“ adding complexity to conflict resolution dialogues ” dr edna pasher, israel & dr carol...
TRANSCRIPT
“Adding Complexity to Conflict
Resolution Dialogues”
Dr Edna Pasher, Israel&
Dr Carol Webb, Sheffield Hallam University, UK
Presented at the Conference on Conflict and Complexity
Conflict Research Society and Conflict Analysis Research Centre
University of Kent, Canterbury, UK, 2nd-3rd September 2008
CONFLICT. It appears to be everywhere. We find it in our personal lives at home, between parent and child and between spouses. We find it at work between
employer and employee. It's there between man and woman.We see religion against religion, nation against nation. It's the underlying theme
throughout all of human history. With the increasing complexity of life on this planet, the exploding human population, and our possession of awesome
weapons, which could trigger our total annihilation, conflict has become the criticalissue of our time. [THOMAS F. CRUMM]
Crumm goes on to say: ‘It’s not whether you have conflict in your life. It’s what you do with that conflict that makes a difference’. A principle mode in which conflict management is directed is towards aims of groups who want to build stronger, more viable, more productive communities; communities that value diversity,practice inclusiveness in their access to human and other types of resources, and nurture the culture of democracy.
The proposition of this paper is to state the need to tackle the COMPLEXITY OF CONFLICT in a range of multidisciplinary scientific domains by addressing the REAL WORLD, and HIGHLY COMPLEX PROBLEM of the resolution and transformation of conflict in the micro and macro spheres of transitional societies in and around Europe.
A fundamental need for such an endeavour is a CROSSDISCIPLINARY DIMENSION, which highlights the relevance of a broad diversity of fields. While the scientific domains approached include the socio-political, environmental and technological scientific domains of conflict management, a large need exists to bridge the often polarised approaches of hard and soft theory and practice derived from disparate fields of complexity science, requiring the synergies of expert knowledge in the diverse fields of physics; mathematics; sociology; psychology; ancient history and social anthropology; management science and engineering; economics; human factors; politics; conflict management, resolution, mediation and transformation; environmental science; and innovation and strategy.
The starting point of this work has been to focus specifically onlimitations and application of current theory and practice in conflict management by working closely with conflict resolution practitioners at the micro level of application in the transitional societies of Bosnia-Herzegovina and the Russian Federation, and at the macro level within Europe in the context of environment and technology. These limitations provide the starting point from which the perspectivesof complexity science can be added in order to make a high impact contribution to knowledge, practice and research in the context of scientific domains in the European Community.
Bosnia-Herzegovina Russian Republic of Bashkortostan
Case Study Contexts
1) Macro level conflicts pertaining to the area of sustainability and the future of European environmental policy (e.g. Traffic and road transport particularly referring to the accession of the new member states, and Climate change - with reference to security of energy supply and the Kyoto protocol).
2) Micro level conflicts pertaining to democracy building and family interventions in the Republic of Bashkortostan in the Russian Federation.
3) Micro level conflict communication methodology in Bosnia-Herzegovina.
• Each of the conflicts and associated problems mentioned is of importance for the European Union, either directly or indirectly, and cannot be solved on a national level.
• Multiple stakeholders are involved in those conflicts which definitely need a long-term solution including innovation and change of society.
• Tools, methods and practices to facilitate this are sought, and advancements grounded in complexity science offer a significant step forward.
The Conflict Management “Domain”
• Conflict Management Theory– Conflict Resolution & Transformation through Consensus &
Communication– Communication & (Organised) Complexity– Subjective and Objective Perceptions of Conflict
• Strategies of Conflict Management and Advancement Sought• Conflict Management Tools
Complexity Science
Complex Adaptive Systems TheoryComplex Responsive Processes of Relating TheoryComplexity Science PrinciplesApplications of the principles
Soft toolsSocial SciencesHard tools (modelling & simulations)Integration…
Advancement is sought in the following areas:
At the high level of conflict management theory and as it pertains to conflict resolution and transformation theory and practice in the form of tools, methods and approaches;
In the integration of hard and soft complexity science tools, methods and approaches;
And, in the transferability and generalisability of complexity science within and between diverse scientific domains.
These advancements could be worked towards by the achievement of the following objectives:
OBJ1:
To UNDERSTAND how the target user group (conflict resolution professionals from different real world intervention domains such as socio-politics, the environment, and business) currently go about practicingconflict management and in parallel to analyse what is known in current conflict management literature about principles, approaches, simulation and modelling tools and workshop concepts.
To DESCRIBE current theory in complexity science from a multidisciplinary perspective (e.g. physics, mathematical modelling, social science, management theory, economics, politics, anthropology) and practical applications derived from the complexity science domain for potential application in the conflict resolution domain.
OBJ2:
To TRANSFER what is known in complexity science and practically derived and applied there from, to the act of conflict resolution and transformation in general by the design, development and piloting of people orientated workshop tools and methods, and modelling and simulation techniques.
OBJ3:
To DEVELOP a coherent approach of complexity science based on an integration of ‘soft’ people orientated tools and methods, with ‘hard’ modelling and simulating techniques, for the purpose of application in the scientific domain of conflict resolution and transformation.
OBJ4:
To DEVELOP a transferable complexity science based model, and COMPARATIVELY DISCUSS the generalisability of this model in terms of its application in diverse domains such as socio-political, environment, and business.
OBJ5:
To EXPERIMENT with and PILOT new concepts, tools and methods while iteratively developing them with a target use group.
OBJ6:
To CATALYSE the awareness and understanding for complexity science based conflict management on a micro-level and macro-level in European politics, research and industry. Making the subsequent findings known through various channels.
To SUPPORT this catalysing by staying in continuous discussion with both researchers and practitioners in the field by development of a community of interest.
OBJ7:
To provide a constitutional basis for further research activities in the conjunction of complexity science and conflict resolution. To prepare and structure this research area in relevant research domains and to elaborate the connections between these research areas.
To identify further relevant research potentials and to recommend and stimulate further research activities on a European level.
To build up a Community of Interest comprising experts from science, politics and economy.
Objectives Leading to Practical Results
R1: Report on European state of the art in theory and practice derived from complexity science from a multidisciplinary perspective on the one hand, and conflict resolution on the other, including conflict resolution practice, methods and tools applied by the Target User Group.
R2: Set of methodological modules (soft approaches) for conflict resolution based on complexity science, and prototypes for modelling and simulation tools (hard approaches) for conflict resolution based on complexity science.
R3: An integrated model of complexity science practical methods, incorporating a balance between hard/soft methods.
R4: Complexity Science based Conflict Resolution Model - transferable for application to different real world problems in diverse scientific domains, such as socio-political, environmental, and business. This includes a demonstrable model and explorative report on the transfer of results and insights to diverse domains, e.g. socio-political, environmental, and business environments, with focus on geographically-localised interventions (micro-level) and strategic networks (macro-level).
R5: Report on testing and validating the prototypes and modules within the Target User Group.
R6: Report on dissemination road map, channels, measures and activities and achieved dissemination levels.
R7: Long term research, political, ecological and business implications and recommendations report.
Acknowledgements
Thanks go to the following people for their previous contribution to the development of the above ideas:
• Frank Wagner, Alex Bading, The Institute for Human Factors and Technology Management (USTUTT) - an institute of the University of Stuttgart
• Professor Peter Allen, Dr Fiona Lettice, Dr Mark Lemon, Cranfield University• Gal Sekely, Atai Ziv, Edna Pasher Ph.D & Associates• Ruth Catlow, Furtherfield• Dr. Herbert Greisberger, Dr Martina Handler, Lisa Purker, Dr. Susanne Kratochwil,
The Austrian Society for Environment and Technology (ÖGUT)• Dr Venera Zakirova, The Bashkir State University• Suada Kapic, FAMA International – Bosnia-Herzegovina
