Barriers to Conflict Resolution

Why can’t we all just get along? In family life, schools, law, the business world, and domestic and international affairs, it is all too common for disputes to fester unresolved even when the parties are committed to a negotiated settlement. In this book members and associates of the Stanford Center on Conflict and Negotiation address the complex issues that protract disputes and turn potential win-win negotiations into conflicts that leave everyone worse off.

Drawing on such diverse but related disciplines as economics, cognitive psychology, statistics, and game and decision-making theory, the book considers the barriers to successful negotiation in such areas as civil litigation, family law, arms control, labor management disputes, environmental treaty making, and politics. When does it pay for parties to a dispute to cooperate, and when to compete? How can third-party negotiators further resolutions and avoid the pitfalls that deepen the division between antagonists? Offering answers to these and related questions, this book is a comprehensive guide to the latest understanding of ways to resolve human conflict.

How can both sides in a dispute avoid the heavy costs of a protracted struggle likely to produce a mutually unsatisfying outcome? The trick, according to the participants in this multidisciplinary symposium, lies in overcoming barriers such as overconfidence, "hardball" bargaining tactics, reluctance to swap concessions, concealing one's true interests and unwarranted inferences about the other party. An outgrowth of a conference held in 1991 at Stanford University (where Arrow directs Stanford's Center on Conflict and Negotiation), this collection of scholarly papers uses examples from labor-management disputes, business deals, arms-control negotiations, environmental treaties and legislative debates, buttressed by game theory, cognitive psychology, economics and behavioral decision theory. One essay looks at how lawyers exacerbate their clients' conflicts and suggests potential areas of cooperation. Another article explores the role of third-party mediators in resolving disputes. Negotiators, policy makers and professionals in many fields will find here useful strategies and insights.
Copyright 1995 Reed Business Information, Inc.