanding of the world, I can dismiss that person as 'evil' and 'ignorant,' or I can reexamine my own assumptions about what is 'out there' in the world. I have an opportunity to become conscious of my own creative imaging process...threatening, but in many ways...liberating conflict can free me to entertain other images offer[ing] alternative possibilities for action in the world. It is precisely this rich potential for experimentation and creativity that makes conflict a positive as well as a negative force...
"In this framing of the problem, conflict resolution practitioners and the parties to a conflict--face a dual task. Assessing the sources of the conflict as objectively as possible--insofar as the conflict has a material base--and helping parties work together to construct an accounting of the world in which diversity of beliefs or images need not lead inevitably to conflict. The complex relationship between the material and the socially constructed or cognitive sources of conflict is one of the pressing puzzles of our time."