Paul Wehr - Conflict Regulation
UNIVERSIDAD DE COLORADO
Sociology 4025: Conflict Management
Material 1
Excerpts from Wallace and Wolf, Contemporary Sociological Theory,
Prentice-Hall, 1986.
INTRODUCTION
Conflict theory is the major alternative to functionalism as an
approach to analyzing the general structure of societies; and it
is increasingly popular and important in modern sociology. It is
also a less unified perspective than the others discussed in this
book, and the disagreements among its proponents are often more
bitter than those they have with theorists who use other
approaches. However, conflict theorists of all types share a
number of important assumptions and preconceptions. Together
these create a distinctive way of looking at the world. .
Functionalists, as we have seen, look at societies and social
institutions as systems in which all the parts depend on each
other and work together to create equilibrium. They do not deny
the existence of conflict; but they believe society develops ways
to control it, and it is these that they analyze. Conflict
theorists' perception of society could hardly be more different.
Where functionalists see interdependence and unity in society,
conflict theorists see an arena in which groups fight for power,
and the "control" of conflict simply means that one group is
able, temporarily, to suppress its rivals. Functionalists see
civ-I law, for example, as a way of increasing social
integration; but conflict theorists see civil law as a way of
defining and upholding a particular order that benefits some
groups at the expense of others.
We can see how very different a view of things this
perspective creates if we go back to the example we used in
introducing functionalism-a modern airport. A functionalist
perspective points out the way the different parts of an airport
work together to keep the system functioning. Conflict theory is
interested in the rivalries among different workers and
management, and the position each group is in to do well for
itself. A conflict theorist might point out that the air traffic
controllers want more staff and additional expensive equipment;
that the pilots are continually trying to restrict entry into the
profession in order to keep salaries high; that the porters,
maintenance staff, and cleaners all belong to militant unions;
and that all these groups are at odds with the airlines and
terminal management, who want to keep costs down and profits up.
The focus is on the shifting balance of power among competing
groups, not on the equilibrium of interdependence and
cooperation. I
'The contrast between equilibrium and conflict analyses of
society is very old. One of the major modern theorists we discuss
later, Ralf
Dahrendorf, builds one of his expositions of conflict theory around
the figure of Thrasymachus, a famous Greek Sophist who appears in the
work of Plato as a "conflict theorist" attacking the "equilibrium
theory" that Plato puts in I the mouth of Socrates. Ralf Dahrendorf,
"In Praise of Thrasymachus" in Essays in the Theo7y of Society
(Stanford, Calif.: Stanford University Press, 1968).
This general "conflict" orientation incorporates three central and
connected assumptions. The first is that people have a number of
basic "interests," things they want and attempt to acquire
and which are not defined by societies but rather common to
them all. Conflict theorists are not always explicit about
this view of mankind, but it is present in all their work.
Second, and central to the whole conflict perspective,
is an emphasis on power as the core of social relationships.
Conflict theorists always view power not only as scarce and
unequally divided-and therefore a source of conflict-but
also as essentially coercive. This analysis leads, in turn,
to a concern with the distribution of those resources that
give people more or less power. For example, any
conflict,theorist'would consider what happened to the
American Indians to have been inevitable. The white
settlers had greater numbers, greater wealth, and more
advanced weapons; and were therefore bound, such a theorist
would argue, to seize lands and mineral wealth and give
little in return. What is surprising, from a conflict
perspective, is not that the settlers' religion and
political beliefs did not stop them, but that the Indians
were not simply exterminated.
The third distinctive aspect of conflict theory is that
values and ideas are seen as weapons used by different
groups to advance their own ends, rather than as means of
defining a whole society's identity and goals. We shall
find that conflict theorists have a great deal to say about
ideas as an aspect of groups' interests, especially under
the categories of "ideology" and "legitimacy." In the case
of America's treatment of the Indians, for example, conflict
theorists would tend to interpret the notion of America's
"manifest destiny" and the idea of "civilizing" the tribes
as clear examples of how people develop ideas that suit
their own interests.
The Two Traditions
The basic elements of conflict theory which we have
described are common to all its proponents; but conflict
theory can also be divided into two quite dissimilar
traditions. These differ, above all, in their view of
social science and in whether they believe that conflict can
ever be eradicated. This chapter will discuss each
separately.
The first group of theorists believes the social
scientist to have a moral obligation to engage in a critique
of society. It refuses to separate-or to admit that one can
really separate-analysis from judgment or fact from value.
Theorists in this group also generally believe that in
principle a society could exist in which there were no
longer grounds for social conflict. Therefore, these
theorists are frequently considered Utopian writers. The
second group, by contrast, considers conflict to be an
inevitable and permanent aspect of social life; and it also
rejects the idea that social science's conclusions are
necessarily value-laden. Instead, its proponents are
interested in establishing a social science with the same
canon of objectivity as informs the natural sciences.
If we look at the major influences on modern conflict
theory, we find that those in the first group, where we will
discuss modern Marxism, the Frankfurt School theorists, and
C. Wright Mills, are most influenced by the work of Karl
Marx. In the second group, where we describe the work of
Ralf Dahrendorf, Lewis Coser, and Randall Collins, Marx's
influence is still apparent; but the most important
continuities are with the writings of Max Weber. We
therefore turn now to a discussion of the roots of modern
conflict theory in the work of these two classical thinkers,
as well as to the influence of such writers as the European
elite theorists, Veblen, Schumpeter, Simmel, and the
American sociologists of the Chicago School.
INTELLECTUAL ROOTS
Power, Position, and Legitimacy: Marx and Weber
The basic elements of conflict theory were set out by
two of the greatest early sociologists, Karl Marx and Max
Weber. Much of Weber's work incorporates a debate with Marx
and Marxist analysis, but in both these authors we find the
same two concerns: with the way social positions bestow more
or less power on their incumbents, and with the role of
ideas in creating or undermining the legitimacy of a social
position.
Karl Marx (1818-1883) Conflict theory in sociology is
the creation of Karl Marx; indeed, Marxism and conflict
theory are sometimes discussed as though the two were
synonymous. There can also be no better example than
Marxism of the close connection between a theorist's ideas
and the events of the "real world"; for it is in the name of
Marx's ideas that revolutionaries around the world attack
existing forms of society and that organized Communist
parties rule a large part of mankind.
Because Marx's work is still used by so many writers in
their analyses of contemporary society, we discuss it in
additional detail later in the chapter. Of course, the
ideas of many other long-dead writers are essential to
contemporary analyses; but Marx's work is rather different.
Marxist sociologists form a school whose analyses take place
within the framework Marx created. In this sense,
therefore, Marxism is an entirely contemporary theory.
The basic elements of conflict theory are all apparent
in Marx's work. He believed, first of all, that people have
an essential nature and predefined interests. Indeed,
Marxists generally argue that if people do not behave in
accordance with these interests it can only mean that they
have been deceived about what their "true interests" are by
a social system that works in others' favor. Second, Marx
analyzed both historical and contemporary society in terms
of conflicts between different social groups with different
interests. Finally, he emphasized the link between the
nature of ideas or "ideologies" and the interests of those
who develop them; and he insisted that the ideas of an age
reflect the interests of the "ruling class."
Marx emphasized the primacy of technology and of
patterns of property ownership in determining the nature of
people's lives and the course of social conflict. Whereas
Marxist and, to a lesser degree, other "critical" conflict
theorists retain this emphasis, other analysts from Weber on
have seen it as an important, but only partial, explanation.
Marx's work is also distinguished by its claim to predict
the future and its belief in the possibility of a perfect,
conflict-free, "communist" society. Such beliefs are
accepted partly or in full by the more "critical" or
"Utopian" theorists, while being rejected by the analytic
conflict theorists who draw on Weber. The divide between
the two approaches thus derives from the central differences
between Marx and Weber themselves.
Max Weber (1864-1920) Max Weber was born into a
prominent bourgeois German family. His father was an
important member of the National Liberal Party, with a seat
in the Reichstag (Parliament); while his mother came from a
wealthy but also intensely religious and cultured background. There was considerable tension in his parents'
marriage. As a youth, Weber tended to identify with his
father. However, during his poststudent years, when he was
still financially dependent and living at home, he came to
resent the older man and his authoritarian behavior. These
conflicts played an important part in the complete breakdown
Weber suffered in his early thirties.
Before and after this period he was enormously
productive, both in his intellectual work and in political
activities. He held chairs at the universities of Freiburg
and Heidelberg, and produced a range of works on topics
which included economic policy, political development, the
social psychology of industrial work, the sociology of
religion, economic history, and the methodology of social
science. At the same time, he played an important role in
Christian-Social political circles, producing papers on
current issues. During this period his home was a center of
German intellectual life.
The last years of Weber's life were also those of the
First World War; of German defeat, and revolution and
virtual civil war at home; of the abdication of the Kaiser
and the establishment of a German Republic. During this
period Weber was intensely involved in politics. After
initially supporting the war, he later urged peace feelers
and called for widespread changes in the German political
structure. He was a founding member of the Deutsche
Demokratische Partei, and involved in writing the new constitution. But he also called the abortive 1918 revolution
a "bloody carnival," something the left-wing never forgave,
and which doomed proposals to have him join the government
or become a candidate for President of the Republic.
For all his lifelong concern with the relationship
between politics and intellectual thought, Weber had none of
the utopian prophet about him. His analyses are complex and
difficult to categorize; and they have had none of Marx's
impact on the world. Nonetheless, a very large proportion
of non-Marxist intellectuals would nominate him as the
greatest of sociologists; and his ideas are the single most
important influence on "analytic" conflict theory.2
Like Marx, Weber saw people's activities as largely
self-interested. However, he believed that in addition to
such universal interests as the acquisition of wealth, a
historian or sociologist must also recognize the importance
of goals and values specific to a society. For example, he
suggested that the Calvinists' desire to save their souls
found expression in the unique goal of simply accumulating
wealth. This was seen as evidence of God's favor, whereas
actually enjoying its fruits would be sinful indulgences
Weber analyzed the way people maneuver in pursuit of
advantage in terms of both such particular values and
circumstances and more general sociological categories. He
formulated "ideal types" by abstracting from different
historical contexts the essential elements of a concept.4
For example, in examining what gives one individual or group
an advantage over others, Weber gives particular attention
to authority-the claim that one has a legitimate right to be
obeyed. He suggests that there are three main foundations
for successful claims to authority-or three, "ideal types."
Charismatic authority rests on a leader's personal
qualities; traditional authority is also personal, but
enjoyed because it has been handed down from the past; and
rational-legal authority is derived from formal rules.
Thus, modern bureaucrats are obeyed because and insofar as
statutes empower them to do certain things; and because our
societies accept statutory law as the ultimate source of
authority.
Weber's analysis of China provides a good example of his
method. Weber wanted to explain why capitalism developed in
the West and not in other societies such as China or India,
which were in many ways equally or more advanced. Among the
factors he identified in China was the system of
"Prebends."5 This system ensured an income for the "dominant
stratum" by giving them the right to collect taxes, of
which they kept a portion for themselves.
Consequently, they had no interest in changing the
traditional economic system. By contrast, English (and
other European) landlords had no such stake in the tax
system; and so had a strong incentive to increase the
income from their lands by methods such as enclosing
the land and developing scientific farming. This
tended to decrease the taxable rural population, but
stimulated the growth of the cities.6
In addition, China had no centralized system of
courts or of rationalized, formal law, which, in
Europe, provided the security of property rights within
which commercial capitalism and capitalist groups could
7 flourish. Nor did the Chinese commercial cities,
unlike their European counterparts or the traditional
Chinese village-based sibs or clans, have rights of
self-government and corresponding political strength.8
Equally important, the Confucian literati' monopolized
senior administrative positions, which were won on the
basis of competitive examinations. Confucian education
was essentially literary. Hence there was a powerful
educational elite that disdained the scientific and
logical thought characteristic of modern industrial
societies, and whose existence induced Chinese families
to concentrate above all on educating sons for the
examinations.9 Thus, Weber argues, a balance of power
developed that checked the move from administrative and
economic traditionalism to "rationalization."
As his emphasis on the role of the Chinese
educational elite makes clear, Weber believed Marx to
be wrong in identifying economic characteristics as the
sole crucial determinant of both social structure and
people's chances in life. Someone's religion,
education, or political faction may, he argued, be as
important a source of power and success. Instead of
relying on Marx's category of class, Weber
distinguished among classes, status groups, and
parties, all of which could be more or less important
for people's lives and serve as foci of group
organization and conflict. 10 By a class, he meant
people who shared the same position in economic life,
whether this involved property, as in Marx's
definition, or marketable skills. A party he defined
as an association that exists to "secure power within a
corporate group for its leaders in order to attain
ideal or material advantages for its active members.""
Examples include political parties seeking power in the
modern state but also the factions that fought for
control of Rome or the Italian city-states. Finally,
"status groups, " as Weber's term stand is generally
translated, are groups whose distinctiveness lies not
in their shared economic position but in either their
shared mode of lifeoften founded on a common education-or in the
prestige attached to their birth and family,
as in the case of a hereditary aristocracy.12
Weber's argument has had great influence on modern
"analytic" theorists who, like him, believe that economic
factors are not always the major determinants of people's
lives and power. His influence is also apparent in these
theorists' discussion of the relationship between ideas and
power. It is important to emphasize that, unlike Marx,
Weber believed ideas and values to have an important,
independent effect on history (as in the case of Calvinism
and Confucianism) and did not consider them to be simply
reflections of underlying interests. At the same time, he
was aware of the role they could play in strengthening the
position of a social group or a given social order. He
emphasized, in particular, the importance of "legitimacy,"
the belief that someone's position and the system
incorporating it are right and proper. This concept recurs
in and influences much of modern conflict analysis.
Power, Position, and Legitimacy:
Twentieth-Century Theorists
Although the major elements of conflict theory were
set out by Marx and Weber, a number of other theorists
developed comparable ideas that have also had a
significant impact on modern analysts. The most
important are the European elite theorists; Thorstein
Veblen; and Joseph SchumPeter.
Elite Theory The most prominent elite theorists are
Weber's contemporary, Vilfredo Pareto (1848-1923);
Pareto's great rival, Gaetano Mosca (1858-1941); and
Weber's friend, Robert Michels (1876-1936). Although
in no sense did they form a school, they shared a
number of important ideas. 13
Their central argument was that only a small number of
people in any organization can hold authority and that their
occupation of these positions automatically places them at
odds with those sub ected to it. Moreover, these theorists
contended, the elites who are in control generally share a
common culture, and they are organized-not necessarily
formally, but in the sense that they act together to defend
their position, as well as using it to their own individual
advantage. In other words, elite theory presents
explicitly the argument that people's self-interest and the
intrinsically unequal nature of power make conflict both
inevitable and permanent.
Michels' main concern was with the so-called "iron law
of oligarchy," the proposition that small groups in
authority come to run political parties essentially for
their own ends. Mosca was primarily concerned with the
conflict between holders of political power and those they
dominate. Indeed, Mosca upended Marx, identifying political
positions as the source of domination in all other spheres,
including the economic. Pareto, on the other hand,
recognized the existence of other nonpolitical elites; but
he emphasized the "governing elites" who rule a society, and
the existence of ruling and subject classes who face each
other like alien nations. The modern analytic theorists,
especially Dahrendorf, have been most influenced by the
elite theorists' insistence on authority and the state as
dominant sources of power. However, their general image of
society as divided horizontally into an elite and a mass is
also apparent in C. Wright Mills' social critique.
Thorstein Veblen (1857-1929) Veblen's major importance
for modern conflict theory lies in the fact that he was one
of the very few early American sociologists to analyze the
roots of power and conflict in a broad historical context.
Early American sociologists were essentially empiricist and
pragmatic in style; and only of America could it be said
that here itsociology is practiced without socialism."14
Instead, they tended, like the highly influential Lester
Ward, to be reformers, who approached "social problems" with
a faith in government policies and gradualist reforms-15
Veblen, by contrast, analyzed society in terms of the
conflicting interests of different social groups, and he
also denounced passionately much of the existing order.
Among modern theorists, C. Wright Mills both continued this
tradition and drew directly on Veblen in his discussion of
status struggles.
Veblen, like Marx, believed that modern society is
characterized by the conflict between opposing "economic"
groups. In his case they are the "industrial" class, who
actually make goods, and the "pecuniary" class, who are
involved in finance and sales and whom he characterized as
parasites living off the innovation and productiveness of
the rest of the population.16 Veblen was also interested in
the constants of human nature that underlie social behavior.
He argued that people desire passionately the esteem of
others and that esteem essentially a competitive affair,
since for everyone to enjoy high status-is a contradiction
in terms. A very large part of people's behavior, Veblen
argued, especially including styles of consumption and
leisure, can be explained by the struggle for high standing
in the eyes of one's neighbors.
Joseph Schumpeter (1883-1950) Of the generation that
followed Weber, it was the Austrian Joseph Schumpeter who
most clearly developed Weber's interest in how a group's
success is rooted in its social position, and in the
importance of legitimacy. He also developed Marx's ideas
about changes in the distribution of power and with them the
process of human history. Schumpeter argued that "classes"-a term he
used loosely to describe more or less organized
and distinctive social groups-achieve power because they
command skills that are either new and innovative or that
(because of changing circumstances) are far more important
than they were in the past. 17 Their position can then be
used to obtain further wealth and privilege, dispose of
older groups, and protect themselves from competition.
Ultimately, however, because they fail to continue providing
valued services and because new innovatory groups rise up,
powerful classes are replaced by others. The new classes
attack the old successfully and deny the legitimacy of their
position.
Two of Schumpeter's most interesting examples are the
rise of imperialist warrior groups and the decline of the
capitalist bourgeoisie. He argues that the medieval feudal
aristocracy developed from warrior groups. They attained
power in a society where war was continual, where people
consequently sought armed protection, and where fighting
skill had to be acquired and maintained over a lifetime. 18
As this situation changed with the rise of the modern state,
modern arms, and the conscript army, the aristocracy's
position declined. At present, Schumpeter argues, the
capitalist class, which ascended because of its economic
achievements, is in decline in its turn. Technological
innovation has become institutionalized, and independent
entrepreneurs are less important. Meanwhile, a new class of
intellectuals, with its own group attitudes and group
interests, attacks the legitimacy of the old order and
creates for itself a new power base in the increasingly
important government bureaucracies.19
Schumpeter had no belief in a conflict-free Utopia, and
he tended to regret the passing of capitalist society rather
than use his work as a vehicle for criticism and advocacy'of
chanlye. However, just as he acknowledged his great debt to
Marx, so his own work has influenced "critical" modern
theorists, as well as those who, like him, believe in an
objective, analytic sociology. In particular, the influence
of his ideas about capitalism's loss of legitimacy is apparent
in the work of Jurgen Habermas, the most important active
theorist in the tradition of the Frankfurt School.
The Web of Conflict:
Simmel and'the Chicago School
In addition to the central tradition of conflict
analysis, which we have just described, there exists a
rather different approach to the study of conflict. It
emphasizes the abstract qualities of a social order,
rather than the origins and progress of actual
conflicts, and is exemplified by the writings of Georg
Simmel and the Chicago School.
Georg Simmel (1858-1918) Among the great early
sociologists, Simmel was the most interested in
identifying universal patterns in human behavior.
Whereas Marx and Weber wanted to understand what made a
particular society operate, Simmel concentrated on
developing what is almost a mathematics of society: a
collection of statements about human relationships and
social behavior that apply irrespective of the
historical setting. He has influenced a whole range of
modern theorists who are similarly interested in
interpersonal relationships: some conflict theorists,
but also symbolic interactionists, exchange theorists,
and network analysts.20
Simmel's sensitivity to how human relationships form
and change was related to his own background and his
feelings of insecurity and rootlessness. He was born
in Berlin, the youngest child of a Jewish businessman
who had converted to Christianity. His father died
when Simmel was still a child, and the boy was never
close to his mother. He studied history and philosophy
at the University of Berlin, and stayed on there as a
"Privatdozent," an unpaid lecturer dependent on student
fees. His lectures were enormously popular; he
published widely; and among his friends were many of
the foremost academics and writers of the time,
including Weber. Yet although he applied constantly
for senior positions in German universities, he was
constantly turned down; p2irtly because of anti-Semitism, and partly
because he refused, in his work,
to stay within a single academic discipline. It was
only in 1914, at the age of fifty-six, that he was
appointed finally to a chair at the University of
Strasbourg.
The most important part of Simmel's analysis for
later conflict theory is his insistence that
association and conflict between individuals and social
groups not only can exist side by side, but indeed are
intimately related. One cannot divide people neatly
into self-contained groups, with common interests which
are different from tl-iose of people in ot'her, selfcontained,antagonistic groups. Marx's image is of a
society divided horizontally into antagonistic blocks;
Simmel's is of a society integrated by numerous crosscutting conflicts, in which those who stand together in
one respect are opposed in another.
Simmel's insistence that "social action always
involves harmony and conflict, love and hatred"21 did
more than reinforce the tendency of "analytic" conflict
theorists to consider conflict a permanent condition.
It also alerted them to the way that varying degrees of
social contact and interdependence affect the nature of
conflict. For example, Lewis Coser's discussion of how
conflict can actually stabilize a society is based
directly on Simmel's writing.
Robert Park and the Chicago School An emphasis on
conflict as a general and abstract principle of social
life has been more typical of American than of European
sociology. Robert Park (1864-1944), whose only formal
training was in Simmel's courses in Berlin,,built up
the "Chicago School of Sociology," which is renowned
for research into the social life and culture of the
City.22 He also developed a system of general concepts that
described what were, for him, the central characteristics of
social life. They consisted of competition, conflict,
accommodation, and assimilation into a common culture.23
Park argued that competition, which is universal and
continuous among individuals, determines their individual
careers. Conflict arises rather over status, and over the
way super-ordination--power--is allocated socially.
Conflict may thus involve groups as well as individuals.
Park and his colleagues were more interested in analyzing
racial antagonisms and conflict among different ethnic
groups than the class struggles stressed by Marx and other
Europeans, whose own societies were much more racially and
culturally homogeneous. Once again, the influence of this
rather different tradition is especially apparent in the
work of Lewis Coser, one of the most important of American
conflict theorists.
Summary
The most important historical influences on modern
conflict theory are the writings of Karl Marx and Max Weber,
and modern theorists can be divided into two groups
according to who is the dominant influence upon them. A
number of other sociologists who share the same general
conflict perspective have also influenced modern theory and
American sociology.
Material 2
part two
CONFLICT THEORY AND ANALYTIC SOCIOLOGY
Ralf Dahrendorf, Lewis Coser, and Randall Collins, the
theorists discussed in this section, can be grouped as "analytic"
conflict theorists because they share the belief that a conflict
perspective is central to the development of an objective, or
"scientific," sociology. However, they are different from critical
theorists in three important respects. First, whereas critical
theorists see social science as intrinsically a part of political
action and deny that fact and value can or should be separated,
analytic theorists consider such a separation to be essential. It
may be difficult or impossible for analysts, particularly those
concerned with human society, to frame their hypotheses
independently of their own opinions and concerns, they argue: but
those hypotheses have implications that can be observed and tested
objectively with empirical measures. It follows that ideas are not
automatically distortions of reality just because they are also the
products of particular social circumstances or tend to favor the
interests of a particular social group.
Second, analytic conflict theorists do not analyze all
societies as stratified along a single dimension, with a ruling
group opposed to the masses. Analytic theorists would agree that
some societies are of this type, but they believe that many others
are far more complex in the way power and status are distributed;
they have interlocking patterns of stratification, which do not
line up neatly. This is true, they believe, because there are a
number of different sources of power and position in society, and
one particular set of institutions, such as that based on property,
is not always paramount.
Third, the analytic theorists do not contrast the present
with
a rational or conflict-free ideal for the simple reason that they
do not believe in one. On the contrary, they emphasize that
conflict and its roots are permanent, conflicts of interest
inevitable.
In all these respects, modern analytic theorists share Max
Weber's approach,just as Marx was the primary influence on the
critical approach. Weber believed in the vital importance of
objective social science. As we saw earlier, he developed a
typology of "class, status, and party" as important influences on
people's lives, as opposed to Marx's emphasis on property classes
alone. Furthermore, Weber considered that the conflicts these generate are permanent features of human society, and he saw modern
society tending not towards a communist Utopia but towards a
bureaucratic society inimical to human freedom. This is not to
say, however, that either he or the analytic conflict theorists he
influenced are indifferent to political action. In general,
conflict theory appeals to sociologists who hold strong political
views; and a number of modern analytic theorists have been very
involved in politics and social policy, often in direct opposition
to the ideas of critical and Marxist theory.
RALF DAHRENDORF
Ralf Dahrendorf (b. 1929) is one of the few living European
sociologists who is widely known and respected in both Europe and
North America. As a teenager in Nazi Germany, he was sent to a
concentration camp for his membership in a high-school group
opposing the state, and he has continued to be deeply involved in
political affairs. He has been a Free Democratic member of the
Baden-Wiirtemburg Landtag (Regional Parliament) and West German
"Bundestag" (Parliament); and as a member of the Commission of
the European Communities, he has been responsible for external
relations and for education, science, and research. The bulk
of his academic career has been spent in German universities,
and in 1984 he became Professor of Sociology at the University
of Constance. However, he has also worked in both Britain and
America and was Director of the London School of Economics,
one of the most prestigious British institutions of higher
education.
Dahrendorf's work on conflict reveals two major concerns.
The first is with what he himself describes as "theories of
society"; 158 that is, with setting out the general principles
of social explanation. Here, Dahrendorf stresses the primacy
of power and the consequent inevitability of conflict. Like
Marx, his second concern is with the determinants of active
conflict the ways social institutions systematically generate
groups with conflicting interests and the circumstances in
which such groups will become organized and active.
Power, Conflict, and Social Explanation
There is, Dahrendorf argues, an inherent tendency to
conflict in society. Those groups with power will pursue
their interests, and those without power will pursue theirs:
and their interests are necessarily different. Sooner or
later, he argues-and in some systems the powerful may be very
thoroughly entrenched-the balance between power and opposition
shifts, and society changes. Thus, conflict is "the great
creative force of human history."159
Power.
According to Dahrendorf's theory of society, the
distribution of power is the crucial determinant of social
structure. His definition of power is Weber's: "the
probability that one actor within a social relationship will
be in a position to carry out his own will despite resistance,
regardless of the basis on which this probability rests."160
In this view, the essence of power is the control of
sanctions, which enables those who possess power to give
orders and obtain what they want from the powerless. However,
people dislike submission. Therefore, Dahrendorf argues,
there is inevitably a conflict of interest and an impetus for
the powerless to conflict with the powerful, the former in
pursuit of power, the latter in defense of it. Power is a
"lasting source of friction."161
This essentially coercive view of power, which is co mon
to most conflict theorists, is very different from that of
functionalism.162 As we have seen, Parsons believes that power
is embodied in political institutions that solve the
"functional imperative" of goal attainment.163 The ability
power bestows to get what one wants at others' expense he
regards as a "secondary and derived" phenomenon. Dahrendorfs
view is the opposite. Power is necessary if large
organizations are to achieve their goals; and at times, such
as in a defensive war, the powerful may carry out very clearly
the common aims of a group. However, what Parsons considers
the secondary aspect of power, Dahrendorf considers primary:
the powerful are not granted power by the community to carry
out some "common will," but grasp and use that power for their
own ends.
Dahrendorf does not see the struggle for power as the'sum
of social life, however. Weber's (and Dahrendorf's)
definition of power includes actors "within a social
relationship": in situations where other people's actions
matter. But there are also times when people are free to do
what they like without other people mattering at all. In his
recent lectures on the cu I rrent political situation in the
West, Dahrendorf has discussed the factors that endow
societies with more or less "liberty" in this sense-with what
has been called "negative freedom."164 In America, for
example, you are "at liberty" to move from one city to another
without anyone's permission. In China you are not; and
whether you get the requisite permission and papers largely
depends on your own "power" and influence.
Norms .
Like other conflict theorists, Dahrendorf argues
that societal norms do not define or emerge from social
consensus. Conflict theory, he argues, perceives, unlike
functionalism, that norms "are established and maintained ...
by power, and their substance may well be explained in terms
of the interests of the powerful."165 This may be seen from
the fact that norms are backed by sanctions. Vivid examples
of what Dahrendorf means can be found in Soviet Russia, where
dissidents risk prison camp or a mental hospital, or in the
pre-Civil Rights South, where "uppity" blacks or nonconforming
whites could lose their livelihoods or even their lives. In
turn, sanctions involve the control and use of power,
particularly the power of law and punishment.166 "In the last
analysis, established norms are nothing but ruling norms," he
suggests. 167
Social Stratification. Dahrendorf clearly distinguishes
between two facts: first, that positions and jobs are different and
demand different skills, and second, that different jobs are
treated as "superior" or "inferior" to one another. There are both
"social differentiation of positions ... and social stratification
based on reputation and wealth and expressed in a rank order of
social status."168 Social stratification is what makes college
presidents more generally respected than bus drivers, and lies
behind claims that teachers "ought" to be paid more than
maintenance men.
Stratification, Dahrendorf argues, is caused by norms,: which
categorize some things as desirable and others as not. In every
group, norms defining how people should behave entail
discrimination against those who do not comply. During the Vietnam
War, for example, those who supported the war were ostracized on
some campuses, those who opposed it on others. Moreover, every
society has general norms, which define certain characteristics as
good (such as being an aristocrat or having more education than
average) and which therefore entail discrimination against those
who do not or cannot conform. These norms, Dahrendorf argues, are
the basis of social stratification, and they are themselves derived
from and upheld by power. Once again, therefore, power is the
central concept.
This is a very different explanation from that of
functionalists, who argue that social stratification derives from
society's need to attract talented people into important positions.
The two may not be as totally irreconcilable as Dahrendorf implies,
however. Dahrendorf does not explain how a group becomes powerful
in the first place, but this will surely often depend, at least in
part, on its offering skills and a type of social order that people
value. Not all successful ruling groups are military invaders! It
is precisely the existence of a relationship between power and
general social values that functionalism addresses. Similarly,
economics' statement that income differentials are a result of the
market value of skills l69 has given rise to theories of
stratification linking success with the provision of scarce
services.170 However, a group that gains a hold on power in this
way will almost certainly strive to maintain and take advantage of
its position, convince everyone of its legitimacy and importance,
and prevent competition
from groups with different potential power bases-and
Dahrendorf's approach is far better suited than
functionalism's to analyzing this process.
Conflict Theory and Explanation. Dahrendorf believes that
a "conflict" approach, which combines general hypotheses about
the nature of power and inevitability of conflict with
information about the positions and resources of particular
historical groups, is the most fruitful one for sociology to
adopt. However, he also argues that "it is clearly not very
satisfactory if the roles of individuals have to be seen
entirely, or even overwhelmingly, in terms of interests
conflicting with those of others."171 Although most conflict
theorists believe that the absence of conflict is a result of
either effective coercion or "false consciousness," Dahrendorf
believes that social relationships can be mutually beneficial.
In a recent discussion of the need for greater industrial
democracy, for example, he suggests that the sharing of
information and decision-making may transform conflicts from
"a zero-sum game in which the gains of one side are the losses
of the other, into an intricate mixture of co-operative
efforts to increase the cake, and conflicts about dividing it
Up.172
The Determinants of Conflict:
A Theory of Conflict Groups
In his best-known work, Class and Class Conflict in
Industrial Society, Dahrendorf addresses the question of
when inequalities and conflicting interests will actually
produce conflicts. His central argument is that social
conflicts will take place, systematically, among groups
that differ in the authority they enjoy over others. By
authority, Dahrendorf (again following Weber) means the
sort of power that is attached to a social role or
position, that is legitimate in the sense of being
defined and delimited by social norms, and that is backed
by sanctions up to (and no further than) these limits.
A university, for example, has the authority to charge
you for your courses, board, and lodging, but not to take
all your money. A mugger has the power to do just that-but no
authority at all to do so.
Dahrendorf's position is that the stable and recurrent
patterns of institutional authority systematically give
rise to social conflict between those who have some
degree of authority and those who have none. In a
departure from conventional "economic" usage, Dahrendorf
labels these groups classes. He writes that "the term
'class' signifies conflict groups that are generated by
the differential distribution of authority in
imperatively coordinated associations:"173 that is,
organizations in which orders are given and taken.
Dahrendorf's theory thus implies that authority is
dichotomous: you
have
it or you do not, and your interests are formed
accordingly. Critics
have
suggested that whether you have more or less
authority may be equally important and thus that conflict may form around other
groupings. But Dahrendorf affirms, with Marx, that conflict
involves only two sides. On the other hand, all "classes" do
not engage in active conflicts all the time. Dahrendorf
therefore attempts to explain when people will actually
mobilize. 174
The Mobilization of Classes. The structural requirements
for people to form active "interest groups" 175 are
"technical," "political," and "social." Technically,
Dahrendorf argues, a group requires a founder and a charter or
ideology to become active. Politically, the more liberal the
state, the more likely is mobilization for active conflict;
the more totalitarian the state, the less likely. Finally,
three social factors are important. Group formation is more
likely first, if potential members are fairly well-concentrated
geographically; second, if they can communicate
easily (as modern communications technology makes it easier
for them to do); and third, if people who stand in the same
relation to authority are recruited in similar ways and come,
for example, from the same type of families or educational
organizations.
The most important psychological requirements are, of
course, that individuals identify with the interests
associated with their position and that these interests seem
important and "real" to them. Dahrendorf disagrees with
Marx's argument that people's class positions (in either the
"property" or the "authority" sense) determine the whole of
their social life and behavior; but he does believe class
interests will be more "real" to people who also share a
culture. He also suggests that people are less likely to
identify with their class's interests and to mobilize, the
larger the number of associations to which they belong.176
Finally, the greater people's personal chances of leaving
their class-in other words, the greater the degree of "intragenerational mobility"177-the less likely they are to identify
actively with it.
Dahrendorf s "structural" arguments are fairly convincing,
although he pays surprisingly little attention to force. He
tends to emphasize that if conflict is not to become
explosive, there must be some degree of mobility and freedom
to express opposition. But as tyrannies throughout history
have shown, a sufficient degree of force can suppress conflict
very effectively.
His discussion of the "psychological" requirements for
class action is
less satisfactory. Especially in preindustrial societies, the
poor have often shared a culture, led lives confined to the
immediate community, had few opportunities for advancement,
and yet accepted the existing order of things almost without
question. Thus, Dahrendorf fails to explain satisfactorily
how attitudes of opposition originate.
The Violence and Intensity of Conflict. Dahrendorf also
discusses at considerable length what affects the intensity
and violence of class conflict when it occurs. Violence he
defines as "a matter of the weapons that are chosen,"
intensity as the "energy expenditure and degree of involvement
of conflicting parties."178
Dahrendorf argues that there is one preeminent factor
affecting the degree of violence. This is how far conflict is
institutionalized, w ith mutually accepted "rules of the
game"; for "those who have agreed to carry on their
disagreements by means of discussion do not usually engage in
physical violence."179 For example, the days of extreme
violence in strike-breaking and picketing in America predate
the general acceptance of unions.
Dahrendorf also identifies three important factors
influencing the intensity of a conflict. Of these, the first
(which he also considers to be the most importantly) is the
degree to which those who are in positions of subjection in
one association are in the same position in their other
associations. The second and parallel factor is the degree to
which authority in an organization is held by people who are
also "on top" in other respects: in Dahrendorf's terms,
whether positions are "pluralist" or "superimposed." Thus, if
the managers of firms are also their owners and if they also
use their wealth and position to control politics, one can
expect particularly intense industrial conflicts.
Dahrendorf's third argument is that the greater the
mobility between positions, the less intense the conflict will
be. This is true not only when individuals themselves can
move, but also when their children are mobile. This is partly
because mobility makes it less likely that a class will have
a common culture and partly because people are less inclined
to attack a class their children may one day join. On the
other hand, if there is little or no mobility, the struggle
becomes more intense.
Dahrendorf's theory allows one to pinpoint potential areas
of conflict within any given organization. As we have seen,
however, it does not give enough attention to the role of
brute force. Nor does it help us much in predicting which
organizations (of the many in which people give or receive
orders) are more likely to experience open conflict. One
simple reason for the latter problem is that Dahrendorf does
not discuss how important a given institution is to someone's
life. In a society of "superimposed" positions, there is almost
certain to be one major source of power and authority from which
the others follow: when conflicts in totalitarian countries do
break through, they center therefore on the party's power and
control of the state. In Western societies, since both the state
and one s place of work are very important institutions, they are
both far more likely to generate active conflict than an athletic
or church social club. Dahrendorf's own discussion does in fact
pay most attention to industrial enterprises and the state.
Conflict in Industry. During the last hundred years, there
have been increasing numbers of 'Joint stock" companies, in which
ownership by shareholders is divorced from management control. As
we have s6len, modern Marxist sociologists generally argue that the
change is not very important, since the firms still represent and
are run in the interests of the owners. Other writers, such as
Burnham,18' believe that it signifies a farreaching change in
social structure and the roots of power.
Dahrendorf argues that his approach demonstrates both what
has
really changed and what has not. He suggests that because
nineteenthcentury managers and owners were generally the same
people, Marx mistakenly ascribed to property differences a conflict
that actually centered on authority, although it was intensified by
the "superimposition" of industrial authority, wealth, and
political influence.182 Today, he continues, industrial conflict
will be less intense both because ownership and control are
separate and because of industry's "institutional isolation" 183
(which means that one's position in industry has less to do with
tb.e rest of one's life than before). At the same time, the split
in authority and the conflicts of interest it generates remain.
Arguments that the divide between workers and management has
blurred are quite mistaken.
The study most directly relevant to Dahrendorf's argument is
probably The Affluent Worker. 184 This intensive survey of affluent
British industrial workers was largely aimed at determining whether
there had been a breakdown of the old social divisions between the
"working" and the "middle" classes. The results cast doubt on the
degree to which industry is, as Dahrendorf suggests,
"institutionally isolated." The workers' family-centered social
life, for example, remained quite separate from that of whitecollar
families. However, although union organization was stronger in
these plants than in many much less wealthy areas, these workers
were only rarely committed to the "union movement" as a
national "Working-class" force; instead they were
extremely involved in union affairs at the level of the
workplace. Only 8 percent attended union branch meetings
often enough to vote regularly in branch elections, but
83 percent voted regularly for their shop stewards. In
other words, they were closely involved in union
organization at the level where they were given orders
directly and where they grouped together, to face and
face down the managers who gave them; but not in
questions of union and economic policy or "class"
politics at the national level.
Conflict and the State. Dahrendorf argues that in the
state, as in industry, the crucial lines of conflict are
between those who give and those who receive orders. The
state is the most powerful association,, in society, and
the "ruling class" is, in a sense, the elite group that
holds the positions at the top of the state hierarchy.
But the ruling class is not composed solely of this
group. The bureaucracy, too, belongs to a chain of
command, and this command of authority makes it part of
the ruling class, even though it does not define the
concerns and objectives of a bureaucratic state.
Dahrendorf's argument helps explain the enormous
stability of such bureaucratic states as Byzantium and
the Egypt of the Pharaohs. The larger the authority-bearing class,
the larger the group that will Marshall
against
any threat to it from an organized conflict group of
subordinates. His argument also implies that the state
and bureaucracy are together a separate institution, not
simply a reflection of other social groupings, and that
other powerful social groups will necessarily oppose the
state's authority and try to restrict its control o.ver
them. In Dahrendorf's own recent analyses of British
politics,187he argues that, "Clearly there is today a
conflict between government and industry,"188 in which
the trade unions are the most visible protagonists but
which also involves the giant companies.
A number of modern commentators echo Dahrendorf when
they write, that growing government activity will have
consequences for the range and intensity of political
conflict. For example, Christopher DeMuth, a faculty
member at Harvard's Kennedy School of Government who formerly worked for Conrail, discussed the behavior of the
huge Greyhound bus company in the Wall Street Journal.
He described how Greyhound lobbies vigorously against the
federal subsidies given to passenger trains, with which
the buses must compete; while it attempts with equal
vigor to stop the Interstate Commerce Commission from
allowing new bus companies to start competing with
Greyhound and tries to prevent any general deregulation of bus transport. DeMuth argues, "There is no
reason to expect Greyhound or any other company to
compete in the economic marketplace while abstaining from
the political marketplace... "(when government involvement) becomes ... sufficiently large, it alters
fundamentally the nature of competition in the private
part (of the economy)-increasing the relative importance
of political as opposed to economic competition.189
Summary
Dahrendorf provides an illuminating account of the
close and permanent relationship between power, or authority, and
conflict. He presents a concrete theory of conflict
group formation, which provides a good
starting point for explaining people's objectives and
identifying potential confrontations. He describes a
number of the important factors that either create
mobilized conflict groups and intense conflicts or,
correspondingly, tend to reduce social conflict.
However, his theory of conflict group mobilization fails
to explain what makes people aware of themselves as a
group with common interests and common grievances.
Neither does he specify precisely which institutions in
a society will be the ones in which conflict will
actually occur. This makes it difficult to "test"
Dahrendorf's basic proposition about conflict formation.
Nevertheless his general perspective has proven
illuminating enough to suggest that the polarization
which Dahrendorf identifies between those with and without authority
is at least one important source of social conflict.
LEWIS COSER
Like many other conflict theorists, Lewis Coser (b. 1913)
combines a distinguished academic career with a strong
interest and involvement in social policy and politics. He
was born in Berlin, and after the Second World War he taught
at the University of Chicago and Brandeis University while obtaining a Ph.D. from Columbia. Most of his academic career
was spent at Brandeis, where he moved from being a lecturer to
a full professor; but since 1968 he has been Distinguished
Professor of Sociology at the State University of New York at
Stony Brook. In 1975 he was president of the American
Sociological Association.
Coser's writings have always displayed his concern with
politics and the links between ideas and the nature of
society. He is coauthor of a history of the American
Communist Party dedicated to Milolovan Djilas,'90 and he has
both edited Dissent and contributed frequently to such other
serious nonspecialist journals as Partisan Review and
Commentary. Some of his more recent work is about "greedy
institutions" that demand total involvement from their
members. Coser says that in the face of recent "indiscriminate" condemnations of the "differentiated, segmented and
'alienated' character of modern life,"191 he felt bound to
point out the threat to human freedom inherent in total
involvement. "I wish it to be clearly understood," he writes,
"that I consider it essential that an open society be
preserved above all."192
Of the modern theorists discussed in this chapter, Coser
is the closest to Simmel. He is the most concerned with the
"web of conflict," or the cross-cutting allegiances that can
both bind a society together and generate struggles and
confrontations. Indeed, Coser's major book on conflict theory, The Functions of Social Conflict, 193 is an exposition and
development of Simmel's own rather fragmented insights. Coser
emphasizes that conflict, although very important, is only one
side of social life and no more "fundamental" than consensus.
194
Coser's contributions to conflict , theory are also
distinctive in two other respects. First, he discusses social
conflict as a result of factors other than opposing "group
interests." Second, he is concerned with the consequences of
conflict. As we have seen, Dahrendorf's major concern is with
the origins of conflict, which, he argues, then creates social
change. Coser has less to say about the institutional roots
of conflict, but he distinguishes among its different possible
consequences, which include greater social stability as well
as change. His discussion of the conditions under which
conflict is likely to be divisive or cohesive adds
considerably to Dahrendorf's analysis of conflict's
characteristics.
The Origins of Social Conflict
In his discussion of the origins of conflict, Coser
pays far more attention than do most conflict theorists
to the role played by people's emotions. 195 He agrees with Simmel that there are
aggressive or hostile
"impulses" in people, and he emphasizes that in close and
intimate relationships, both love and hatred are present.
Close proximity, he points out, means that there are also
ample opportunities for resentment to develop; hence, conflict
and disagreement are integral parts of people's relationships,
not necessarily signs of instability and breakup.
At the same time, Coser argues, the forms that hostility
and conflict take and their relative frequency in different
situations have to be explained in terms of social
institutions and social roles. A good example of what Coser
means is the differences among countries in how much children
fight with their parents. This is the sort of "close"
relationship in which some resentments are inevitable.
However there are also intercultural variations in the
father's authority; whether the children have financial
independence; whether the steps by which children assume welldefined adult roles are clearly laid down; and whether other
family members provide practical and emotional support outside
the nuclear family. Coser's own work addresses the way such
"structural" factors interact with people's underlying
emotions.
Coser defines two basic types of conflict, "realistic"
and "nonrealistic." 196 In realistic conflict, people or
groups are simply using conflict as the most effective way of
getting what they want; if they could get what they wanted
without a fight, they would give up the conflict immediately.
Coser's inclination is to see most kinds of social conflict as
essentially "realistic," or rational--explicable in
institutional terms. Thus, in the Los Angeles Watts riot of
August 1965, Coser saw something other than the "insensate
rage of destruction" described by the official McCone report.
The path of the riot, he pointed out, led straight to City
Hall; the riot was a way of getting the authorities'
attention. Similarly, the Luddite machine smashers of the
early nineteenth century were highly selective in their
targets; they were, he argues, engaging in "collective
bargaining by riot" at a time when more organized union
channels were outlawed. 197
Conflicts of this type are essentially the same as those
that other conflict theorists analyze in terms of "self-interest."
However, Coser argues, there are also
"nonrealistic" conflicts, in which the conflict is the end in
itself, whether or not this is admitted. Nonrealistic
conflict serves as a way of releasing tension or affirming
one's identity, and it embodies hostilities that actually
derive from other sources. Blaming everything on a scapegoat
is a classic example. Often, of course, a conflict contains
both realistic and nonrealistic elements.
The Consequences and Functions of Conflict
In his analysis of the results of social conflict, Coser
argues that conflict often leads to change. 198 It can
stimulate innovation, 199 for example, or, especially in war,
increase centralization.200 For the most part, however, Coser
concentrates on conflict's role in maintaining group cohesion.
This is, of course, the subject that most concerns
functionalists. However, Coser is a "functionalist" only in
the sense of sharing this interest. He does not imply that it
is necessarily desirable for a group to survive and remain
cohesive or that conflict occurs because it may be functional
for the group; and he sees cohesion as only one of conflict's
possible results.
In this context, Coser distinguishes between conflicts
that are external and conflicts that are internal to a group.
Both types, he argues, can define a group, and establish its
identity; and also maintain its stability and increase its
cohesion.
Extemal Conflict. In his most unqualified statement about
the rela tionship between conflict and cohesion, Coser argues
that external conflic is essential in establishing a group's
identity. In this he is following not onli Simmel but also
Marx, who felt that only conflict makes a class self-aware
Coser states, with Simmel, that "conflict sets boundaries
between groups within a social system by strengthening group
consciousness and awareness of separateness, thus establishing
the identity of groups within the system."201 However, he also
distinguishes expressly between hostile senti ments and actual
conflict; 202 and we would suggest that it is hostile senti
ments, rather than actual conflict, that are essential to
group formation. A religious group or utopian agricultural
settlement of the type common in American history may coexist
with other parts of society without overt conflict.
Coser also argues that external conflict can often
strengthen a groul It makes group members conscious of their
identity by introducing strong "negative reference group" to
which they contrast themselves; also increases their
participation.203 Nonetheless, the process is not inevitable.
If internal cohesion before the outbreak of conflict is very
low, the conflict may simply hasten disintegration. Coser
contrasts,,,(be disruptive effects of the Second World
War on French society with its unifying effects ).204 in
Britain, and a less dramatic but similar example is
America during the Vietnam and Second World Wars.
However, since Coser offers no way of telling in advance
which development is likely, his arguments here are not
very useful in explaining actual conflicts.
Intemal Conflict . Coser follows Durkheim, Mead, and even
Marx in arguing that a group's opposition to and conflict with
"deviants" makes apparent to group members what they ought to
do.205 In this sense, internal conflict is central to defining
a group's identity, which is embodied in norms that define
"correct" behavior.
Coser also argues that internal conflict can increase a
groiip's survival, cohesion, and stability. He again follows
Simmel when he argues that internal conflict is a crucial
safety valve under "conditions of stress ... preventing group
dissolution through the withdrawal of hostile participants."
206 If opposition to one's associates were not possible,
people would, in Simmel's words, "feel pushed to take
desperate steps ... opposition gives us inner satisfaction,
distraction, relief." 207 Indeed this is one of the few
occasions when Coser falls into the trap of implying that
because som ething is functional it will automatically happen,
and that because safety valves are important all societies
will provide them.208
Coser's argument here seems to confuse a group's survival
or stability with its cohesion. He implies that whatever
promotes survival also promotes cohesion. However, if it uses
brute force and terror to support imbalances of power, a
society can survive and even remain stable in the face of a
great deal of internal hostility: witness "Papa Doc's " Haiti
or Stalin's Russia. Although conflict may help maintain a
society by providing a safety valve, this pattern is hardly a
necessary or universal one. On the other hand, Coser is
probably correct in emphasizing the close links between
internal conflict and group cohesion. In rigid social
structures with no channels for expressing hostility, when
conflict occurs it is disruptive and violent.
The controversial "Sonnenfeldt doctrine" illustrates this
theory of conflict at work in America's foreign policy. In
1976, considerable furor resulted from leaks of a statement
made by Helmut Sonnenfeldt, then a senior State Department
official, in which he argued that the breakdown of Soviet
control in Eastern Europe was undesirable because chaos would
result when stored-up hostilities erupted. Although official
spokesmen attempted to tone down the implications of this
principle, they never clearly denied it; nor did the
succeeding adminstration explicitly disown it.
Finally, Coser argues that internal conflict can be
important because "Stability within a loosely structured
society ... can be viewed as partly a product of the
continuous incidence of various conflicts crisscrossing
it."209 When people belong to many different groups, each of
which pursues its own interests and is consequently involved
in its own conflicts, they are less likely to devote all their
ener ies to a single conflict that could break the society
apart. Thus, Coser suggests, "one reason for the
relative:absence of class struggle' in this country is the
fact that the American worker, far from restricting his
allegiance to class-conflict groupings and associations, is a
member of a number of associations and groupings ... (and) the
lines of conflict between all these groups do not
converge."210
In this context, Coser admires Max Gluckman's work
on the importance of cross-cutting conflicts in African
tribes. Gluckman notes that. "all over the world there are
societies which have no governmental - institutions ... Yet
these societies have well-established and well-known c odes of
morals and law.... We know that some of them have existed over
long periods with some kind of internal law and order, and
have successfully defended themselves against attacks by
others."211
These "feuding" societies rely on private vengeance
instead of government. The process does not tear them apart,
Gluckman argues, because they "are so organized into a series
of groups and relationships that people who are friends on one
basis are enemies on another. (For example) a man needs help
in herding his cattle: therefore he must be friends with
neighbors with whom he may well quarrel over other matters....
And through his wife he strikes up alliances with relatives-in-law
which are inimical to a wholehearted one-sided
attachment to his own brothers and fellow-members of his
clan.... A man's blood-kin are not always his neighbours: the
ties of kinship and locality conflict.... These allegiances
... create conflicts which inhibit the spread of dispute and
fighting.212
Divisive Social Conflict
In discussing conflict's role in defining a group and
maintaining its cohesion, Coser makes the proviso that
internal conflict has this role only if it is not about
basic values and principles. This, in turn, depends on
the rigidity of a society and, once again, the degree to
which its members are interdependent.
Coser argues, first, that an internal conflict is
more likely to involve basic principles (and so be
socially divisive) in a rigid society that allows little
"expression of antagonistic claims. 11213We have already
noted Coser's belief that some conflict is functional
because it serves as a safety valve, without which social
hostility would eventually erupt violently. Here, he
suggests that when conflict emerges after having been
suppressed for a long time, it will also split the group
around basic issues and Values.
Second, Coser returns to the theme of "cross-cutting"
allegiances and argues that "Interdependence checks basic
cleavages."214 Interdependence therefore makes divisive
internal conflict much less likely and reduces the
likelihood that external conflict will find a noncohesive
group. As we have already discussed, the basic reason is
that "interdependence" means that people with common
interests in one respect are opposed in another, so that
an overriding and polarizing issue is less likely.
However, there is also a related psychological process
involved. Conflicts are much more intense, Coser argues,
when they involve exclusive groups; this further
increases the likelihood that divisive conflicts will
occur in societies that have non-overlapping groups.
Such conflicts are intense because it is in close
relationships that love and hate coexist. "The
coexistence of union and opposition in such relations
makes for the peculiar sharpness of the conflict," he
argues.215The fewer the groups people belong to, the more
likely they are to become intensely involved in the ones
they have. An intense involvement affects the nature of
conflicts both within the group itself and between it and
others. Although Coser, a sociologist, makes this point
formally, the leaders of sects and the founders of
revolutionary parties have always been aware that the
more a person's relationships all lie within the group,
the more his loyalties and energies will be at its
disposal. The mass suicides of Jonestown, when several
hundred members of a religious sect drank poison at their
leader's behest, almost certainly could not have occurred
if the group had been living within a larger and long-settled
community, rather than isolated in the jungles of
Guyana.216
Coser's arguments about interdependence follow reasoning
similar to James Madison's in The Federalist Papers. One of
Madison's reasons for urging voters to adopt the American
Constitution was that the resulting union of states would be
one of considerable size and diversity. This would reduce the
likelihood of one "faction" trampling over its fellow citizens
and of oppression of a minority by the majority. He argued:
The smaller the society, the fewer probably will be the
distinct parties and interests composing it; the fewer the
distinct parties and interests, the more frequently will
a majority be found of the same party; and the smaller the
number of individuals composing a majority ... the more
easily will they concert and execute their plans of
oppression. Extend the sphere, and you take in a greater
variety of parties and interests; you make it less
probable that a majority of the whole will have a common
motive to invade th@ rights of other citizens.217
Finally, although Coser stresses the importance for
divisive conflict of a society's rigidity and the degree of
its members' interdependence, his arguments about the role of
ideas in conflict are also relevant here. Coser suggests that
conflicts will be more intense when those involved feel that
they are fighting on behalf of the group and not just for
themselves when, in consequence, they feel that what they are
doing is morally legitimate. They also then feel strengthened
by power derived from the collectivity with which they have
identified and which they embody.218 This is why Coser argues
that intellectuals increase the bitterness and the radicalism
of conflicts between labor and management; in Mannheim's
words,
they transform "conflicts of interest into conflicts
ideas"219 and provide
just this moral impetus.
Summary
The major importance of Coser's conflict theory lies
in its demonstration that conflict can often be neither
socially divisive nor a source of change. This is
especially clear in his comparison of societies with or
without many independent and overlapping groups, and of
the differing natures and consequences of conflict within
them. However, Coser's account is not fully
satisfactory. Complex and interdependent societies that
are not particularly "rigid" may experience conflicts
that are highly divisive; and rigid, hierarchical
societies may survive for centuries without explosive
conflict. The recent history of political strife in
Central America and the breakdown of democracy in Chile
and Argentina illustrate our first point, the thousand-year history of
the Byzantine Empire our second. In
addition, the abstract quality that Coser's work shares
with Simmel's and the way it ignores the nature and bases
of group resources mean that on its own, it explains very
little about concrete social situations. Finally,
Coser's emphasis on the functions of conflict, although
a useful corrective, is onesided. At the very beginning
of his work, he described social conflict as a struggle
in which opponents attempt "to neutralize, injure or
eliminate their rivals."220 Thereafter, one looks in vain
for him to pay much attention to such behavior or to
recognize the stability of many situations based on force
and oppression.
RANDALL COLLINS
Randall Collins (b. 1941), the last of the conflict
theorists we shalt discuss, is also the youngest, and his
work exemplifies the growing interest among American
sociologists in a conflict perspective. We noted earlier
the renewed interest in Marxism and the discovery of the
Frankfurt School by younger, left-wing sociologists, who
see their sociology as inextricably entwined with their
desire for social change. Many of their contemporaries,
whose aim in their sociology is scientific explanation
and not political action, also now believe that a
conflict perspective is the most fruitful way to approach
sociological analysis. 221
Collins' work is the most far-reaching theoretical
synthesis based on this approach to date. Unlike Marx's
or Dahrendorf's, Collins' work is not a conflict theory
in the sense of describing when social conflict will
actually occur. Indeed, in many of the situations he
describes there is no overt conflict at all. Rather, he
sets out to show that one can explain a wide range of
social phenomena on the basis of a general assumption of
conflicting interests and an analysis of the resources
and actions available to people in particular social
situations.
Collins took a B.A. at Harvard, an M.A. at Stanford,
and a Ph.D. at the University of California, Berkeley.
While still a student working as a research assistant at
the Institute of International Studies at Berkeley, he
began publishing.222 He taught at the University of
California, San Diego, and at the University of Virginia
in Charlottesville; he is currently at the University of
California, Riverside.
Collins' work incorporates all the major elements of
conflict theory: an emphasis on people's interests, a
view of society as made up of competing groups whose
relative resources give their members more or less power over
each other, and an interest in ideas as a weapon of social
confl'ct,and domination. As he acknowledges, Collins' major
debts are to Marx, "the great originator of modern conflict
theory,"223 and above all to Weber, 224 whose analytic
framework, comparative historical approach, and non-Utopian
outlook he adopts.
In addition, of all the conflict theorists we have
discussed, Collins draws most on Durkheim ' who is commonly
seen as the father of functionalism. Collins has little good
to say about functionalism, but he believes that Durkheim
explains a great deal about the ways in which emotional bonds
and loyalties are created among people. The most original
aspect of Collins' work is the way he incorporates a theory of
how social integration is achieved into a conflict approach.
Unlike most conflict theorists, Collins also draws on the work
of such theorists as Mead, Schutz, and Goffman, who are
enerally associated with such "micro-sociological"
perspectives as 9 symbolic interactionism and phenomenology.
This is the result of his concern with exactly how individual
loyalties and emotional bonds develop.
The Nature of Conflict Sociology
Collins' basic assumptions are that there are certain
"goods," namely wealth, power, and prestige, that people will
pursue in all societies,225 and that everyone dislikes being
ordered around and will always do his or her best to avoid
it.226 That is, he assumes that people have certain basic interests wherever they live and that they will act accordingly.
From this it follows that there will always be social
conflict. This is true even though not everybody is equally
greedy, simply because power, in particular, is inherently
unequal: if I have a great deal of power, other people must
necessarily have less, and they must obey me. "Since power
and prestige are inherently scarce commodities, and wealth is
often contingent upon them, the ambition of even a small
proportion of persons for more than equal shares of these
goods sets up an implicit counter-struggle on the part of
others to avoid subjection and disesteem," Collins concludes.227 Such social conflict can take many forms, but at
the very heart of it, he believes, lies direct coercion.
Force is something people can always turn to, and some people
always fare better at it than others. "Above all else, there
is conflict because violent coercion is always a potential
resource,
and it is a zero-sum sort.11228
As part of his analysis of the determinants of social
structure and change, Collins provides a typology of the
resources people bring to this struggle. First are material
and technical resources, which include not only property,
tools, and such skills as literacy but also-very importantlyweapons. Second, he stresses the role that strength and
physical attractiveness play in personal relationships.
Third, he mentions the sheer numbers and types of people with
whom individuals have contact and with whom, therefore, they
have the possibility of negotiating for material goods and
status.229 Fourth, Collins emphasizes the resources people
possess in their "store of cultural devices for invoking
emotional solidarity. 11230 By this he means their ability to
create and maintain a shared view of how things are and should
be, which also sustains the favored position of those
promoting that view.
We can see what Collins is talking about if we compare
the position of a rural Indian "untouchable" with that of,
say, a nineteenth-century Hindu maharajah. The untouchable
has almost no skills he could market in a city, for he is
barred by the caste system from all but certain "unclean"jobs,
such as curing hides or cleaning latrines. For him to work
with caste Hindus would pollute them. His social contacts are
extremely limited, so he knows very little about whether he
has any alternatives; he is dirty and undernourished; and his
religion, dominated by the priestly caste of the Brahmins,
teaches him that his lot is the inevitable result of his
conduct in previous lives and must be accepted as such. By
contrast, the maharajah has enormous resources and breadth of
opportunities and social contacts. Being better fed, he is
almost certainly bigger and more attractive physically.
Moreover, although he has little or no control over the
conduct of the Hindu religion and the influence of its
priests, his cosmopolitan contacts may well have weakened the
priests'influence over him. Obviously the maharajah is in a
position of enormous power compared to the untouchable, and he
is in a position to achieve a much wider range of objectives.
If you compare two very dissimilar people in America, such as
a mother on welfare and a company president, you will find
that there are again big differences-but also that they are
less extreme. This is because the two societies distribute
their resources very differently.
There are, Collins suggests, three main areas of life in
which people obtain more or fewer resources and are more or
less dominant or subjected. Together these create the
patterns of "social stratification." They are first, people's
occupations, where they can be grouped into different classes;
second, the communities where people live, with their
different status groups, including age, sex, ethnic, and
educational groupings; and third, the political arena, where
different parties seek political power.231 In every case, what
is crucial for social behavior is the degree to which people
are in a position to control others and so obtain wealth,
status, and overt deference. Collins does not regard one
aspect of stratification as primary: people's overall position
is simply the sum of their resources and positions in a number
of different areas. In other words, Collins prefers Weber's
pluralist model to Marx's unicausal one, arguing that
"different orders of stratification do not line up neatly.
The major part of Collins' work sets out propositions about
the concrete ways in which the distribution and use of
resources result in different sorts of social behavior and
institutions. He also discusses in detail what creates a
shared culture and a "legitimate" social order.
Social institutions and the Balance of Resources
Some of Collins' most interesting arguments about the
relationships
among conflicting interests, the distribution of resources, and the
nature of
social institutions concern modern education, organizational theory,
and the
state. In each case, we shall find that his method is drawn from
Weber:
for the most part, he discusses general principles in terms of
concrete
historical settings and the balance of power within them, much as we
described Weber doing in his Religion of China.233
Stratification by Education . Collins has always been
interested in how
educational qualifications have been used as a resource in the
struggle for
power, wealth, and prestige; and he has used a conflict perspective to
carry
out empirical research on the role of education in people's careers.
He
treats education as one important basis of status-group differences, a
sort
of "pseudo-ethnicity" that socializes people into a particular form of
culture.234 The educational elite, which shares a given culture, will
use it as
a criterion for employment in elite positions, he argues, and it will
also try to
instill respect for its culture in the society as a whole.235
Modern industrial societies have longer periods of formal
education,
and require far higher educational credentials for jobs than
preindustrial
ones. The usual explanation given is that more jobs require more
skills than
in the past; but Collins argues that this is, at best, only a part of
the truth.
The evidence shows that education "is not associated with employee
productivity on the individual level, and job skills are leart,,.i!ed
mainly
through opportunities to practice them",236 and not at school at all.
Dif-
ferences among industrial countries are very marked, but not obviously
related to technological progress. For example, in the postwar
period,
American education has, on average, gone on far longer than that of
the
Japanese or West Germans.237 Moreover, Collins points out, engineers
are
the one professional group with real technical skills that industry
needs. If
the "technological" explanation of modern education were correct, one
would
expect the engineering schools to have the highest prestige on campus,
and
engineering training to dominate education. Nothing of the sort has
occurred. Indeed, America, at the undergraduate level, has "the most
massively nonvocational system of education in the modern world.11238
The best way to understand the enormous growth of the
"credential system"
is to see education as a way of setting up entry require ments for
jobs (and so
limiting competition); and creating exclusive occupational cultures
which are
defined as prerequisites for doing a 'ob. Thus, if you do not speak
the same
language (or jargon) as established workers, having learned it during
"professional" training, then this provides evidence against your
competence. This
process can, quite quickly, create the sort of 44 credential
inflation" which we have
experienced in recent years. The highly educated set upjob
requirements that
favor them; people recognize the importance of education as a route to
success
and acquire ever more of it; employers raise entry requirements yet
further to
screen out the flood of applicants-and so on.
Weber showed that the Chinese literati used education in just
this way, and
monopolized senior advisory positions on the basis of their
"qualification" of a
literary Confucian education.239 Collins identifies similar examples
at work today.
For example, the most "educated" executive group is found not in,the
most rapidly
developing high-technology companies, but in the " traditionalistic"
financial and
utilities firms.240
Collins' analysis is similar to the Marxist analysis of
Bowles and Gintis 241 in
its emphasis on the role of education in creating and preserving
social position.
However, Collins does not see this as a particularly or specifically
capitalist
process. Rather, education is always a potentially important
resource; though
societies will vary in the degree of suc'(:,Oss which educated groups
achieve.
The analysis also has echoes of Ivan Illich's famous diatribe against
formal
education, Deschooling Society. Illich argues that schools teach
little. Their main
purpose is to assign social rank. "School reserves instruction to
those whose
every step in learning fits previously approved measures of social
control," he
charges.242
Organizational Theoty Collins' general approach to
organizations is to view them
as "arenas for struggle" in which superiors try to control their
subordinates. He
argues that, in consequence, one can best understand the structure of
an
organization by looking at the sanctions available to those in charge.
The three main types of sanction which can be used are
c...oercion; material
rewards given in return for appropriate activities and behavior; and
normative
control, which invokes people's loyalty to ideals. Each has
distinctive
consequences. People dislike and resist coercion, and subordinates in
the
organizations that rely on coercion resort to "dull compliance and
passive
resistance."243 Forced labor camps are extremely unproductive, and
slaves
consistently appear stupid and irresponsible to their masters.
Material rewards,
Collins suggests, are less alienating, but they produce organizations
where there
are continual fights over pay and piecerates, where informal groups
control the
work pace and prevent people from working "too hard," and where people
tend
to do th ngs only if and insofar as they are paid.244
Normative control is the most desirable for superiors,
because if subordinates
share superiors' goals, they will be far more motivated to cooperate,
obey, and
work hard.245 However, it too has costs attached. One of the most
effective ways
to create normative control is to spread authority, because the more
people give
orders in an organization's name, the more they identify with it.
Superiors can,
for example, "co-opt members into responsible positions; a related
method is to
offer them a chance to be promoted. 246 Both these approaches,
however, tend
to reduce the superiors' own centralized power.
An alternative tactic is to recruit members who have a
feeling of solidarity or
friendship. Nepotism, the recruitment of family members, is a
traditional way of
creating organizational loyalty,247 and recruiting people with similar
backgrounds
also makes friendships and thus loyalty to the organization more
likely.248Collins
also argues that the more an organization emphasizes rituals, is
isolated from the
world, and feels itself to be in danger from outside,249 the more it
will reinforce
identification and loyalty. A good example of how isolation increases
people's
loyalty to an organization is the landslide majority that white South
Africans gave
to the. Nationalist Party, the architects of apartheid, in 1978, a
time of strong
public American pressure and criticism.
However, Collins points out, people who like each other tend
to form strong
informal groups, which may disagree and conflict with their leaders.
Organizations that rely on normative control can expect continual
conflicts about
policy, and factional fights about who is best able to implement the
group's goals.
"Astute organizational politicians, then, always attempt to mix
normative incentives
with material rewards and perhaps subtle coercive threats, since the
latter can be
administered much mor6 routinely and kept under more stable control.
11250 To
transform the revolutionary Bolshevik party into the bureaucratic
Communist
party (which has controlled Russia without challenge for over fifty
years),
Stalin changed from the 4 t normative control" of shared ideals, with
its intense
ideological disputes, to control by the material rewards available to
party
members and the underlying fear of the secret police.
The State . In using a conflict perspective to analyze the
state,,, Collins
again emphasizes that coercion is at the core of social life and
social '
conflict. The state, he suggests, is a special sort of organization,
because
it is "the way in which violence is organized"251 and "Is, above all,
the army
and the police."252 To analyze political systems, Collins suggests,
one
must ask how violence is organized and which interest groups control
and
influence the state's policy.
Collins argues that the resources enabling people to win
control of the
state include systems of belief, property, networks of communication,
and
military technology.253 Indeed, of all the theorists discussed in this
chapter
Collins is (after Schumpeter) the most sensitive to the effects of
military
technology and military organization on political and social life. A
society
in which a large proportion of the men fight with their own cheap
weapons
will be far more democratic, he argues, than one in which a sma group
with
expensive individual equipment, like the medieval knights, monopolizes
warfare. Similarly, whether an army is supplied and paid from central
stores,
like the Roman army, or requisitions locally and takes conquered lands
as
its reward, is crucial in determining whether there is centralized
state or a
loose-knit feudal order.
Unlike Collins' analysis of military force, his discussion of
economic
resources as a basis for political power is sketchy. Collins sees
coercion
and military power as primary, and in discussing the economic
underpinnings of political systems, he essentially restates Lenski's
rather
Marxian typology, in which techniques of production are the major
causal
factor.254 Collins' discussion tends to neglect the effect of
different forms
of property and economic organization on political structure. He also
ignores the different laws and systems of law in which these forms are
rooted, although law is as essential a function of the state as is the
use of
force. Curiously enough, Weber, the greatest influence on
Collins'work gave
considerable emphasis to economic organization and its legal basis.
For
example, he pointed to the historical and political consequences of
the
ability of European townsmen to own their own labor and property and
to
govern their towns; and he showed the consequences of the way the
Chinese were legally tied to the village-based sibs or clans, while
their towns
had no rights to self-government.
Culture, Ideology, and Legitimation
In discussing Collins' analysis of social structure, we have
noted the
importance he attaches to the creation of legitimacy. This emphasis
on the
role of ideas is, of course, common to conflict theory; but Collins'
distinctive
contribution is to provide detailed discussions of both the actual
process by
which common beliefs are generated and of the general relationships
between people's outlook and the way they experience conflict
situations.
Collins is continually at pains to remind his readers that
his subject is
ultimately individual people. Writers in the tradition of "social
phenomenology," such as Mead and Goffman, have, he believes, a great deal
to tell us about social interaction, because they focus on individual
experiences and recognize that these are not something given, fixed, and
immutable.255 Instead, our experiences are in large part a result of our
own
perceptions and values, so that "men live in self-constructed
subjective
worlds."256 These worlds determine whether we see a photograph, for
example, as
harmless, as a way of stealing our souls, or as a transgression of
God's commandment
against graven images. They also affect whether we experience our
societies as good
and satisfactory or oppressive. Moreover, Collins argues, the sorts
of perceptions we
have are themselves subject to regular and identifiable influences.
We can identify the
sorts of individual experiences that make people view a social order
as "real" and
legitimate, and so alter the course of social conflict.
The experiences Collins identifies are: first, and most
important,257 the giving and
taking of orders; and second, the sorts of communications people have
with others.258
He argues that because of the nature of human psychology, those who
gave orders will
tend to identify with the ideals of the organization in which they
hold power and in whose
name they justify their orders; and because of their experiences, they
will be self-assured
and generally formal in manner. By contrast, the more people receive
orders, the more
alienated from organizational ideals they are likely to be, the more
fatalistic, subservient,
concerned with extrinsic rewards, and the more distrustful of others.
Those in the middle
of the authority hierarchy, who give and receive commands, tend to
combine
subservience with organizational identification, but they are little
concerned with an
organization's longterm objectives.
Collins' basic premise is that people wish to maximize the
degree to which they
give rather than receive orders. Hence, he argues, a mid-'level
official or bureaucrat
"attempts to transform order-taking situations into orders that he
passes on to
others."259 This explains the proverbial inflexibility of mid-level
bureaucrats compared
to their superiors, who see rules as a means to more distant ends. On
the other hand,
Collins' general emphasis on the relationship between one's outlook
and whether one
gives or receives orders implies a world in which everyone works in
large organizations.
In fact, if you think about people's occupations, you will find that
many people-such as
farmers, insurance salesmen, and many housewives-are not much involved
with "orders"
on a day-to-day basis at all.
The types of communication that people have with others are
extremely important,
Collins argues, because they may reinforce, or (and this is crucial
for social control)
offset the effects of people's experiences of command. They, above
all, are what
determine the degree to which people accept as "real" the ideas and
norms around
which their society is organized. They determine whether people see
the social order
as legitimate. He points out that human beings, like all animals,
have automatic emotional reactions to certain gestures, sounds, and signals; and he
suggests
that social ties are fundamentally based on shared reactions, '@l,hich differ from those
of animals because they involve symbols (such as flags or salutes)
rather than
genetically programmed sounds and gestures.260 The strength of these
reactions
depends on two aspects of people's communications with each other: the
amount of
time people spend together, or their 4 4 mutual surveillance," and the
diversity of their
contacts. These, Collins argues, correspond to what Durkheim called
"social
density" in his analyses of how "society" creates loyalty and
identification among
its members. 261
Social Density Collins argues that the greater the degree of
mutual survel
'llance-the more people are in the physical presence of others-the
more they
accept the culture of the group and expect precise conformity in
others.262
Conversely, the less they are around others, the more their attitudes
are explicitly
individualistic and self-centered.263 This is in large part because
being physically
together makes it more likely that "automatic, mutually reinforcing
nonverbal
sequences" will develop. These increase "emotional arousal"; and "The
stronger
the emotional arousal, the more real and unquestioned the meanings of
the
symbols people think about during that experience."264
The diversity or cosmopolitanism of people's contacts
similarly affects the
way they think. Collins'argues that the more different sorts of
comrnunication
people are involved in, the more likely they are to start thinking in
abstract terms
and in terms of long-range consequences. On the other hand, the less
varied
people's contacts, the more likely they are to think only about
particular people
and particular things: and to see the world outside their own familiar
circle as alien
and threatening. Thus, limited contact will tend to create shared,
local views of
reality, and a feeling of identification with familiar local people
vis-A-vis the outside
world.265
Ritual Collins believes that mutual surveillance and limited
communications
counteract the effects of being on the receiving end of orders. They
create
emotional ties that bind a group together and make the way it is
organized
unquestionably "real." Thus, they strengthen the position of the
dominant
members of a group. In addition, Collins argues, rituals or
stereotyped
sequences of gestures and sounds",266 can make people's emotional
arousal
more intense and so commit them more strongly to certain views of
reality.
Emotional arousal is also affected, he suggests, by the sheer number
of people
involved;267 and if we look at the ceremonies to which groups and
societies
attach great importance, we can see that they generally combine highly
stereotyped rituals with large gatherings of people. Durkheim pointed
this out in
his discussion of aboriginal religious ceremonies and their role in
"integrating"
society;268 Hitler's Nuremberg rallies, graduation ceremonies, and the
use of
particular songs and symbols at civil rights or antiwar demonstrations
are also
good examples.
Collins' arguments here complement Schumpeter's and Habermas'
discussions
of the declining legitimacy of the modern market economy.269 The
"rational
attitudes" of such a society mean that we tend to find ritual
increasingly distasteful:
compare a president holding barbeques at the White House with a
pharaoh or a
medieval king holding court. Using Weber's terminology, Collins
observes,
"Traditional authority ... uses highly stereotyped gestures and verbal
formulas, with
the result that the symbols of authority are highly reified and
emotionally
compelling.... (Under) rational-legal authority ... little attention
is paid to the
surrounding postures, with the result that symbols are regarded as
human
enactments with little emotional compulsion."270
The empirical evidence gives Collins' arguments considerable
but far from total
support. Politics, about which Collins says surprisingly little,
provide useful
confirmation, because party activists often occupy a position in the
party that is
quite different from their day-to-day occupations in breadth of
communication and
power-and as Collins' theory would indicate, this affects their
outlook substantially.
Parents who are manual workers and who are active in politics and
unionism tend
to have upwardly mobile children who become managers and
professionals.271
The federal Office of Equal Opportunity was founded in the 1960s on
just these
assumptions; for one of its objectives was to create, by involving
poor people in
"community action," a new set of attitudes towards the "authorities"
and a new
ability to deal with them.
Again, Melvin Kohn's surveys of attitudes and values showed
that middle-class
parents ... are more likely to emphasize children's self-direction,
and working-class
parents to emphasize their conformity to external authority."272 Kohn
argued that
this can be explained for the most part by differences in whether the
fathers'
occupations allow self-direction or require them to receive and obey
directions
from others.273
On the other hand, evidence on working-class union mil ',6ncy
and the
development of revolutionary ideologies suggests that Collins'
analysis is too
simple. His account of how "ritual communities" are created would
lead one to
expect that militancy, revolutionary doctrines, and a commitment to
"working-class
solidarity" are most likely to develop among isolated, homogeneous
groups of
workers with their own tight-knit communities. For a number of years,
sociologists
have argued that this is indeed the case, citing the study by Kerr and
Siegel,
which argued that "isolated masses" of workers are more militant and
strike-prone.274 More recently, however, this view has been challenged
by a new
research group interested in strikes and political violence, and, in
particular, by the
work of Shorter and Tilly.275 Their study of France during the period
1830-1968
shows that militancy was a characteristic of the metropolis, not the
isolated enclave-and of the relatively cosmopolitan skilled worker at that. It
is similarly true,
we might add, that tight-knit, fanatical, revolutionary political
parties of the right
and left have been born in heterogeneous cities, not in small,
cohesive
communities.
This suggests a serious imbalance in Collins' treatment of
ideas. In his
emphasis on the way ideas can be used to support the ruling order, he
neglects
the origins of ideas and beliefs that oppose it. Indeed, his
arguments sometimes
leave one wondering why all ruling groups have not been able to assure
themselves of permanent legitimacy by manipulating ritual!
Tribal
societies seem
almost never to generate ideas of "revolution" (changing the entire
order) as
opposed to "rebellion" against individual leaders,276 but in Europe
and America,
such ideas have been a part of social life for many centuries, and
they are held
with quite as much passion and conviction of their "reality" as the
beliefs of a tribal
"ritual community." A full account of the origins of beliefs and world
views needs
to explain this process, too; and indeed, "conflict sociology" in
general, needs to
take more account of the origin and force of ideas as tools of
opposition as well
as domination.
Summary
Collins provides an excellent exposition of the basic
assumptions of
analytic" conflict theory. His work is also important because it
provides a
large number of concrete propositions that relate institutional
structure to
the resources available to different groups. Further, it incorporates
the
insights of "micro-sociological" perspectives, especially in its
account of
how social experiences affect people's outlooks and so affect the
nature
of social behavior, conflict, and change.
Not surprisingly, Collins' major weaknesses are the
weaknesses of
conflict theory as a whole. The most important are, we would suggest,
an overemphasis on the "zero-sum" aspects of social interaction; too
mechanistic a view of ideas as an offshoot of the existing social
structure;
and an inadequate account of the nature of the state. It is to these
general weaknesses of conflict theory, as well as its major strengths,
that
we now turn briefly in conclusion.
CONCLUSION
Conflict theory's major strength lies in the way it relates
social and organi-
zational structure to group interests and the balance of
resources. This
analytical framework is often very productive. Moreover,
whereas functionalism never really identifies a mechanism of change,
conflict t.heory
does, when it points to shifts in resource distribution and
power. Conflict
theory insists fruitfully that values and ideas must be
related to their social
environment and not treated as autonomous. Finally, it
avoids "explaining"
things simply in terms of their results. By tracing social
behavior back to
individuals' interests and the purposive way they pursue
them, it shows
how changes may actually occur.
However, conflict theory also has important weaknesses.
Its insistence
that power is people's main, objective and the primary feature of
social
relationships is too limited. One can hardly account for the behavior
of the
Pilgrim Fathers in terms of "self-interest" or the search for power,
as conflict
theory commonly uses those terms. Moreover, the way in which they
define
and discuss power leads many conflict theorists to imply that the
whole of
social life is essentially "zero-sum": that is, that one man's gain is
by
definition made up from others' equal JOSS.277 In fact, this is not
necessarily the
case.
Suppose that we take a hypothetical self-interested ruler who
wishes to get as
much money out of his subjects as possible. He can either seize
whatever he can
find by brute force; or he can set up a well-defined tax system in
which people
know in advance exactly how much they will oweand that nothing more
will be
demanded. In the latter case, it is still ultimately the ruler's
ability to coerce which
ensures that his subjects pay up. However, they will also find it far
more
worthwhile to work hard, save, invest, and create economic growth than
they will
if anything they produce is liable to arbitrary confiscation. For
that reason, the
ruler may well, ultimately, do better for himself by choosing the less
arbitrary
course. Certainly, his subjects will fare much better if he does.278
Of course, no ruler ever has a completely free hand to choose
one alternative
or the other. However, societies can and do vary systematically in
how far they
provide the sort of environment which gives people security,
encourages
economic growth, or creates some degree of the "positive-sum" in their
affairs.
Contemporary conflict theory279 tends to ignore such important
differences in
how state power is exercised, and in how far it provides people with a
secure and
predictable framework for their actions. Consequently, it also tends
to produce
an inadequate theory of the state, and to treat laws-the product of
the state-oversimpl istically, as though they were merely a reflection
of group interest rather
than systems with their own dynamic and influence.280
The same oversimplification is apparent in conflict theory's
treatment of values
and ideas. It is important to analyze the degree to which ideas are
rooted in a
social order and the ways laws and "ideologies" reflect people's
interests; but it
is also important to be aware-as functionalism is-that they have a
degree of
autonomy. Conflict theorists tend to treat ideas as though they were
simply a
reflection of the interests of the powerful; but narrow self-interest
is often not a full
explanation of events. Self-interest would have suggested the total
extermination
of the American Indians. That this did not happen was largely the
result of
notions of justice and morality which, however compromised, were
universal in
their application.
Similarly, conflict theory tends to emphasize how ideas
maintain stability,281
when in fact the ideas in a given society often criticize and
undermine the current
order. Christianity, for example, produced figures like St. Francis
and Luther,
whose teachings created massive social upheavals; and the Kremlin
suppresses
the Russian dissidents brutally because it fears their ideas so much.
Finally, although conflict theory specifies a mechanism of
change, it does not
provide an entirely satisfactory account of it. This is because
conflict theory is far
better at explaining how a group maintains power than it is at showing
how it
acquired it in the first place. Collins, for example, argues that
educational
qualifications are an important source of privilege without saying
very much about
why they are now a more important resource than they were in the past.
Yet
groups do not acquire resources and power at random, and we had
occasion to
suggest earlier in the chapter that the origins of a group's power can
often be
explained by the services they provided. Educational qualifications
may be used
to protect and strengthen an elite group's position; but they are a
more effective
weapon now than in the past because education is also necessary to
provide the
technical skills on which modern wealth depends. The way social life
involves the
exchange of such goods and services, as well as values and coercive
power, is
emphasized by exchange theory.
Material 3
Constructive Confrontation Theoretical Framework
By Guy Burgess, Ph.D. and Heidi Burgess, Ph.D. -- Co-Directors, Conflict Research
Consortium Copyright 1996 © by Guy Burgess and Heidi Burgess
Introduction
Mediation and Intractable Conflict
The greatly expanded use of mediation and other alternative dispute resolution
techniques has been one of the great success stories of recent years. It has been
immensely effective (and widely accepted) in an number of arenas—such as family and
labor-management conflicts. Unfortunately, mediation has been much less effective in
resolving intractable conflicts involving deep-rooted value differences (abortion,
homosexual rights, or deep ecology), very high-stakes distributional problems (the
setting of the Federal budget, health care reform, or social program reform), or
"pecking-order" conflicts (sibling rivalry or gang warfare). These kinds of conflicts
commonly resist even the best- designed conflict resolution processes. Although
individual dispute episodes (over what abortion procedures are allowed when, or
whether federal funds can be used to provide or counsel about abortions) may be
temporarily decided, the underlying conflict over abortion continues. Similarly, budgets
are set and money is spent, but the conflict between the rich and the poor, the young and
the old, conservatives and liberals, Republicans and Democrats, remains. Siblings, too,
resolve their immediate disputes over toys, privileges, and parental attention. But the
underlying tension persists, only to erupt again at a later time.
When mediation is applied to intractable conflicts in an attempt to resolve them, it often
"fails." Therefore, mediation becomes a recipe for disappointment and disillusionment.
People conclude that mediation is not all that it is cracked up to be—they see it as a time
sink, a money sink, a sell-out, or a cooptive trick that does not yield the promised winwin resolution. This failure to work as advertised, we believe, underlies much of the
skepticism and resistance that mediation and the conflict resolution field as a whole are
encountering.
Constructive Confrontation
To better deal with intractable conflicts, we have been developing an approach which
we call constructive confrontation. This approach is based on the assumption that
intense, long-term confrontations over important and difficult issues are inevitable.
What is not inevitable, however, is the destructiveness commonly associated with these
conflicts. (Consider, for example, the deaths in Bosnia and the Middle East, the
economic losses of the U.S. Government shutdowns, or the racial tension resulting from
misunderstood and poorly-applied affirmative-action programs.) To limit such
destructiveness, we suggest that the parties and intermediaries involved in intractable
conflicts should move away from the unrealistic goal of resolution, and focus, instead,
on how these conflicts can be conducted more constructively.
In order to find out how this might be done, the Consortium's Intractable Conflict
Project began by sponsoring a series of conferences and seminars in which we asked
more than 125 conflict scholars, intermediaries, and advocates two questions: 1) From
your perspective, how can people deal with intractable conflicts more constructively? 2)
What do you mean by "constructive?" Topics addressed included interpersonal
conflicts; public policy conflicts over race, ethnicity, abortion, homosexual rights, and
environmental protection; and international conflicts in the Middle East, Bosnia,
Rwanda, and elsewhere. Although the answers differed somewhat from one person (or
one context) to another, there was a remarkable degree of similarity between the
responses we received. By combining the answers to these questions with theoretical
ideas from others working in the field, we have been able to develop a theory of
intractable conflict, as well as a series of practical steps that parties and intermediaries
can take to make their participation in these conflicts more productive.
The Medical Model
The constructive confrontation approach follows a medical model in which destructive
conflict processes are likened to diseases—pathological processes that adversely affect
people, organizations, and societies as a whole. Sometimes these "diseases" can be
completely cured; at other times, we can only limit the most troublesome symptoms. As
in medicine, some pathological processes seem to resist all mitigation efforts so far
developed, though further research might yield effective remedies. We must be clear
that conflict processes are not, of themselves, pathological. Constructive conflict plays
an essential role in social evolution and human betterment. Our goal is simply to control
the destructive conflict dynamics which can overwhelm these benefits.
Also like medicine, constructive confrontation takes an incremental approach. Rather
than looking at conflict as a single entity and asking how can it be completely
"resolved," constructive confrontation looks at each aspect of the conflict process and
asks whether or not that part is effective and constructive, and if not, how it might be
improved.
While constructive confrontation differs considerably from current mediation practice, it
builds upon the field's considerable skills by applying these skills in different settings.
As such, we see constructive confrontation as a way of extending the field's
contributions to situations where the resolution or problem-solving model has not been
as effective as we would all like.
Constructive Confrontation Steps
As in medicine, the first step in constructive confrontation is diagnosis. This process
begins with preparation of a conflict map. Such a map should include the identification
of active and potential adversary groups and intermediaries, along with their interests
and positions. It should also place the immediate dispute into the context of the longterm, underlying conflict.
The next part of the diagnosis involves differentiating the core aspects of the conflict
from what we call conflict overlays. Overlays are problems in the conflict process that
get "laid over" the core, making the core issues harder to see and address. Examples
(which are shown in Figure 1 and discussed in detail below) include escalation and
polarization, misunderstandings, fact-finding problems, procedural problems, and
framing problems. After diagnosing overlay problems, problems in the core
confrontation process must also be identified. These include the inadequate
identification of power options, the inadequate assessment of the costs and benefits of
various options, overlooking ripe moments, and reliance on bitter end power struggles.
(These too are shown in Figure 1 and discussed in detail below.)
Identification, Selection, and Implementation of Treatment Options
After destructive conflict dynamics are diagnosed, the next step in constructive
confrontation is the identification and implementation of realistic, incremental steps for
reducing as many of the overlay problems as possible. In some cases these remedies
involve easy "don't do its"—pitfalls which are easy to avoid once you see them. (For
example, gratuitous insults which promote unnecessary hostility.) Other steps require
either the acquisition of new skills (e.g., active listening), outside assistance from
conflict professionals (facilitation, transformative mediation, or structured dialogues,
perhaps), or the making of hard choices for which there are no clear answers (deciding
whether to pursue a short-term victory even though it is likely to provoke a damaging,
long-term backlash, for example.) While some remedies can be implemented
unilaterally, others require the joint efforts of adversaries, intermediaries, or both. Once
specific options are selected and implemented, results should be monitored and
adjustments made when needed as the conflict continues and changes over time.
The sections that follow offer a number of examples of conflict pathologies and possible
treatments. This is, by no means, an exhaustive list of the things that could go wrong. It
does, however, illustrate what one looks for when using the constructive confrontation
approach. Once one starts to look at confrontations in this way, a great many other
opportunities for transforming conflicts in constructive ways appear.
Overlay Identification and Treatment
Overlay problems tend to fall into one of five categories: 1) framing problems, 2)
misunder standings, 3) procedural problems, 4) fact-finding problems, and 5) escalation
and polarization.
Framing Problems
The framing of an intractable conflict by the parties is a complex and often muddled
process in which vague but intense feelings of frustration are transformed into
passionate crusades for particular positions. If done well, the conflict is framed in ways
which accurately reflect the core issues and lead to clear and sensible strategic choices.
Often however, errors are made and muddled framing processes leave people pursuing
positions that do not really advance their interests. People can, for example, simply get
so angry that they fall victim to the primal scream syndrome in which they simply vent
their frustrations without seriously considering what it would really take to achieve their
goals. Here ADR techniques which help people think more clearly about interests can
be very helpful, even though a win-win solution may be impossible.
In other cases, the parties may pursue "into the sea" framing with the objective of
making an opponent figuratively or literally disappear from the face of the earth. This
unrealistic and immoral goal leaves adversaries with no choice but all-out confrontation.
The solution requires the parties to frame the conflict in ways which would at least
provide their opponent with a livable outcome.
There is also the danger of unnecessary zero-sum framing in which the parties
incorrectly assume that a conflict (or sub-conflict) has an irreducible win-lose character
when it does not. This problem, which can be addressed through standard mediation
techniques, is capable of making a tractable conflict seem quite intractable.
The worldview problem arises when disputants assume that their opponents see the
world the same way that they do. Because disputants then see their opponents as taking
an utterly unconscionable position, the only possible explanation is that they are
fundamentally evil. In reality opponents' perceptions of the world are usually
dramatically different and this different worldview gives them a reasonable, though
certainly different, reason for reaching the conclusions that they do. In these situations a
joint clarification of the parties' assumptions, beliefs, concerns, and fears--along with
their interests and positions--can be very helpful in clarifying why people feel the way
they do.
Misunderstandings
The reality of intractable confrontation is bad enough. When contending parties
miscommunicate, the situation can get much worse, especially when one considers the
common, worst-case bias that people tend to have toward their opponents. In addition to
a lack of basic communication skills, the parties can fall victim to a number of
pathologies that contribute to misunderstandings. These misunderstandings not only
lead to misinformed decisions, they also contribute to the even more destructive
processes of escalation and polarization (which are discussed below).
Few people communicate effectively when they are angry. They say things they don't
mean, or things they would regret if they had been thinking carefully before they spoke.
At the same time, they tend to misinterpret—usually for the worse—things their
opponents say. Put together, these tendencies cause people to overreact and assume their
opponents are far more sinister than they really are.
These problems are exacerbated by the recreational complaint syndrome—the common
practice of gossiping with one's friends and allies about how one's opponents are the
source of all evil, while one's own group, of course, is the source of all virtue. The
ability of many radio talk shows to exploit this phenomenon underlies both their success
and the highly inaccurate images of the world that they often give to their listeners.
Another problem, the extremist bias, results from the fact that moderate, reasonable
people are dull. More interesting, and what the media tends to focus upon, are extreme
people and events. This often leads readers and listeners to conclude that these extreme
events fairly characterize the opposition and that extreme responses are therefore
justified.
People also commonly suffer from the "I already know" syndrome. This problem
discourages them from re-evaluating an issue, changing their mind, or even listening to
opponents once they have decided what they believe. As a result they are likely to cling
to unrealistic stereotypes and not be alert for changes in their opponents' positions or
behavior. Finally, communication crises arise when people are overtaken by events and
simply run out of time to talk and listen.
These are all problems which can be limited by the systematic application of many
communication-improvement techniques which are now in wide use by mediators and
other conflict resolution professionals. These include active-listening skills, facilitated
dialogues and meetings, rumor control teams, enhanced public writing and speaking
skills, and the use of telecommunications technologies to facilitate rapid, accurate, and
widespread communication. Slowing down the pace of events can also be beneficial
since it provides time for the parties to collect all relevant information and plan a
constructive response, rather than reacting to rumors or other misinformation without
the time to think things through.
Procedural Problems
Before the parties can constructively address the core substantive issues they must limit
the distracting effects of procedural disputes. While people do not always expect to be
victorious, they do expect to be treated fairly. Violation of generally-accepted principles
of fairness can easily divert attention from the core, substantive issues and become the
central focus of a controversy. This may also broaden the scope of the conflict
considerably as others, who feel their procedural rights threatened, are drawn into the
fray.
Some procedural problems stem from the missing stakeholder syndrome which arises
through a failure to identify all stakeholders or to provide a mechanism though which
their concerns can be heard and their legitimate interests protected. It is important to
include both active stakeholders and potentially-affected groups who are likely to
become active as the conflict progresses. Other procedural problems involve issues of
power and the charge that ADR is just another way to co-opt the powerless and sugarcoat injustice. Similarly, lengthy and elaborate grievance-review processes, which may
be intended to be fair, can also be seen as delaying tactics designed to avoid dealing
with injustice under the guise of careful and fair deliberation. (Process complaints can,
of course, also arise as part of a process diversion designed to draw attention away from
the core issue by those with weak substantive arguments.)
Regardless of their source, process complaints must be limited before the core conflict
can be constructively addressed. This can be done by implementing a series of common
sense treatment measures—have clear rules of procedure, make sure the rules are well
publicized, and then follow them. Don't skip steps, don't hide things, don't do things that
even appear improper. It doesn't look good, even if the reason seems good at the time.
Treat everyone fairly, and be aware of the impact of power differentials. The process
must be chosen carefully to be fair to all groups and be predictable, at least in terms of
process, if not outcome.
Fact-Finding Problems
In today's technically complex society it is impossible for people to effectively advance
their interests without a good understanding of applicable facts. Without this
understanding, long-fought- for "solutions" are likely to have unintended and often
adverse consequences.
Typical fact-finding problems include the bidding war syndrome where people
contending for leadership positions try to "one-up" each other by claiming to be more
concerned about public safety or some other issue than their opponent. Eventually, this
process makes it impossible for leaders to decide that a particular safety measure is not
worth the expense. Irreducible uncertainties also provide a golden opportunity for those
wishing to avoid addressing the tough, but important, issues. They can simply force the
process into analysis-paralysis with calls for yet another study.
Equally problematic is the use of junk science to support self-serving positions.
Decision makers and the public are usually not scientists and are, therefore, unable to
distinguish good science from bad. When one side gets an "expert" to support its view,
the opposition is likely to do the same, leaving decision makers and the public with no
way to tell who to believe. Often, the potential benefits of formal fact-finding are lost
altogether.
Potential solutions to such fact-finding problems include blue-ribbon oversight
committees, fact- finding teams, data mediation, technical primers to help lay people
understand complex issues, and no-strings-attached funding which citizen groups can
use to hire independent experts to verify (or refute) claims made by other parties to a
conflict.
Escalation and Polarization
Perhaps the most destructive conflict dynamic is escalation. Its explosive cycle of
provocation and counter-provocation eventually results in the replacement of
substantive debate with increasingly hateful and sometimes violent confrontations
directed more at hurting opponents than advancing interests. This process plays a
crucial role in the long slide toward war and the crossing of taboo lines which normally
restrain our most inhuman impulses. It can also lead people to take ever more extreme
and unjustifiable positions. Escalation alone is sufficiently powerful to transform what
should be a tractable dispute into one that is virtually impossible to resolve.
Despite the dangers of escalation, advocates frequently escalate a conflict intention
ally—thinking that they can harness to power of escalation to mobilize support for their
side. While this riding the tiger strategy may appear to work, it is also likely to build
support for the opposition. The common result is the intensification of the conflict, not
victory. Escalation can also contribute to polarization—a process which greatly expands
the scope of the conflict by forcing people to choose sides in an attempt to build the
strongest coalitions possible.
Although traditional settlement-oriented mediation is usually inappropriate to use in
intractable conflicts, many of the standard de-escalation strategies used by mediators
and facilitators can be adapted and applied in these cases. These include restructuring
communication so that it ceases to be hostile and reframing escalated discourse in a
nonescalated way. Other useful approaches include GRIT (the Graduated and
Reciprocated Initiatives in Tension-reduction);(1) dialogue processes which create
"islands of unescalated discourse" within the context of heated confrontations;(2)
independent observers who observe and report to the larger community any violations
of peacekeeping arrangements; cooling-off periods; and disarming behaviors such as
Anwar al-Sadat's trip to Jerusalem. There are also "mistakes were made" amnesties in
which past errors are acknowledged without assigning blame or punishing the offender.
Identification and Treatment of Core Conflict Problems
The core issues involved in intractable conflicts usually have at least one of two key
characteristics. First, they tend to contain an irreducible win-lose element. Sometimes
these are deep-rooted moral differences that cannot be negotiated; sometimes they are
domination contests where only one party can be on top. In either circumstance, winwin solutions are structurally impossible. Second, the stakes are usually very high. If the
stakes are low, parties will settle. It isn't worth it to continue to fight. But if the stakes
are one's identity; one's security; one's way of life; one's life chances or the life chances
of one's children--then the stakes are high enough that parties will not accept defeat
until they have tried all of the powers available to them in an effort to prevail. Power,
therefore, plays a central role in intractable conflicts.
In addition to identifying the conflict overlays, diagnosis also needs to include an
analysis of the power strategies being used to confront the core conflict.
Several pathologies occur frequently in the core conflict confrontation process, making
the confrontation more costly and less effective than it might otherwise be. These
include the inadequate identification of options, the inadequate assessment of the costs
and benefits of options, overlooking ripe moments, and fighting until the bitter end.
Each of these is discussed below.
Inadequate Identification of Strategic Options
One of the most common causes of destructive confrontation strategies is the inadequate
identification of options. Often this is due to the parties' limited skills. Most often,
parties only consider options they are familiar with and good at. Lawyers tend to
litigate, mediators tend to mediate, warriors tend to wage war. While this rule is violated
on occasion, people usually stick with the approaches that they are most comfortable
with and experienced in using. Unfortunately, at least in the U.S., there seem to be many
more people who are skilled in force-based approaches to conflict than there are with
skills in transformative, constructive alternatives. This results in an excessive reliance
on force-based strategies involving interpersonal threat, hard-ball politics, no-holdsbarred litigation, and, all too often, violence. Not until many more people are exposed to
and trained in unconventional and more constructive power options--such as effective
persuasion, nonviolent action, coalition-building, and constructive political activism-will force-based strategies recede from their current dominance in intractable conflict
confrontations.
While force-based strategies have problems, over reliance on softer strategies also can
cause problems. For instance, mediators and negotiators often overlook what we call the
"EATNA" effect. EATNA stands for "Estimated Alternatives To A Negotiated
Agreement" (a take-off on Fisher and Ury's "BATNA"). The term "EATNA limit"
refers to the problem that parties will not negotiate a settlement to a conflict that is
highly important--as intractable conflicts usually are--if they believe that they have an
alternative that will yield a better outcome than the negotiated settlement.
The EATNA limit is a fundamental principle that can only be changed through
conversion--by getting parties to come to believe that they were wrong--at least in part-and that their opponents were right. This occurs fairly often during effective mediation,
as the parties recognize the legitimate concerns or claims of the other party. However, if
the parties at the table are just representatives of a larger constituency group, as is often
the case in public policy conflicts, the conversion process is very difficult to "scale up."
While the immediate negotiators may be willing to accept a settlement that is weaker
than their EATNA, because their view of their opponent has been converted, the
constituents still have their original preconceptions. As a result, these constituents are
likely to want to reject the settlement and pursue their "better" alternatives. Thus the
EATNA effect and the scale up problem lead to what we call the mirage effect-settlements often vanish just as they appear to be within reach, as constituency groups
won't ratify or uphold the agreement the negotiators reached. There are no easy
solutions to this problem either. The challenge, however, is to develop better ways of
extending conversion processes to large constituency groups.
Most often overlooked in choosing strategic options is the power of persuasion.
Although seldom considered a power strategy, it is a very effective one if used well--the
strongest, according to Kenneth Boulding, in Three Faces of Power. Boulding's three
faces (or forms of power) are threat (we call it force) which takes the form "you do
something I want, or I will do something you don't want;(3) exchange (we call it
negotiation) which takes the form "you do something I want and I'll do something you
want;(4) and love, which takes the form "you do something for me because you love
me.(5) If "love" seems to strong a word, Boulding suggests, one can substitute
"respect." Love does seem too strong a word in the context of intractable conflicts, but
certainly, parties can, indeed, come to respect each other through effective persuasion
techniques.
To be successful, persuasion cannot be based upon narrow, selfish attempts by one
group to secure an unfair advantage at another group's expense. Instead, it must be
based upon clearly articulated principles or values that serve the interests of all citizens.
While different political systems and religions have widely differing views about
morality, fairness, and justice, there are often important areas of common ground that
can serve as a basis for persuasive appeals. For example, Martin Luther King's strategy
was based upon an appeal for America to "live out the true meaning of its creed." Since
all citizens (black and white) have a stake in the principles of equality and justice,
King's appeal was able to deliver white support in ways that a simple black revolt
against the evils of white society could not.
King's strategy was actually a combination of force, exchange, and persuasion. He
moved from one to the other quickly, and often used two or three at once in an effort to
win improved rights for blacks. Several of our respondents suggested similar
approaches. Paul Wehr urges the development of what he calls a power strategy mix--a
combination of persuasion, negotiation, and force, with just enough of the latter to force
the issue, and enough of the first two to keep the opponents negotiating in good faith.(6)
Using a power mix also avoids the one-size-fits all problem in which the only
confrontation strategies that parties use are those designed to deal with their most
threatening and incorrigible opponents. While there is a place for forceful strategies for
dealing with hardliners, it is usually a serious mistake to treat all opponents as if they
were incorrigible extremists. More reasonable opponents could easily become so
enraged by such a strategy that their opposition does, in fact, become extreme and the
conflict escalates out of control. We suggest dividing opponents into at least four
groups: persuadables, reluctant persuadables, and incorrigibles. Advocacy groups then
need to develop different strategies for dealing with each of these groups. Persuadables
should receive a large dose of persuasion. For reluctant persuadables the strategy should
be modified to include a modest amount of forcing power to prevent them from
avoiding the issue. For incorrigibles the level of force must be increased substantially
while still retaining the persuasive efforts needed to legitimate that force and minimize
the backlash effect.
Misjudgment of the Costs and Benefits of Alternative Strategies
A second common confrontation error is over-estimating the likely effectiveness of a
chosen strategy and/or underestimating its cost. This happens often among advocates of
force. While force- based strategies can be very effective over the short term, they entail
substantial risks which are often overlooked. One is the risk of inaccurately assessing
the balance of power. Sometimes, for instance, disputants fall prey to the picnic illusion-the assumption that they are in such a powerful position that the impending
confrontation will be a "picnic." If this assumption is inaccurate (and it often is) the
conflict is likely to be much more costly than anticipated and may even result in defeat.
Often the result is protracted and costly power struggles which might have been avoided
had both sides more accurately assessed the power of the other and chosen a course of
action that better reflected the real power balance.
Another cost of force, even when it is quickly successful, is the threat of backlash.
People hate to be forced to do things against their will, especially, when important
issues are involved. While they may, at least initially, submit to such force, they will
resent it and are likely to try very hard to build their power base with the goal of
launching a counter-attack at the earliest possible opportunity. Therefore, force is likely
to encourage backlash, escalation, and continued confrontation. The 1995- 96
Republican response to years of liberal social and environmental policies is one current
example of such a backlash.
Similar errors can be made with negotiation-based or persuasion based strategies.
People favoring negotiation, for example, often overlook the EATNA limit and the
conversion scale-up problem, and assume that negotiation can be used as an alternative
to force. While the costs of such an approach are not as high as those of force-based
strategies, the benefits may also not reach expectations.
Among traditional low-power groups, there is also the danger of the illusion of
powerlessness. Pessimists (and especially disempowered pessimists) often assume the
costs of confrontation are much higher and the potential benefits are much lower than
they actually are. This usually results in withdrawal or conflict avoidance. While this is
appropriate in some cases, it can also result in the perpetuation of serious injustice. A
solution to this problem is some sort of advocacy advisor who can apply their
knowledge of conflict processes to the task of empowering the disempowered.
Overlooking Ripe Moments and Fighting to the Bitter End
Expectations are key in another way as well. If parties can agree on the likely outcome
of available power contests, then they have an incentive to negotiate an agreement that
closely parallels the expected outcome, but reduces transaction costs and allows finetuning of the outcome. When this occurs we say that the dispute (not the underlying
conflict) is ripe for resolution. In a few cases the dispute may not be ripe until
destructive power contests have been pursued to the bitter end. In this case negotiations
only clarify the terms of surrender.
However, the relative power balance is often clear far before the end, or can be made so
by using one of many "short-cut" power-balance tests. For example, mock trials give the
parties a prediction of the probable outcome of litigation which they can then use as a
basis for negotiation. Similarly, opinion polls or straw votes can be used to forecast the
outcome of an electoral power contest. A strong display of police or military power can
demonstrate the potency of a force-based BATNA, which can then remain unused as
nonviolent negotiation and persuasion efforts are pursued. If these short cut processes
are used to measure the power balance, they can save the costs of a bitter end power
contest, yet yield the same result. This is better, even for the loser, as they will have
more resources left to regroup and come back again later for a more effective challenge
of the status quo. This is a hard choice to make, however, when the stakes are high.
Often parties fall prey to the down in flames syndrome in which people who are losing a
dispute episode stubbornly pursue the power contest to the bitter end, hoping that
somehow they might eventually prevail. Along with the overuse of force and
miscalculating the power balance, the down in flames syndrome is one of the most
destructive conflict pathologies.
It is also important not to pursue resolution for sake of resolution. Resolution of the
immediate dispute should not be the ultimate goal. While such a resolution may be a
laudable intermediate goal, the ultimate goal should still be the building of constructive
relationships and the making of fair and wise decisions over both the short and long
term.
Constructive Confrontation
The Constructive Confrontation Cycle
Traditional problem-solving mediation is linear. It goes through a predetermined series
of steps, in a prescribed order. Although different mediators list different steps, most
correspond rather closely to those set out by Moore.(7) First, the parties are contacted,
background information is collected, a strategy is developed, and the parties' agreement
to participate is obtained. Then the mediation session commences--opening statements
are made, issues are defined, interests are elicited, options for settlement are developed
and assessed, and agreement is reached. A settlement document is drawn up and signed,
the mediation is over, and the parties go home.
Constructive confrontation is very different. There is no established beginning point,
and usually no end. Rather, parties begin when and where they want to, usually when
they have decided (or recognized) that the conflict they are involved in is more
destructive than constructive, and they need to develop a more effective way of
managing it. To do this, they do begin with a diagnosis process (this is necessary), but
then they can choose any of many different approach to treating the pathologies they
discover. They can try to tackle all the problems at once, or they can take them one at a
time. They can deal with misunderstandings first, and then procedural difficulties, or
they can go the other way around. They can start down one path, and reverse to another
path as the need develops. Constructive confrontation is very flexible and adaptable to
the problem at hand.
Constructive confrontation is also cyclical. After treatments are undertaken, results are
monitored, and strategies adjusted if the treatments did not work. It is expected that the
underlying conflict will continue, so in order to keep that conflict productive, parties
must continue to monitor the changes in core issues and development of overlay
problems over time. Things that were "fixed" a few months or years ago may spring up
again and need further attention. So constructive confrontation is an ongoing process,
not a one-time event plopped in the middle (or at the end) of a protracted conflict.
Constructive Confrontation
One goal of constructive confrontation is to help disputants develop a clear
understanding of the dimensions of the problem—both from their own perspective and
from their opponents.' A second goal of constructive confrontation is to enable people to
separate the core conflict from what we call the conflict overlay—the unnecessary and
confounding aspects of the conflict that divert attention from the core issues.
The final goal of constructive confrontation is the development of a conflict strategy
(which may or may not be a resolution strategy) that will best serve the party's interests.
Unlike principled negotiation, which calls for the parties to consider all sides' interests
simultaneously and to develop win-win solutions, constructive confrontation recognizes
that this is often not a realistic request. Therefore, we ask people not to consider the
interests and needs of the other parties, but to design their confrontation strategy
primarily with their own interests and needs in mind. This works best if it can be
accompanied by a recognition of commonly accepted principles of fairness and justice.
Since it is almost always in the interest of both parties to act in a way which limits
destructive outcomes (e.g., violence, escalating hatred, and distrust) this strategy seldom
makes a conflict worse, and it usually encourages constructive results—improved
relationships, better understanding of the issues from all points of view, and a better
understanding of the confrontation and resolution options and the likely results of both.
Thus, these strategies usually work to the advantages of both sides. They are unlikely,
however, to go far enough to resolve the conflict.
Constructive, Though Still Conflictual, Relationships
The ultimate goal of constructive confrontation is the constructive transformation of
conflictual relationships. Such a transformation allows individuals, organizations, and
the society as a whole to realize the benefits of conflict. It helps people, organizations,
and societies to learn, grow, and change. It helps people identify problems and
challenges and develop ways to meet those challenges and become stronger in the
process. Without successful transformation, destructive conflicts just drag people down.
They consume resources, time, energy, and morale—all to no avail. They destroy
relationships, undermine productivity, and often lead to violations of basic human
rights. It is, therefore, essential that better techniques be developed to transform
destructive intractable conflicts into constructive, though often still conflictual,
relationships. This is just a beginning. Much more effort is needed to test these ideas
and to develop better approaches for transforming destructive conflicts in constructive
ways.
Material 4
Paul Wehr
Self-limiting Conflict:The Gandhian Style
I have mentioned two basic categories of conflict regulation scholarship. In
the preceding section we concerned ourselves with the first, specialists
engaged in third-party intervention research and experimentationintermediaries, negotiation, conciliation, communication control and
modification. The second involves the study of ways of waging conflict that
tend both to keep it within bounds and to limit its intensity or at least the
possibility of violence-nonviolent social movements, nonviolent resistance on
the part of individuals and groups, nonviolent alternative national defense
strategies. Let us look at conflict processes that are self-regulating in nature,
i.e., that have built-in devices to keep the conflict within acceptable bounds
and to inhibit violent extremism and unbridled escalation.
Socialization is an important determinant of the style and effectiveness of
conflict regulation in any society. If Tolley (1973) is correct in placing the
formative period for attitudinal and behavioral patterns concerning peace/war
issues and conflict regulation styles at ages 4-12, then learning creative
approaches to conflict regulation through family, school, mass media, and
other primary learning environments is essential. There are a few sources
dealing with this problem (Nesbitt, 1973; Abrams and Schmidt, 1972).
There are societies and groups within societies that socialize their members in
effective conflict regulation. Bourdieu (1962) describes Berber Kabyles of
North Africa as a society held together by a process of balanced and strictly
controlled conflicto
56 Self-Limiting Confllict in which members are socialized to avoid violence. Elise
Boulding (1974) observes that there are certain types of family environments and childrearing practices that tend to produce persons with nonviolent proclivities and creative
response patterns to conflict. Ultimately the socialization process, political socialization
in particular, is probably the most important conflict regulation device. We should soon
learn some interesting things about the impact of a decade of involvement in an
unpopular war on the attitudinal and behavioral patterns of America's youth.
Etzioni's self-encapsulation concept is very useful here. It is a process in which certain
conflicts are increasingly limited by their own nature and by the nature of the host
system, so that the "range of expression of the conflict is curbed." Certain modes of
conflict and weapons are excluded by mutual, sometimes tacit, consent, and the conflict
becomes ritualized-the game is played by the rules, so to speak. Dahrendorf's analysis of
the institutionalization of labor/management conflict over the past half century is an
excellent illustration of selfencapsulation. In the United States, encapsulation occurred
as a consequence of third-party intervention, when the federal government decided to
protect labor's right to strike. It was also self-propelled encapsulation to some degree, as
both labor and management decided that it was rational to place strict limits on their
conflict-in other words, to maximize gains and minimize losses all around.
The Gandhian Model of Self-Limiting Conflict
Self-encapsulation can also occur through both ideological restraints and
tactical approach. If at least one of the parties to the conflict develops an
ideology that by its very nature limits the weaponry and violence used in the
conflict, it is in an important sense self-encapsulating. Mahatma Gandhi's
satyagraha (a word taken from Sanskrit, meaning "insistence on truth")
movement in the first half of this century used such techniques, and other
movements for social justice and selfdetermination have developed variations
on this theme of nonviolent direct action. The Martin Luther King, Jr., and
Cesar Chavez movements are the best examples in recent North American
history, though there are interesting Latin American nonviolent movements as
well.
The satyagraha movement was a series of direct action campaigns aimed at
calling into question the validity and moral legitimacy of the dominancedependence relationships existing in India and South Africa. The movement
challenged white rule in South Africa, British rule in the Asian subcontinent,
and the caste structure of Indian society itself. As do all ma'or social
movements, Gandhi's had a discrete ideology, well defined roles, a strong
leadership, and clear goals. It challenged a set of social structures with highly
inequitable distribution of privilege, access to authority, and life chances. The
movement's primary objective was to refine a technique for making latent
conflict manifest and waging it without violent means or consequences.
Specific political goals included the winning of political independence of the
subcontinent from Britain, the liberation of oppressed minorities such as the
outcastes, and the creation of a new and appropriate model for Indian
economic, political, and social development. There were philosophical
objectives as well. The search for social and spiritual truth gave form and
direction to Gandhi's strategic and tactical approaches. The concepts of ethnic,
religious, and social community were also central to the movement's ideology.
The Gandhian Conflict Style
We will focus on the Gandhian techniques of waging conflict that served to
limit the hostility-to inhibit the "runaway processes" within conflict dynamics,
as Coleman (1957) terms them. How was Gandhi able to successfully propel
yet control a movement that had such great potential for massive violence and
reactive repression? In large measure the answer lies in both the strategy and
tactics of confrontation that Gandhi developed and in the movement's
ideological bases.
Step-wise Strategy. Perhaps the most obvious self-limiting aspect of Gandhi's
confrontation style was its step-wise rather than spiralling escalation. Each
satyagraha campaign involved a series of steps, each more challenging to the
opponent than the preceding one. It would begin with negotiation and
arbitration. This would be an extremely elaborate and lengthy stage including
(1) on-site accumulation and analysis of facts, with opponent participation; (2)
identification of interests in common with opponents; (3) formulation of a
limited action goal acceptable to all parties and mutual discussion of same;
and (4) a search for compromise without ceding on essentials (Naess, 1958).
Gandhi did much to avoid further escalation; at this preliminary stage he
established the close, cooperative, personal relationships with opponents that
would later limit the antagonism normally generated by the escalation process.
If the conflict was not resolved at that initial level, the satyagrahis would
prepare for direct action, then move on to agitation, ultimatum, economic
boycott and strikes, noncooperation, civil disobedience, usurpation of
governmental functions, and the creation of parallel government (Bondurant,
1965:40). If in any of these stages, the conflict was resolved, those subsequent
would be unnecessary. After each new step, however, there was a built-in
period of withdrawal, reflection, and analysis of one's own and one's
opponents' positions and tactics. Missing was the escalation of normal
conflict, in which a hostile response evokes an even more hostile response in
an unbroken upward spiral. This strategy maximized the role of rational and
conciliatory action on the part of all concerned, while providing for an
intensification of the confrontation as needed to achieve the goals of the
movement. The step-wise approach and the interaction of reflection and action
allowed the movement leadership and rank-and-file participants to control,
channel, and direct the dynamics of the conflict situations they had created.
One might say that the movement's peculiar "self-consciousness" served to
gauge the impact of each step in a campaign, to continually reassess its
effectiveness and nonhostile intent, and thereby to maximize its selflimiting
capacity.
The step-wise approach suggests that Gandhi's model of the conflict process is
phasic rather than cyclical, with a confrontation proceeding through a series of
escalatory steps. In the Gandhian perspective, the conflict should lead the
parties to a new level of truth, not back to the point where they began.
Ideological Self-Limitation. An essential concept in the Gandhian model of
self-limiting conflict was ahimsa or nonviolence. Each satyagrahi had to give
unqualified commitment to nonviolent action and was resocialized for this by
movement leadership. Although the nonviolent ethic in Hinduism, Jainism,
and Buddhism did reinforce satyagraha's nonviolent belief system, satyagrahis
from these and other religioethnic sects who were accustomed to battling each
other violently had to be resocialized into new forms of confrontation.
The internalization of this ideological commitment gave satyagraha a unique
form of self-control. No tight commandand-control system existed within the
satyagraha movement. The leader and participant roles, individual and
collective behavior, the influence of norms and peer expectation were all
rooted in individual and group self-control. It was primarily because of this
personalized self-control that such a massive movement developed with
surprisingly little violence. Resocialization was essential to this self -controlwhere it was incomplete, violence would often erupt and Gandhi would halt a
campaign.
Nonviolence is by its very nature an ideology that moderates the intensity of a
conflict. An inherent theoretical assumption is that a nonviolent act will elicit
a similar response from an opponent and will thereby increase the chances for
conciliation. In practice, however, the dynamic is much more complex. In his
analysis of nonviolent action as a form of interpersonal behavior, Hare (1968),
using Homans' exchange theory and Bales' interactional analysis, shows how
nonviolent protestors may evoke violent responses from police and
bystanders.
The nonviolent actors usually intend to take downward (submissive), backward
(advocating social change), and positive roles in their confrontation with others,
especially those in authority. When they can maintain this role they seem to be able to
"pull" a dominant- positive response which may lead to social change. However, if they
become negative, or appear to be negative, then they pull a hostile response. (Hare,
1968:12)
Small group experiments (Shure et al., 1965; Bartos, 1974) have also
suggested the potential risk that pacifist or conciliatory responses may
increase the aggressiveness of an opponent. The point to be made here is that
the training and discipline of nonviolent actors and their understanding of the
interpersonal dynamics of nonviolence are important. Socialization into and
internalization of the role of nonviolent actor is critical for the self-limiting
capacity of nonviolent action.
Controlling the Dynamics of Escalation. Social scientists are now aware of
certain growth dynamics of conflict-dynamics that in most conflict situations
are unobserved and uncontrolled. Perhaps the most thorough analysis of the
dynamics of intensification is that of J. S. Coleman (1957). 1 will describe a
number of these dynamics and suggest how Gandhian conflict techniques
tended to control them-particularly the "runaway responses" to which
Coleman refers.
In community conflict situations certain changes normally occur as the
conflict develops:
1. Movement from specific to more general issues and from original to new
issues. This shift sets the stage for a wider and more intensive conflict as it
alerts more potential parties to the controversy, uncovers fundamental
cleavages and differences in the community, and clouds the basic issues. All
of this, for obvious reasons, makes conflict resolution more difficult. Where a
social movement like satyagraha is involved, such an issues diversification
dynamic increases its opponents and inhibits its focus and sense of
achievement. The Gandhian tactic for controlling this dynamic was to tie each
campaign to a single issue and a sharply limited arena. The limited issue in
each campaign, however, was subtly and cleverly tied into larger questions
like the end of colonial rule. The effect was to limit the potential allies of the
opponent, to retain as much issue clarity and simplicity as possible, and to
insure moderate and continuous success feedback in limited increments. With
each limited success, the nonviolent action device gained credibility both with
its adherents and its opponents. This tended to encourage both increased
commitment to nonviolence and more conciliatory attitudes on the part of
opponents.
2. Movement from disagreement to antagonism as the conflict develops.
Issue-based conflict is transformed into ad persona hostility-the conflict is
personalized. Attacks are no longer on opposing positions but on those who
hold them. This naturally heightens the conflict parties' sense of perceived
threat and intensifies the conflict; it increases the "life-stakes" involved, so to
speak.
The Gandhian model of conflict-waging inhibits the conflict personalization
process. It reduces threat by stressing the maintenance of good personal
relations with opponents while pressing the issues. An exemplary case was the
Ahmedabad Satyagraha during which Gandhi maintained close friendly
relations with several millowners while persuading them (and finally coercing
them through fasting) to make concessions. Gandhi, by personalizing his
relationships with his opponents, often accomplished individual "conversions"
to his position. By this process of separating the person from the issue, he was
able to shake the loyalty of opponents to their respective groups (e.g.
millowners, members of the Brahmin caste), to sufficiently break down group
identification and increase opponents' propensities toward conciliation. This
technique was often employed to limit antagonism in satyagraha campaigns.2
The Gandhian model recognizes both the necessity and danger of polarization.
Without it the issues cannot be clarified. The challenging movement needs it
to survive and grow. Yet, in Gandhian conflict theory, confrontation is not a
zerosum or even a positive-sum ame as much as it is a 'oint process of truth
seeking, with the settlement emerging from that process. Gandhian conflict
simultaneously provides for confrontation and maximizes the potential for
conciliation. Gandhi developed a delicate mix of polarizing and conciliatory
tactics that both produced and moderated confrontation. His view of conflict
as the joint pursuit of truth rejected absolute ideological and tactical positions,
thereby restraining the polarization process.
3. Distortion of information. As the conflict grows, according to Coleman,
informal communication modes supplement and may even replace formal
media as a result of an increased demand for information by more people who
are alerted and involved. Rumor, slander, innuendo, and inaccurate data tend
to aggravate the conflict. The sense of threat is heightened between the parties
as they become more secretive. What is the other side planning? The worst is
imagined. Information that contradicts threatening images of opponents is
filtered out. Gandhi's conflict style, countering this dynamic, maximized the
flow of information between the movement and its opponents. His techniques
and tactics were openly discussed. Steps in the campaign were made known to
opponents beforehand. He used the mass media to acquaint everyone with
movement plans. Misinformation and secrecy were eliminated, reducing
perceived threat among opponents and lessening public fear and ignorance.
4. Mutual reinforcement of response. Coleman emphasizes the process of
reciprocal causation, the stuff of which conflict escalation is made. Cycles of
hostile response develop and feed the polarization process. Negative images
of the other party are continually confirmed. Hostile acts call forth hostile
responses that in turn evoke more hostility and so on. Conflict resolution is
largely the discovery of a means to break into escalatory reciprocal causation
and reverse its direction. Oberschall (1973:266) notes that reciprocity is also
the basis for dispute settlement. The "ethic of symmetry" requires that each
give as well as take, and refrain from taking unreasonable and extreme
positions.
The Gandhian conflict style uses positive reciprocal causation. Nonviolent
action theoretically calls forth a nonhostile response from one's opponent. As I
noted earlier, this principle may not always operate-where nonviolent actors
are poorly trained, for example. Even when the nonviolent actors are
disciplined, the initial trauma of an unexpected nonviolent act contravening
established custom and threatening privileged status may anger and frustrate
opponents and encourage them to respond violently, as was often the case in
the early months
of the sit-in movement in the South (Wehr, 1968). The theory of nonviolent
action asserts that while an opponent's initial response may be hostile,
nonviolent response to that hostility will increasingly modify and ultimately
transform it. The experience of the Gandhian and similar movements tends to
len . d supportive evidence t'o this proposition, although, as Bondurant
observes, police excesses were common in official response to satyagraha.
An American journalist, Webb Miller, reported that after one raid on a salt depot he
counted, in a hospital, 320 injured, many still insensible with fractured skulls, others
writhing in agony from kicks in the testicles and stomach. (Bondurant, 1965:97)
5. Emergence of extremist leadership. To curb the operation of Gresham's
Law of Conflict (Coleman, 1957:14), by which extremist leaders increasingly
replace moderate ones as the conflict heats up, Gandhi selected his first- and
second-level leadership carefully, and, as Sharp (1973:470) notes, they were
disciplined and trained thoroughly in preparatory periods before each
campaign. Wherever possible, Gandhi would lea d a campaign personally,
with his stature as a leader permitting him to control access to leadership
positions. His pledge of nonviolence acted as a brake on extremist elements.
The Gandhian principle of self-reliance also helped the movement to stay
clear of alliances with other political forces that did not share its commitment
to nonviolence. The emphasis on cooperative, constructive programs in each
satyagraha campaign reinforced the positive, creative aspects of the conflict
technique. One was not challenging established norms and structures without
exemplifying alternatives. The habits of cooperation in improving sanitation,
nutrition, and education were essential dimensions of the satyagrahi's role.
Other Limiting Aspects. The principle of self-realization in satyagraha was a
conflict-limiting device in two respects. (1) Any conflict was viewed as a selfrealization process for all parties involved. Such a view sees the opponent as
one to be persuaded or one to be persuaded by, not as one to be elimi- nated,
humiliated, or bested. (2) For the satyagrahi, the conflict was an
empowerment process. Satyagraha as a technique gave the hitherto powerless
a strength, a unique identity and status vis-@-vis their opponents. This
identity-producing dynamic encouraged a symmetry in the conflict that
reinforced its selflimiting qualities. Violence is often a product of desperation
and asymmetry in a power relationship. Satyagraha provided both a power
balance that facilitated eventual conciliation with minimal violence and a
concern for the opponent as someone with an identity deserving of respect.
Coleman identifies a number of factors working for moderation of conflict in
communities-cooptation of the opposition, resort to normal techniques of
handling problems, the existence of preconflict relationships that crosspressure participants, identification with and investment in community
institutions. Though Gandhi exploited these factors wherever possible, he was
primarily concerned with institutionalizing new conflict processes, creating
new rules by which conflict might be waged-encapsulating the conflict, to
refer again to Etzioni's concept.
We find, then, in Gandhi's model of conflict built-in inhibitors of violence,
rancorous escalation, and extreme polarization-three processes that facilitate
destructive consequences in normal conflict waging. The specific self-limiting
aspects discussed above are rooted in a conception of conflict as a truthseeking process in which the objective is not to win, but to achieve a fresh
level of social truth and a healthier relationship between antagonists. This is
what Bondurant called the Gandhian dialectic.
In every case of satyagraha the conflict is to be understood in dialectical
terms. The immediate objective is a restructuring of the opposing elements to
achieve a situation which is satisfactory to both the original opposing
antagonists but in such a way as to present an entirely new total circumstance
[emphasis mine]. (Bondurant, 1965:195)
This rather innovative view of struggle, then, insured that the techniques of
waging it would be self-limiting. The conception of struggle as truth seeking
produces in Gandhian conflict an escalating dynamic somewhat different from
the normal one, which Kriesberg has described:
Having expressed hostility and coercive action against another party, the alleged reason
for it assumes importance commensurate with the action taken. The cause is endowed
with additional significance and there is increasing commitment to it. In addition, as the
other side reciprocates with coercion the threats and injuries suffered also induce
feelings of loyalty and commitment [that justify] increased effort toward their
attainment and the willingness to absorb, without yielding, the coercive efforts of
adversaries. (Kriesberg, 1973:155)
In the dynamics of Gandhian escalation, to the contrary, persuasion in theory
replaces coercion, though, as Klitgaard (1971) notes, this did not always
occur. The escalating commitment is not to "winning" but to the discovery of
the truth of social justice, a commitment that admitted the possibility of the
opponent's truth.
Gandhian philosophy does not exclude compromise as a device for the
accommodation of differing positions at a point where conflict has not
become explicit and basic principles have not been challenged. But once
conflict materializes the Gandhian technique proceeds in a manner
qualitatively different from compromise. What results from the dialectical
process of conflict of opposite positions as acted upon by satyagraha, is a
synthesis, not a compromise. The satyagrahi is never prepared to yield any
position which he holds to be the truth. He is, however, prepared-and this is
essential-to be persuaded by his opponent that the opponent's is the true, or
the more nearly true, position. In the working out of the Gandhian dialectical
approach, each side may, of course, yield through dissuasion any part of its
position. But this is not compromise. When persuasion has been effected,
what was once the opponent's position is now the position of both antagonist
and protagonist. There is no sacrificing of position, no concession to the
opponent with the idea of buying him over. Non-violent resistance I 'I
persuasion has carried the conflict into must continue until mutually agreeable
adjustment. Such adjustment will be a synthesis of the two positions and will
be an adj'ustriient satisfactory to both parties in the conflict. There is no
victory in the sense of triumph of one side over the other. Yet, there is no
compromise, in the sense in which each side would concede parts of its
previous position solely to effect a settlement. There is no "lowering" of
demands, but an aiming at a "higher" level of adjustment which creates a new,
mutually satisfactory, resolution. (Bondurant, 1965:197)
What unfolded in the Gandhian dialectic was a process similar in many ways
to the consensus formation traditionally used by Quaker bodies and in certain
traditional political systems (Bourdieu, 1962). No one wins or loses.
Antagonists arrive at a "meeting of the minds," so to speak.
Gandhi was ostensibly one of the opponents in the satyagraha campaigns, but
his style and commitment to the process made him, in a sense, a third party to
the conflict. Kakasaheb Kalelkar, one of Gandhi's satyagraha leaders, has
called him a
a "master in the art of synthesis. " This skill at facilitating a convergence of
positions among antagonists is, unfortunately, impossible to analyze in any
but a superficial way here.
Applicability of the Model
Is the Gandhian model as a conflict regulation device transferable, in part or
whole, to other conflict arenas? In fact, it has been adopted and adapted for
use in other social movements-e.g., the Martin Luther King, Jr. (1961) and
Cesar Chavez (Matthieson, 1970) movements for equal rights in the United
States and the Danilo Dolci movement in Sicily (Mangione, 1972). Its tactics
were borrowed by wartime resistance movements in Norway and Denmark
and by the movement in Czechoslovakia in 1968, to cite the most prominent
cases. It has been used effectively by groups and individuals not ideologically
committed to nonviolence but who have recognized its practical value.
Gandhian self-limiting conflict may provide future tactical possibilities for
both liberation movements and civilian defense programs.
Of equal interest is the potential applicability of parts of the
model for conflict regulation in marital conflict, community disputes, and
international peacemaking. Its transferability will be greatest where conflict
involves the total identity of the opponents, where a restructuring rather than a
mere reallocation of values is called for. Yet in most conflict situations the
information maximization tactic would tend to reduce threat and encourage
conciliation. Training people who are likely to be involved in intergroup
conflict how to break into an escalating spiral with a nonhostile response
would help to regulate conflict. Training people to distinguish between
antagonist and issue in their conflict waging is a third Gandhian tactic that
would help limit conflict.
One final conflict-limiting mechanism in the satyagraha a pproach that mi ht
be used effectively in conflict regulation training is that of timing. Conflict is
rarely, if ever, waged "on schedule." Gandhian confrontation was self-limiting
partly because it was well timed. Runaway processes were precluded by
careful, self-conscious weighing of each action and the opponent's likely
response to it. Even in conflicts where maximization of gains is the primary
objective for each party, training both parties and third-party intermediaries in
timing and scheduling could increase the potential for conciliation.
Satyagraha has several prominent weaknesses, however. For one thing, it is
quite culture-rooted, with concepts like selfsuffering and nonviolence difficult
to transplant. Yet the Gandhian method of creative confrontation is not as
culturebound as is popularly believed. The research of Sharp (1970) and
others suggests that many of the techniques of satyagraha were borrowed from
Chinese, Russian, and Irish nonviolent resistance movements. While a major
part of its genius lay in the way it was skillfully shaped out of Indian tradition,
as a means of struggle it has had substantial cross-cultural transferability.
The Gandhian movement was fueled by the charismatic leadership of one
man, though it produced other men of somewhat lesser stature like Ghaf fir
Khan and Vinoba Bhave. When that leadership was withdrawn, the movement
declined rapi idly. Whether nonviolent movements are any more susceptible
to such a dynamic than other movements is a debatable point, but with Gandhi
and King, movement dependence on their leadership was both strength and
weakness.
A third possible weakness concerns the vulnerability of satyagraha to
cooptation by opponents. The confrontation/ conciliation mix is an extremely
delicate one and the movement may take much less than it could get from
opponents in order to maintain the balance. Most revolutionaries would argue
that compromise has no place in a struggle movementthat it is only diversion.
Finally, Gandhi's methods did not always work for even Gandhi himself. A
number of satyagraha campaigns were abortive or produced violent
confrontations. It will be interesting to see how successful the current
resurgence of the satyagraha movement in India will be. It has had some
major successes in confronting corrupt governments in Gujarat and Bihar and
the Desai government is committed to Gandhian principles, but it is too early
to measure lasting impact.
Material 5
Social Conflict
Escalation, Stalemate,and Settlement
Dean G. Pruitt
State University of New York at Buffalo
Jeffrey Z. Rubin
Tufts University
RANDOM HOUSE NEW YORK
CHAPTER 6
Processes That Produce
Escalation
Chapter 5 described the transformations that occur during escalation and
proposed sets of conditions under which conflict is most and least likely to
escalate. In this and the next chapter, we look at the processes of escalationthe chains of events that produce and maintain these transformations when
conflict occurs under conditions favorable to escalation. To put it another
way, when the situation is unstable and the parties fall into conflict, what
actually happens that pushes them in the direction of escalation?
The present chapter focuses mainly on the production of escalation: the
processes that encourage the use of heavier tactics, cause issues to proliferate,
and produce increasing absorption in the struggle. Chapter 7 examines the
persistence of escalation once it has occurred: the processes that encourage
the continued use of heavy tactics and a consistently deep absorption in the
struggle.
We now introduce a second example of escalating conflict to supplement the
case study of a campus crisis presented in the last chapter. This is the
sequence of events that took place during the development of the Cold War
between the United States and the Soviet Union. The fact that both of these
cases involve conflict between collectives (groups, organizations, or nations)
does not imply that escalation is found only in such relationships. Much of our
theory also applies to the escalation of interpersonal conflict, such as conflict
between spouses, neighbors, business associates, and the like.
I
DEVELOPMENT OF THE COLD WAR
The development of the Cold War between the United States and the Soviet
Union immediately after 1945 is a prime example of conflict escalation. These
two major nations were allies during the Second World War, which ended
with high hopes for continued cooperation. But the Soviets emerged from the
war with deep suspicions of the West. This led them to adopt a goal of
controlling the nations adjoining their territory, making it difficult to maintain
EastWest cooperation. They built a communist satellite system in Eastern
Europe, supported communist guerrillas in Greece, and put political pressure
on Tur key. In 1947 the United States responded to these actions in three ways: lt gave
military aid to Greece and Turkey. It created the Marshall Plan, which was designed to
revitalize the economy of Western Europe and weaken communist parties in Western
European countries. And (in conjunction with Britain and later with France) it began the
slow process of unifying West Germany and rebuilding its economy, as a further
bulwark against Soviet expansion.
The latter move was viewed with considerable alarm by the Soviet Union, which had
been at war twice with Germany in the prior 30 years. The Soviets responded at first
with protests. Then, in 1948, they tried sporadically interrupting communications
between Berlin (which was under joint control but was an enclave surrounded by the
Russian-controlled portion of Germany) and .West Germany. Finally, after the West
introduced a currency reform in West Germany, they installed a full blockade of Berlin,
claiming that they were repairing the routes to the city. The United States and its allies
responded by launching a successful airlift between Berlin and West Germany and by
beginning negotiations that led to the formation of the North Atlantic Treaty
Organization (NATO), a military alliance involving the United States and most of the
Western European nations. This latter development led eventually to the rearmament of
West Germany, which caused considerable further alarm in the Soviet Union.
The story of this conflict continues to the present day, but we stop it at this point
because we have said enough to give a massive and extremely significant example of
conflict escalation. This escalation illustrates most of the transformations described in
the last chapter: tactics went from light (protests) to heavy (blockading a city, forming a
military alliance); issues proliferated; the parties became increasingly absorbed in the
struggle; more and more elements of the relationship between the superpowers were
affected; and goals changed from self-advancement to subverting the adversary.
We look now at the processes that encourage such transformations, especially those that
foster the use of increasingly heavy tactics, a key transformation in most escalative
episodes.
THREE CONFLICT MODELS
Most theories of escalation can be classified under one of three broad conflict
models (Pruitt & Gahagan, 1974): the aggressor-defender model, the conflict
spiral model, and the structural change model. Though all three models have
some value (they all account well for some episodes of escalation), the first
model has generally been overemphasized and the last underemphasized.
The Aggressor-Defender Model
The aggressor-defender model draws a distinction between the two
parties.One party, the "aggressor," is viewed as having a goal or set of goals
that places it in conflict with the other, the "defender. " The aggressor
ordinarily
starts with mild contentious tactics because of the costs involved in escalation. But if
these do not work, he or she moves on to heavier tactics, continuing to escalate until the
goals are attained or a point is reached at which the value of goal attainment is
outweighed by the anticipated cost of continued escalation. The defender merely reacts,
escalating his or her efforts in response to the aggressor's escalation. Escalation persists
until the aggressor either wins or gives up trying.
The terms "aggressor" and "defender" in this model are not intended to be evaluative. In
other words, they do not imply that one side is wrong and the other right in the
controversy. The aggressor is simply a party who sees an opportunity to change things
in the direction of his or her interests; the defender, a party who tries to resist this
change.
The aggressor-defender model helps to explain one of the stages in the development of
the Cold War. This is the point at which the Soviet Union adopted the goal of blocking
the unification of West Germany. At first the Soviets employed the mild tactic of
protest. When this did not work, they moved to a heavier tactic of sporadically
interrupting communications between Berlin and West Germany. When this was
unsuccessful, and the West introduced a currency reform that contributed further to
German unification, they employed an extremely heavy tactic, a full blockade of the
city. This explanation is cogent, but despite its popularity, the aggressor-defender model
is incapable of interpreting many other stages in the development of the Cold War-and
indeed in most conflict escalation. In other words, this model provides a useful but
incomplete account of the processes underlying escalation.
The Conflict Spiral Model
The conflict spiral model of escalation is found in the writings of many theorists (North,
Brody & Holsti, 1964; Osgood, 1962, 1966; Richardson, 1967). This model holds that
escalation results from a vicious circle of action and reaction. Party's contentious tactics
encourage a contentious response from Other, which contributes to further contentious
behavior from Party, completing the circle and starting it on its next iteration.
Two broad classes of conflict spirals can be distinguished. In a retaliatory spiral, each
party punishes the other for actions that it finds aversive. An example is an argument
followed by a shouting match followed by a fist fight. In a defensive spiral, each party
reacts so as to protect itself from a threat it finds in the other's self-protective actions.
An example is an arms race. In a defensive spiral, each party can be thought of as
alternately the aggressor and the defender.
Conflict spirals produce escalation of tactics when, as is often the case, each reaction is '
more severe and intense than the action it follows. They also contribute to the
perpetuation of tactical escalation-that is, to the fact that heavy tactics continue to be
used on both sides once they are first employed. If I hit you, you will often hit me back,
which leads me to hit you once again, and so on.
In addition to explaining the escalation of tactics, the conflict spiral model
helps us understand the growing size of an escalating Conflicts the
proliferation of issues, and increased attention to the conflict. The point is that
each retaliatory or defensive action in the spiral provides a new issue-a new
grievance for the target of this action, producing a growing sense of crisis in
the mind of this party.
The conflict spiral model provides further insight into the dynamics of Cold
War escalation. In response to Soviet moves in Eastern Europe and in Greece
and Turkey, the United States and its allies began to establish a West German
state. In response to this action, the Soviet Union instituted a blockade of
Berlin. In response to this blockade and all that had come before, the United
States and its allies formed NATO and began to arm West Germany. And so
on. The sequence of actions in the UB campus crisis, which started with
stones thrown at the president's window and ended with an ugly confrontation
between a mob of students and a number of city police officers, also illustrates
such a spiral.
The aggressor-defender and conflict spiral models are compared
diagramatically in Figure 6. 1. In the aggressor-defender analysis, causation
flows in only one direction; the aggressor acts and the defender reacts. In the
conflict spiral analysis, causation flows in both directions; each party reacts to
the other party's actions. The conflict spiral diagram involves an
oversimplification (which is necessary to help us distinguish the forest from
the trees) in that it pictures each party's action as a response to the other's
immediately preceding action. In reality, each action is a "result of the
cumulative impression from all the previous actions by the other side" (White,
1984, p. 95), though more recent actions are usually given greater weight than
earlier actions.
The conflict spiral model.should not be seen as an improved version of, or
replacement for, the aggressor-defender model of escalation. The latter is
useful whenever one party develops a goal that places it at odds with another
party and pursues this goal through an escalating sequence of actions. Many
cases of escalation exhibit this form. However, even in controversies where an
aggressor-defender analysis is useful, the conflict spiral model frequently
provides additional insights. Quite often the goal that impels the aggressor is,
at least in part, a reaction to the defender's prior actions. This point is often
missed by participants in conflict, who attribute the cause of the conflict
exclusively to their adversary'.s aggression. It is also often missed by involved
observers, who assign the cause of the confict to actions ofthe side with which
they have weaker relations or the side that has employed the heavier, less
defensible tactics. But a careful analysis usually reveals that causation has
flowed in both directions.
A case in point is the Soviet effort to prevent the unification and ascendancy
of West Germany, which took the form of an escalating series of protest
actions that were progressively resisted by the West. Even though these
actions are properly labeled "aggression" (in the nonevaluative sense of the
term used here), they can also be seen as a reaction to Western efforts to
strengthen Germany. Hence they are also part of a larger conflict spiral.
Likewise, German efforts to conquer Europe in the 1940s, which were surely
aggression by any definition of the term, can also be seen in part as reactions
to the humiliation of Germany after the First World War-and thus as part of a
conflict spiral lasting many years.
The Structural Change Model
Our picture of the forces producing escalation is rounded out by a third model,
which is implied by the writings of Burton (1962), Coleman (1957), and
Schumpeter (1955, first published in 1919), among others. This structural
change model argues that conflict, and the tactics used to pursue it, produce
residues in the form of changes in the parties and the communities to which
the parties belong. These residues then encourage further contentious
behavior, at an equal or still more escalated level, and diminish efforts at
conflict resolutions Thus escalated conflict is both antecedent and consequent
of structural changes.
Three kinds of structural changes can be distinguished: psychological
changes, changes in groups and other collectives, and changes in the
community surrounding the parties.
Psychological changes are many and diverse. As conflict escalates, negative
attitudes and negative perceptions of the adversary typically develop. The
adversary is blamed for the growing controversy and comes to be distrusted in
the sense of being seen as indifferent or even hostile to our welfare. Negative
traits are attributed to the adversary, such as being self-centered, morally unfit,
or (in extreme cases) a diabolical enemy. The adversary is dehumanized and
deindividuated. Anger, fear, and wounded pride become the dominant
emotions. Zero-sum thinking develops-it's either victory for them or victory
for us. New goals come to the fore: to look better than, punish, discredit,
defeat, or even destroy the adversary. The capacity for empathy with the
adversary is eroded. There are also changes in the approach taken to joint
decision making: Positions become rigid, there is little room for compromise,
and there is a dearth of imagination and creativity. Emphasis is placed on
proving how tough and unyielding one is, so as to persuade the adversary that
one cannot be pushed around. Coupled with this is an exaggerated fear of
small losses, which are seen as diminishing one's status vis-a-vis the other and
possibly encouraging the other to take advantage of one. There is also a
tendency to break contact with the adversary-to be unwilling to communicate
with him or her. All of these changes typically occur on both sides of the
dispute.
These psychological changes occur in all escalated conflicts, whether the
actors are individuals or collectives. When collectives (groups, organizations,
or nations) are involved in a controversy, structural changes also occur at the
collective level. The psychological reactions just described are accentuated by
collective discussion and tend to become collective norms. Collective goals of
defeating the enemy tend to develop, and subgroups are set up to implement
these goals. Increased cohesiveness, resulting from having an outside enemy,
contributes to the force of these norms and to the dedication of individuals in
the collective to the newly found goals and the means of implementing them.
New, more militant leadership often emerges, contributing further to the
collective orientation toward struggle. In other words, doves are replaced by
hawks. If one of the parties is an unorganized set of individuals, conflict
sometimes encourages the development of a struggle group-precipitated out of
the mix of strong individual emotions-which then takes up the cudgel against
the adversary.
Structural changes may also take the form of polarization in the broader
community of which the antagonists are a part. Third parties join one or the
other antagonist, forsaking the constructive neutral role they might otherwise
play.
The important point about all of these changes is that they contribute to the
cycle of escalation: They result from the use of escalated tactics and
encourage further escalation. This contribution takes three forms: One is that
psychological and collective changes are the mechanisms at work in conflict
spirals. As can be seen in the top part of Figure 6.2 (model 1), heavy tactics
used by Party tend to produce structural changes in Other, which motivate
similar heavy tactics from Other, provoking structural changes in Party, which
start the spiral around once more. For example, Party's yelling at Other (a
contentious tactic) causes Other to think of Party as an unpleasant person
(structural change), making it easier for Other to yell back (more contentious
tactics), encouraging Party to develop the goal of punishing Other (another
structural change), motivating Party to make a fist (still more contentious
tactics), and so on. Any or all of the changes described earlier, except
community polarization, can be written into the boxes marked "structural
changes" in this figure.
The second way in which structural changes contribute to the cycle of
escalation is illustrated in the bottom part of Figure 6.2 (model 11). These
changes often result from Party's own use of heavy tactics and contribute to
further use of these tactics. For example, by a dissonance theory (Festinger,
1957) analysis of attitude change, the very fact of defending one's nation
against another nation is likely to create more negative attitudes toward the
adversary, encouraging further defensive efforts.
The third impact of structural changes is to erode some of the safeguards
against escalating conflict that were describe in the last chapter: positive
attitudes, respect, friendship, perceived similarity, common group
membership, and future dependence. Crosscutting relationships also tend to
disappear as communities polarize, and the effectiveness of conflict-limiting
institutions in the broader community (such as legislatures and courts) may be
adversely affected. The result is not only to encourage further escalation in the
current situation but also to make escalation more likely in future conflicts
involving the same parties. Thus escalated conflict often weakens a
community's capacity to deal effectively with further conflict.
In addition to reinforcing escalation, those changes involving the development
of hostile goals actually increase the divergence of interest between the
parties. New issues come to the fore, resulting from the desire each party has
to defeat the other. Such developments confirm each party's distrust of the
other. Distrust of this kind involves no misunderstanding; as a result of the
development of hostile goals, each party has become an actual eneiny of the
other.
The short, diagonal arrows at the top left of the diagrams in Figure 6.2 are
meant to suggest that the initial impulse for these circular processes has its
impact on behavior rather than on structural change. We believe that this is the
way such circles ordinarily arise. In response to a perceived divergence of
interest (or in response to some stimulus entirely outside the relationship
between the two parties), one of the parties engages in contentious behavior.
This produces structural changes tha't start the system on the road to
escalation. However, it is possible for escalation to start with a structural
change. A conversation with a third party may turn me against my neighbor
and kick off an escalative process. A radical leader may urge a crowd of
students to stage a sit-in, producing a cohesive struggle group that is capable
of mounting a concerted campaign against the university administration. (This
was the sequence of events in the 1968 Columbia University student crisis.)
Structural changes help to account for the escalation that led to the Cold War
and for the flinty persistence of this escalation. Such psychological changes as
anger, hostility, profound distrust, blackened images, and an inability to
empathize took root in the United States during the early period of the Cold
War and persist today. Zero-sum thinking ("What is good for them is bad for
us, and vice versa") set in and is still noteworthy in the modern era.
Considerations of national pride and face-saving gripped every American
president from Truman onward-none wanted to be in office when another
country fell to communism. Most Americans became unable to empathize
with the genuine Soviet security needs that underlay a large proportion of their
actions. For a period of time in the late 1940s and early 1950s, most
communication with the Soviet Union was broken off, and today it is at an
uncomfortably low level again.
Collective changes also took place. At the depth of the Cold War, hostile
norms were so strong that people who had a good word for the Soviet Union
were made to feel uncomfortable and were sometimes hauled up before
congressional committees. The country even flirted for a time in the 1950s
with highly militant leadership, in the person of Senator Joseph McCarthy, a
virulent anti-communist with a large political following. Fortunately, some of
these collective excesses were overcome by the 1960s. But the establishment
of a semi-autonomous military machine, with political support from
technological sectors dependent on it, provides constant input into. the stillfestering controversy.
We have described these changes as we have seen them in the United States,
because we know our own society better than that of the Soviet Union.
However, there is good reason to believe that comparable changes have taken
place and have been perpetuated in the Soviet Union (see White, 1984).
In addition to these psychological and collective changes, there has also been
some polarization in'the international 'community, with many other nations
choosing up sides between the two giants. This trend has abated somewhat in
recent years.
In summary, we have described three models of conflict escalation that are
commonly found in the literature: the aggressor-defender, conflict spiral, and
structural change models. These models are not mutually exclusive. Rather,
each helps us understand certain aspects of escalation. The most complicated
model, by far, is the structural change model, because there are so many
possible residues of escalation that keep escalation going. We shall devote
most of the rest of the chapter to a further elaboration of this model,
examining in more detail selected psychological, collective, and community
changes. The concluding comment looks at the impact on escalation of the
models that the parties themselves use in analyzing their conflict.
PSYCHOLOGICAL CHANGES
This section deals only with psychological changes that have been subject to
careful research: the desire to punish (aggress against) the other, negative
attitudes and perceptions, and deindividuation.
The Desire to Punish (Aggress Against) the Other
A great deal of research has been conducted on the sources of "aggression"
(see Baron, 1977; Berkowitz, 1962; Zillmann, 1979). Because aggression is
defined in this research as intentionally hurting another person, this research
sheds light on the antecedents of the desire to punish the other party.
Research on this topic indicates that aggression arises mainly from aversive
(unpleasant) experiences: deprivation, failure to achieve aspirations,
inequitable treatment, pain and suffering, and the like. Such experiences are,
of course, quite frequent when Other is engaged in contentious behavior.
Hence the desire'to punish Other can be seen as one link between Other's
contentious behavior and Party's subsequent contentious behavior.
Blaming Other. Aggression is more likely when the perceived source of an
aversive experience can be blamed for his or her actions-that is, when these
actions seem to be Other's fault. Blame has a number of sources. For example,
Other is more likely to be blamed for actions that seem voluntary than those
that seem involuntary (Schneider, Hastorf & Ellsworth, 1979). Actions that
seem freely taken are more likely to evoke blame than those apparently
resulting from heavy environmental pressures, unless Other is clearly
responsible for resisting such pressures. Actions that appear contrary to the
norms of society are also especially enraging (Mallick & McCandless, 1966).
The implication of these points is that conflict is especially likely to escalate
when the parties see each other's contentious behavior as arbitrary and not
attributable to extenuating circumstances, because under these conditions the
parties are especially likely to develop a desire to punish one another.
To forgive Other because of extenuating circumstances requires a high level
of cognitive activity. Party must analyze Other's circumstances and motivation
and hold them up to standards of reasonable conduct. It is clear that this is
socially learned behavior. Small children do not behave this way, being much
more likely than adults to hold people responsible for their actions regardless
of why these actions were taken (Shaw& Sulzer, 1964). Furthermore, Party
pays less attention to extenuating circumstances when he or she is
autonomically aroused, as might be expected with any complex cognitive
behavior (Zillmann, Bryant, Cantor & Day, 1975).
The Role of Anger. Theorists differ on the role of anger in aggression, but it
seems reasonable to assume that anger is often at work when aversive
experiences lead to aggression.
Like other emotions, anger can be interpreted as resulting from cognitive
labeling of an undifferentiated state of autonomic arousal. According to
Scbachter (1964), the first stage in emotional experience is arousal-activation
of the autonomic nervous system. The second stage is interpretation of this
arousal. To make this interpretation, people employ whatever information is
available. Not all interpretations lead to emotion; for example, if they have
recently taken a new medicine or exercised, people may assume that this is the
cause. But there are certain standard interpretations that produce emotion. If
people see danger, they are likely to interpret their arousal as fear and feel
fear; if they are aware of a recent aversive experience, their reaction is likely
to be anger. When such interpretations are made, greater arousal leads to
stronger emotion and more extreme emotional behavior.'
It follows that people become particularly emotional when they are aroused by
other stimuli in addition to those that produce the emotional interpretation.
Such an effect has been found in the case of anger leading to aggression. For
example, Zillmann (1979) has shown in a controlled experiment that people
who exercise and then have an aversive experience aggress more vigorously
against the source of the aversive experience than they do if they have not
exercised. This result is particularly apparent when the exercise comes
somewhat earlier than the aversive experience so that people lose track of why
they are aroused and attribute it entirely to the aversive experience. In
addition, it has been shown that emotion can be destroyed by encouraging
people to attribute their arousal to a neutral experience such as taking a pill.
This misattribution" effect is also found with anger (Loftis, 1974).
The ideas just presented imply that heavily contentious behavior and hence
escalation are most likely to occur when people approach conflict in an
aroused state. The arousal can be due to any source, including physical
exercise (folklore to the contrary, a fast game of basketball is more likely to
exacerbate controversies than to cure them) and listening to loud or complex
music
'Schachter's theory has recently come under attack because some of his
earliest research could not be replicated (Marshall & Zimbardo, 1979;
Maslach, 1979). However' it still provides the best available theoretical
account of the body of research results cited in this section.
98 Social Conflict
(Konecni, 1975). The chances of escalation are diminished when people's emotions are
subdued-for example, as a result of listening to soft, sweet music (Konecni, 1975)-or
when they believe their state of arousal originates outside the controversy, in concern
about health, tensions at home, or the like.
Inhibition of Aggression. The desire to punish another person is by no means always
expressed in actual behavior. Indeed, aggressive impulses are usually inhibited.
Inhibition may be due to a number of sources, including social condemnation of
aggression, conscience, ability to empathize with the target's potential suffering, fear of
punishment by the target, and ties with the target.
If social condemnation of aggression contributes to its inhibition, social endorsement
should be disinhibiting. Thus, if Party is angry against Other and a third party acts
aggressively, this should make it easier for Party to actually aggress. There is ample
research support for this conclusion. The model for Party's aggression can be a fellow
group mem ' ber (Wheeler & Caggiula, 1966), a character in a movie (Berkowitz &
Geen, 1966), or even a football player in a game Party is watching (Goldstein & Arms,
1971). It follows that, to help avoid escalation in a difficult controversy, the disputants
should shun aggressively tinged entertainment and that people who are in contact with
them should try to behave peacefully.
People who have difficulty projecting ahead are especially likely to act aggressively
when they are tempted to do so. This is because they are not deterred by fear of
punishment from the target or third parties. For this reason, people who are under the
influence of high emotion (Zillmann, 1979) or alcohol (Mulvihill & Tumin, 1969) are
particularly likely to get involved in escalating controversies.
Displacement. The preferred target for the expression of aggression is the party who is
blamed for the aversive experience. However, it is not always possible to indulge this
preference. The source of annoyance may be well protected, or there may be
extenuating circumstances that reduce his or her culpability, or it may be impossible to identify the source, Under these circumstances, the desire to punish is sometimes
displaced onto another target. If one cannot hit an offending boss, one can yell at one's
spouse or kick the cat.
Evidence of displacement can be seen in a historical study by Hovland and Sears
(1940), who found an inverse correlation between the price of cotton in the South and
the number of blacks lynched over a 49-year period. The lower the price of cotton, the
more lynchings. What presumably happened is that white farmers were frustrated by the
decline in the cotton market but could not legitimately aggress against the cotton
merchants who were paying less. Hence, they took it out on a handy displacement
object, the black man. More recently, Berkowitz, Cochran, and Embree (1981) has
shown that subjects who are forced to hold their hand in very cold water (another
aversive experience) are more aggressive toward fellow subjects than are those who
hold their hand in moderately cold water, another demonstration of displacement.
The phenomenon of displacement suggests that people who have had earlier
aversive experiences in settings that do not permit aggressive behavior are
especially likely to choose escalated tactics in the current conflict.
Negative Attitudes and Perceptions
An attitude is a positive or negative feeling toward some person or object. A
perception is a belief about, or way of viewing, that person or object. Like all
structural changes, negative attitudes and perceptions are both cause and
effect of the use of contentious tactics. Accordingly, they are way stations in
the escalation of conflict.
Attitudes and perceptions tend to be consistent in valence in the sense that, if I
have negative (positive) feelings toward somebody, I tend also to have
predominantly negative (positive) perceptions of that person. However, they
are not 100 percent consistent. I may dislike a man and generally think ill of
him but nevertheless trust him, because I have had a positive experience
whenever I have relied on him. Hence, we must, to some extent, deal
separately with these two psychological elements.
The following kinds of perceptions are particularly characteristic of escalated
conflict. Adversaries tend to be seen as deficient in moral virtue-as dishonest,
unfriendly, or warlike a They also tend to be distrusted; we believe them to be
hostile to our welfare. In addition, they are sometimes seen as lacking in
ability or achievement (Blake & Mouton, 1962), though this kind of
perceptual distortion is less likely because of the greater availability of sound
evidence about these characteristics (Brewer, 1979). By contrast, one's own
side is seen often as more moral and sometimes as more able (White, 1984).
When groups are in conflict, a variant of these perceptions is sometimes
found, which White (1984) has called the "evil-ruler enemy image." This is
the perception that ordinary members of the other group feel neutral of even
positive toward us but that their leaders are hideous monsters. In this view,
aggressive actions taken by ordinary members of the other group are
attributed to the fact that they are misled by their leaders, rather than to their
moral degeneracy. Such images can be seen in American views of the Soviet
Union and in Soviet views of America. They were also found in. the UB
campus crisis described in the last chapter. In the midst of the crisis, the
university president went on the air to denounce a small group of "vicious
vandals" who were misleading the larger body of normally reasonable
students. The evil-ruler enemy image appears to permit a decidedly negative
view of the opponent while realistically acknowledging that not all members
of any group can be evil.
Attitudes and the perceptions that accompany them tend to be similar on both
sides of a controversy. This is the so-called "mirror image" hypothesis
(Bronfenbrenner, 1961; Frank, 1982). For example, the profound distrust felt
by most Americans toward the Soviet Union is mirrored in Soviet attitudes
toward the United States.
Unfortunately, the existence of a mirror image is often not recognized by
parties involved in a conflict, who tend to distrust the adversary without
realizing that the adversary also distrusts them. This lack of insight can
contribute to the conflict spiral in the following way: If Other is behaving in a
contentious fashion and we do not recognize that Other fears us, we assume
that Other's behavior is aggressively motivated and therefore feel the need to
escalate our response further.
Effects on Behavior. Negative attitudes and perceptions encourage escalation
and discourage the settlement of conflict in at least seven ways.
The first is by encouraging a tendency to blame the object of the attitude for
one's unpleasant experiences. People who have aversive experiences
commonly seek a culprit to blame. However, the evidence about who is to
blame is often ambiguous. Even when another party is clearly the source of
the aversive experience, there may be extenuating circumstances. When
evidence is ambiguous, attitudes tend to structure perceptions. This means that
disliked parties are blamed and that liked parties are given the benefit of the
doubt.
A finding by Blumenthal, et al. (1972) illustrates the impact of at ' titudes and
perceptions on blame. During a period of political turmoil in the United
States, in the summer of 1969, people were found to blame the conflict on
groups whose views they did not like. Liberals blamed the police, whereas
conservatives blamed the demonstrators. Both tended to use the term cc
violence" to describe the behavior of groups they disliked and the term
"justified force" to describe the behavior of groups whose views they favored.
People were also more sympathetic to the use of force against the groups they
blamed.
A second, and related, mechanism leading to escalation is that parties who are
distrusted tend to be seen as threatening when their actions are ambiguous
(Pruitt, 1965). They are given little benefit of the doubt or credit for good
intentions. This produces an escalation of defensive and deterrent moves, and
it often creates new issues for conflict.
Examples of this process are seen regularly in relations between the United
States and the Soviet Union. Take, for example, American interpretations of
the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. This invasion is commonly seen as a sign
of expansionist intent-as evidence that the Soviet Union is ready to invade
other Middle Eastern countries such as Saudi Arabia. The United States has
invested billions of dollars in additional armaments as a result of this
perceived threat. Yet the evidence of this threat is ambiguous in the sense that
there are other highly plausible interpretations of the Soviet invasion. Most
notable is the view that the Soviet Union was simply trying to protect a
beleaguered communist government from disintegrating and being reabsorbed
into the Western community of nations. Under the latter interpretation, the
Soviet invasion probably would still be labeled "aggression. " But it would not
be evidence of a major threat to the West, because Soviet intentions would be
seen as strictly limited (White, 1984).
The point of all this is that American distrust of the Soviet Union has led
many Americans to choose, from the various possible interpretations of the
Soviet invasion, the one that forbodes the greatest future danger. In a strictly
parallel fashion, recent increases in the Ai-nerican arms budget have
apparently been misunderstood in the Soviet Union as evidence of increased
military threat. As in the case of the United States, distrust serves to shape
Soviet perceptions of this inherently ambiguous evidence.
A third way in which negative attitudes and perceptions encourage escalation
is by diminishing inhibitions against aggression among people who have been
provoked. People are reluctant to aggress against parties they like and respect,
even when these parties can clearly be blamed for unpleasant experiences, but
they are quite willing to aggress against parties they do not like or respect.
The finding that southern white students (many of whom can be assumed to
have been prejudiced) retaliated more vigorously when insulted by a black
than by a white (Rogers & Prentice-Dunn, 1981) supports these
generalizations.
When negative attitudes lead to name-calling, inhibitions against aggression
are particularly likely to fall away. Name-calling strengthens the impression
that the other is morally inadequate and dissimilar to oneself Some names
(such as the epithet "pig," which was hurled at policemen by student
demonstrators in the 1960s) even make the other seem subhuman. Hence they
tend to erode normal inhibitions against aggression.
A fourth way in which negative attitudes and perceptions encourage escalation
is by interfering with communication. People tend to avoid those toward
whom they are hostile. The point is well put by Coleman (1957): "As
controversy develops, associations . . . wither between persons on opposing
sides" (p. 11). This contributes to misunderstandings and hence to the
proliferation of conflict issues. It also makes it difficult to reach a peaceful
settlement of the controversy.
The reasons for this common development are not altogether clear. Why stop
meeting and talking when one becomes hostile toward another party?
Conceivably, people view association as implying friendship and
endorsement. If so, contact with an opponent might send out false signals that
one accepts the opponent's position. This is part of the reason for mutual
nonrecognition between Israel and the Palestine Liberation Organization. Or,
conceivably, the phenomenon has deeper emotional roots. According to
balance theory (Heider, 1958). negative attitudes toward any object
psychologically imply a negative relationship with that object-and a desire to
put psychological distance between oneself and that object.
A fifth mechanism is that negative attitudes and perceptions tend to make it
difficult to empathize with the adversary (White, 1984). Adversaries seem so
different from us that it is hard to put ourselves in their shoes. Furthermore,
there is an easy explanation for all of their actions which makes empathy seem
unnecessary: these actions stem from evil motives. Absence of empathy is like
absence of communication in that it fosters misunderstandings. It also
encourages escalation by blocking insight into the conflict spiral. Awareness
that the adversary's hostile behavior is a reaction to our own hostile behavior
causes us to limit our escalation as a matter of self-protection.
102 Social Conflict
But if we lack empathy into'the adversary's motives, we are unaware of our own role in
encouraging the other to aggress and are likely to escalate unthinkingly.
A sixth point is that negative attitudes and perceptions foster "zero-sum thinking"--the
belief that what is good for you is bad for me, and vice versa. This happens partly
because of distrust. If I believe you are hostile toward my interests, I will tend to doubt
that you can endorse any alternative that helps me. Zero-sum thinking also arises from
negative feelings toward the other party. Why should I help you if I don't like or respect
you? An example of this phenomenon can be seen in the results of a study by Sillars
(1981), in which it was found that students who blamed their roommates for past
conflict tended not to take a problem-solving approach in dealing with their roommates.
Syna (1984) has found a similar effect with married couples.
Zero-sum thinking is the antithesis of perceived integrative potential (PIP), a concept
introduced in Chapter 2. Hence it tends to diminish perceived common ground (PCG),
which makes problem solving an unlikely alternative. To resolve the controversy, Party
must either yield or contend, and the latter is the more common approach because there
so often are constraints against yielding. Thus zero-sum thinking often leads to conflict
escalation.
The seventh and final point is that, when negative attitudes and perceptions grow
severe, the adversary comes to be viewed as a "diabolical enemy" (White, 1984) and the
conflict is seen as a war between light (our side) and darkness (their side). We are the
chosen people; they are the "evil empire" (to quote President Reagan's statement about
the Soviet Union). In such circumstances, we are ready to blame them for all that goes
wrong, communication often takes a nose dive, empathy is especially weak, and
problem solving is extraordinarily hard to sustain. Heavy tactics tend to become the rule
and new controversies develop regularly, confirming our view of them and theirs of us.
Sources of Negative Attitudes and Perceptions. Like all structural changes,
negative attitudes and perceptions result from escalation as well as
contributing further to it. More precisely, they are affected both by Other's
escalated actions and by Party's own escalated actions.
Aversive behavior that is blamed on.Other tends to produce an initial angry
reaction characterized by a state of autonomic arousal. This is often followed
by a cooler, longer-lasting residue, which serves to goad people toward
aggression and hence toward escalation. The latter state is sometimes an
active goal to punish Other, leading directl' to escalation. But more often it is
simply a negative attitude toward Other, which acts in the seven ways we have
described.
An alternative reaction to Other's contentious behavior is sometimes found.
Instead of blaming Other, one might instead blame oneself as the source of
behavior to which Other is reacting or blame both parties equally on the
assumption that a conflict spiral is at work. However, this is less likely to
happen, especially if there are multiple conflicts between oneself and Other
(Syna, 1984). There are two reasons for the tendency to blame Other for
controversy. One is ego-defensive: Finding fault with oneself is,more painful
than finding fault with another person. The other is perceptual: We are much
more aware of other peoples' contributions to controversy than of our own,
because their contribution is more apparent to the senses. In Heider's (1958)
terminology, their contribution "engulfs the field." For these reasons we tend
to see Other as more causally central to the controversy.
The perceptions of other people or groups that have the greatest effect on our
conflict behavior are the inferences we draw about their stable dispositionstheir basic traits and motives and their attitudes toward us. If these
dispositions seem negative, we are more likely to escalate our tactics; if they
seem positive, we are less likely to do so. To understand the origins of such
perceptions, we turn to two principles of attribution theory: the discounting
principle and the augmentation principle (Kelley, 1973; Schneider, Hastorf&
Ellsworth, 1979).
According to the discounting principle, Other's actions are more likely to be
attributed to an underlying disposition when alternative causes can be
confidently ruled out. Thus role-related behavior is less likely to be seen as
due to underlying attitudes or personality traits than is behavior that departs
from Other's role (Jones & Davis, 1965). For example, a bank employee who
forecloses on our loan is less likely to be viewed as morally destitute than is a
friend who takes the same action, because the bank employee can be seen as
simply doing his or her job.
According to the augmentation principle, Other's actions are viewed as
expressing an underlying disposition to the extent that he or she incurs risks or
costs in enacting them. This implies that a person who jeopardizes his or her
job to harm our interests is especially likely to be seen as having negative
dispositions. If a porter should refuse to carry our bags for no apparent
reason,, we are likely to view him or her in particularly negative terms,
because his or her behavior can only be explained by assuming hostility
toward us or toward people in our category.
It is no surprise to learn that Other's behavior affects Party's attitudes toward
Other. But many people are astonished to learn that there is evidence (Bem,
1972; Festinger, 1957) that Party's own behavior toward Other also affects
these attitudes and perceptions. Through a process of rationalization, people's
feelings and beliefs tend to become consistent with their behavior.
There is no inconsistency between regarding behavior as a source of attitudes
and regarding attitudes as a source of behavior. When people can choose
among several courses of action, attitudes often influence their choice. But
when environmental pressures push them in a particular direction, attitudes
tend to fall in line.
We can conclude from these generalizations that Party's hostile behavior
toward Other causes Party to dislike Other and see him or her in a negative
light, whereas friendly behavior tends to erode such attitudes and images.
(Evidence favoring the latter point can be seen in the experimental finding that
people tend to trust others to whom they have directed promises of
cooperation [Loomis, 1959].) This implies, in turn, another mechanism that
can generate conflict escalation: Party takes contentious action toward Other,
which encourages negative feelings and perceptions about Other, motivating
heavier contentious tactics in the next time period.
Behavior affects attitudes only when the actor believes that it was freely taken
and was not due to external pressures. If I call a policeman a pig and believe I
did so of my own free will, I shall probably develop a negative attitude toward
that policeman or all policemen. But if I believe that I was coerced into taking
this action or (and this is rare) acknowledge that I was trying to impress
somebody, my attitude will not be affected. The issue is not whether the
behavior is actually freely taken (the authors of this volume take no stand on
the question of whether people ultimately have free will) but whether the actor
believes his or her behavior was freely taken. Because people usually believe
that their actions are freely taken, behavior usually has a considerable impact
on attitudes.
Deindividuation
Another person is deindividuated when he or she is perceived as a member of
a category or group rather than as an individual. This perception has no
valence and hence cannot be viewed as a negative attitude or perception. But
it nevertheless encourages contentious behavior, apparently by eroding
in'hibitions against acting aggressively. What may happen is that people who
are deindividuated seem less human than those who are individuated, and
hence seem less protected by social norms against aggression.
Deindividuation was probably at work in an experiment by Milgram (1974) in
which subjects in the role of "teacher" gave especially severe shocks to others
in the role of "learner" when the latter were at a distance or out of sight.
Deindividuation of the enemy may be what makes it easier for fliers to drop
bombs on people they cannot see than for foot soldiers to shoot those they can
see. Deindividuation is countered by receipt of information about others that
makes them seem unique. Hence, guards in Nazi prison camps are said to
have treated prisoners more leniently when they knew their names (Zimbardo,
1970).
Another way to discover that outgroup members are individuals is to have
friendly relations with them over a period of time. It follows that residential
settings that foster interracial friendships should lead to a reduction of white
prejudice against blacks, an effect that has been demonstrated in two survey
studies (Deutsch & Collins, 1951; Hamilton & Bishop, 1976). It is said that,
before he led a protest demonstration, Gandhi would ask for hospitality from
the local English governor and thus make friends with him. This was
presumably a way of individuating himself-and his movement by association
with him-in the eyes of the authorities, thereby reducing the aggressiveness of
tactics used against his followers.
Similar reasoning suggests that aggressive or discriminatory impulses should
lead to deindividuation of the prospective target, In this way, people
prediction emerges from a study by Worchel and Andreoli (1978). It was
found that subjects who were angry with, or were expected to shock, another
person were especially likely to forget individuating information about that
person (such as his or her name) and to remember deindividuating information
(such as his or her race). Name-calling during conflict may in part reflect this
effect. An epithet such as "nigger or pig" reduces the individuality of the
other, making it easier to aggress.
This finding implies that deindividuation is another way station in the circle of
conflict escalation. Each participant deindividuates the other in order to
rationalize his or her initial contentious moves. This state of mind then makes
it easier to take more severe measures against the other.
In addition to viewing others as deindividuated, it is possible to see oneself in
this way-in other words, to lose awareness of one's own distinct identity. This
also facilitates aggression. Among the sources of self-deindividuation are
acting in concert with others, wearing nondistinctive clothing, emotional
arousal, and lack of sleep. In a study of the effect of clothing on aggression,
Zimbardo (1970) found that college women playing the role of punitive
teachers were especially likely to give shocks when they were wearing a hood.
Such apparel reduces one's distinctiveness and, presumably, one's inhibitions.
Military and police uniforms probably have a similar effect.
CHANGES IN COLLECTIVES
When groups, organizations, or nations become involved in contentious
conflict, these collectives tend to change in at least six ways that contribute to
escalation of the conflict. In describing these changes, we shall speak only of
groups, because groups have been mainly studied in this context. But there is
good reason to believe that these changes are found in all collectives.
First, group discussions often cause individual group members to become
more extreme in their hostile attitudes and perceptions. This is due to the
group polarization mechanism (Moscovici & Zavalloni, 1969). When group
members share any view and discuss it with one another, this view tends to
become stronger. Two main mechanisms apparently account for this
phenomenon (Lamm & Myers, 1978). One is that the group members hear one
another's views and the arguments underlying them. Finding that others agree
with them, they feel their views are validated and also learn new arguments
favoring them. The other is that a sort of competition develops among the
group members, in which each strives to hold an opinion that is at least as
extreme in the direction favored by the group as that advocated by the average
group member. As a result, at least half of the members shift in the direction
favored by the group.
In the context of social conflict, this means that psychological changes such as
hostility and distrust are magnified when groups are involved. We see this
phenomenon most clearly in mob action; a group of people who are upset
about some incident gather and, through discussion, strengthen one another's
sentiments to the point of angry action. But the phenomenon is not limited to
106
mobs. It can occur in perfectly stable and respected groups and organizations,
including the United States Senate and the Soviet Politburo.
A second kind of change is the development of runaway nornm supporting a
contentious approach to the controversy (Raven & Rubin, 1983). A norm is
any attitude,' perception, goal, or behavior pattern that is shared by the
dominant segment of a collective. Norms come to be seen as "right thinking"
by most members of the group and are taught to new members and imposed
on old members who appear to question them. Most of the psychological
changes mentioned earlier in this chapter-including negative attitudes, distrust,
zero sum thinking, and a reluctance to communicate with the other party ans
become the subject of norms. When this happens, they gain more strength and
stability than they would have if they belonged to a single individual or to a
set of individuals who did not share a common group membership. Hence,
escalation becomes more likely.
The development of contentious group goals is a third common outcome of
conflict. Such goals include defeating or even destroying the adversary. Goals
such as these arise from the conflict experience and fuel it. In addition, groups
are capable of acting on their goals in ways that are not available to
individuals. The activities of a number of individuals can be coordinated.
Furthermore, a division of labor is possible, permitting highly complicated
contentious routines, such as the recruitment and outfitting of an army. Hence
groups are particularly efficient at conflict escalation if their members are so
inclined.
A fourth kind of change that can contribute to escalation is the development of
group cohesiveness or "solidarity," as it is commonly called. Groups are
cohesive to the extent that their members find them attractive. Cohesiveness
affects group behavior in three important ways. It encourages conformity to
group norms (Festinger, Schachter & Back, 1950). This conformity is due in
part to enhanced communication within the group (Back, 1951), in part to
member fear of being ostracized (Festinger, 1950), and in part to social
pressure, which is especially strong in cohesive groups (Schachter, 1951).
Cohesive groups are also capable of especially vigorous action in pursuit of
their goals. And there is reason to believe that members of cohesive groups
are particularly convinced of the rightness of their cause and the effectiveness
of their intended actions (Janis, 1972; Kriesberg, 1982).
For all of these reasons, we can expect group cohesiveness to augment or
multiply the effect of the psychological states discussed earlier in this chapter.
If the attitudes toward an outgroup are generally negative, they should be
particularly strong in a cohesive group. If the other group is distrusted or seen
as a threat, cohesiveness should strengthen these perceptions. If a goal of
defeating the adversary is adopted and contentious tactics for achieving this
goal are developed, a cohesive group mounts a particularly vigorous campaign
against the adversary. In making these points, we do not intend to say that
cohesiveness per se encourages antagonism or escalation. Research evidence
(Dion, 1973) does not support such a position. The point is simply that
cohesive groups are likely to be particularly militant in contentious conflict.
Contentious conflict has been repeatedly shown to enhance group cohesiveness (Dion, 1979; Harvey, 1956; Ryen & Kahn, 1975; Worchell &
Norvell, 1980).' It follows that enhanced cohesiveness is still another
mechanism that results from and encourages conflict escalation.
The fifth type of change that often occurs in groups engaged in heavy conflict
is that they take on militant leadership (Sherif, et al., 1961). Every group has
its leaders. Some are formally designated as such; others can be called leaders
because group members are influenced by what they say. Groups ordinarily
choose as their leaders people who resonate with the dominant sentiments of
the members and are good at the activities to which the group is dedicated
(Hollander, 1978). This is as true of groups in conflict as of groups engaged in
any other kind of activity. If conflict involves negotiation, people with
bargaining skills are likely to gain status. If it involves heavy contentious
activity, leadership is more likely to fall into the hands of militants, who can
mirror the anger of the membership and build a fighting force. Such leaders
have particularly strong negative attitudes and perceptions of the adversary
and are especially rigid in the demands they make. Accordingly, they tend to
reinforce and augment the group's commitment to extreme tactics.
Leadership changes of this kind occurred on both sides in the UB campus
crisis. The heaviest part of the controversy began when the campus police
clubbed several demonstrators in the Student Union. At first, officers of the
Student Government tried to exercise leadership over the campus, promising
to negotiate with the university administration. But the students were so angry
at the administration that they shunted these officers aside in favor of a group
of radicals who had not previously exerted much influence. Similar changes
occurred in the university administration. A vice-president who wanted to
mediate the controversy was excluded from decision making, while other
officers who advocated sterner measures came to the fore.
In addition to devising tactics for dealing with the opponent, leaders of groups
that are in conflict often try to strengthen their members' dedication to the
struggle, for example, by blackening the image of the adversary (Bowers &
Ochs, 1971).
The sixth and last type of collective change that often occurs in escalating
conflict is the development of new and more militant groupings. Sometimes
this involves the organization of a new subgroup in a well established
collective a committee or department to deal with the emerging struggle. At
other times, it involves the development of an entirely new struggle group.
The latter phenomenon will be discussed in some detail.
When a party in a conflict is an unorganized collection of people, a struggle
group is sometimes born, which takes responsibility for defending that party's
interests. The development of such a group is particularly likely to encourage
further escalation, because, in addition to having all the other attributes of a
group in conflict, a struggle group exists for the primary purpose of prevailing
over the adversary. Such a development is often a turning point in the conflict.
Many community conflicts have developed in this way (Coleman, 1957),
including the UB campus controversy, in which student radicals organized a
Strike Committee that kept the campus in turmoil for the next six weeks. What
happens is that people who have not previously communicated with each
other gradually become aware of their common interests and collective
identity. A sense of ingroup and outgroup begins to develop, often in
conjunction with growing pride about (Apfelbaum, 1979), and favoritism
toward, the ingroup. Radical spokespeople now emerge, whose
pronouncements help crystalize the developing consciousness. An organized
group is then formed, at first in miniature but often growing to a sizable
membership with a large following of sympathetic nonmembers. This group
has the dual function of defeating the opponent and fostering its own further
growth.
At the end of the controversy, most struggle groups simply wither away. A
few, however, go on to assume a permanent, legitimate place in the
community as advocates of the interests of the people who gave them their
origin. Several American social movements have followed such a line of
development, most notably the labor movement.
COMMUNITY POLARIZATION
When two groups come into heavy conflict with each other, it is often hard for
other community members to remain neutral. One reason is that the
participants in the controversy frequently seek support from others and
demand that they decide whether they are "with us or agin' us." Another is that
the use of escalated tactics is often annoying or frightening to the broader
community. It is hard to remain indifferent when people are yelling at each
other, hurting each other, or damaging each other's property. There is a
tendency to cast blame in such circumstances, causing many third parties to
join the side of the party to which they were initially closer or which seems to
have escalated less and hence to be more properly considered the defender.
This is the process of community polarization.
When communities polarize, their conflicts tend to escalate further. This is
because of the destruction of crosscutting group memberships and the
disappearance of neutral third parties who would otherwise urge moderation
and mediate the controversy.
CONCLUSIONS: CONFLICT MODELS EMPLOYED BY
THE PARTICIPANTS
The three conflict models (aggressor-defender, conflict spiral, and structural
change) were presented earlier as aids to a scholarly analysis of conflict. But
they can also be seen as models of participant thought--oncepts that describe
the way the parties in an escalating conflict understand what is happening to
them. Each model has implications with respect to action, so we can
sometimes make predictions about the direction taken by a conflict if we
know what models the participants in the conflict subscribe to.
A firm belief in the aggressor-defender interpretation often serves to
exacerbate the conflict spiral. This is because parties who interpret their
conflict in this way usually see themselves as the defender and the adversary
as the aggressor. If surrender is out of the question, they must redouble their
efforts at deterrence and defense to prove to their adversary that aggression
does not pay. Seeing this, the other is likely to redouble its efforts as well,
spawning@ a new round of contentious activity. The result is a conflict spiral.
Thus the pace of the current arms race between the United States and the
Soviet Union is bound to be accelerated by President Reagan's belief that
"There is no arms race; they are racing and we are just trying to catch up."
On the other hand, belief that one is in a conflict spiral can serve to dampen
this spiral. Parties who make such an analysis of their conflict are likely to
avoid overly contentious actions in order not to antagonize the other, and to be
conciliatory on the grounds that the other party will probably reciprocate
(Tetlock, 1983). These are the "doves," by contrast to the "hawks" who make
an aggressor-defender analysis. If the doves are right about the nature of the
conflict (as they often are), this stance can contribute to de-escalation. For
example, in 1977 President Sadat of Egypt, concluding that his country was
involved in a conflict spiral with Israel, made a gesture of good will in the
form of a personal journey to Jerusalem. This started a de-escalatory spiral in
relations between these countries that resulted in the eventual resumption of
diplomatic relations. If the doves are wrong (as they sometimes are), a soft
conciliatory stance may simply encourage the adversary to redouble his or her
efforts to force them to yield. For instance, after surrounding Indian outposts
in 1961, Chinese forces withdrew in an effort to signal a desire to be
conciliatory. Unfortunately, Indian leaders "interpreted the Chinese
withdrawal as a sign of timidity [and] became even bolder in their efforts to
occupy as much of the disputed territory, east and west, as was possible"
(Lebow, Jervis & Stein, 1984).
A structural change analysis of the conflict one is experiencing implies a
number of possible tactics. 'Some of these are similar to the implications of
conflict spiral analysis. For instance, people are likely to mitigate harsh words
and heavy tactics when they believe such actions will encourage negative
perceptions and the emergence of hawkish leaders on the other side. Other
tactics are peculiar to structural change analysis. For example, one may try to
avoid structural changes in one's own party that will contribute to further
escalation of a controversy. Thus a leader who suspects that a permanent
defense establishment will become a strong advocate for hawkish policies
may insist that only temporary agencies be formed to meet a current threat.
In addition, structural change analysis implies the importance of timing in
reversing any actions one has taken that are resented by the other party (Pruitt
& Gahagan, 1974). For example, it seems reasonable to assume that
110 Social Conflict
the UB campus crisis would have dissipated quickly if the administration had
publicly apologized for the initial violence by the campus police, made
restitution to the students who were assaulted, and arranged to drop the
charges against those initially arrested. Such actions would probably have
prevented the formation of the Strike.Committee. But once this committee had
developed and numerous students had taken important positions in it, the
campus was consigned to an extended period of heavy conflict.
The next chapter continues our discussion of escalation, focusing mainly on
the question of how a conflict stays escalated once it has moved along this
path.
Material 6
(From William Ury, Getting Past No , Bantam, 1993)
OVERVIEW: BREAKING BARRIERS TO COOPERATION
Diplomacy is the art of letting someone else have your way.
-Daniele Vare, Italian diplomat
We all negotiate every day. Much of our time is spent
trying to reach agreement with others. We may try to
negotiate in a cooperative spirit but frequently we fin
d ourselves frustrated. We want to get to yes, but often
the answer we get back is NO.
Think of a typical day: Over breakfast you may get
into an argument with your spouse about buying a new car.
You think it's time, but your spouse says, "Don't be
ridiculous! You know we can't afford it right now." You
arrive at work for a morning meeting with your boss. You
present a carefully prepared proposal for a new project',
but your boss interrupts you after a minute and says: "We
already tried that and it didn't work. Next item."
During your lunch hour you try to return a defective
toaster-oven, but the salesperson refuses to refund your
money because you don't have the sales slip: "It's store policy."
In the afternoon you bring an already-agreed-upon contract to
a client for
his signature. You have trumpeted the. deal to your associates and
made
the necessary arrangements with manufacturing. But your client tells
you:
"I'm sorry. My boss refuses to okay the purchase unless you give us a
fifteen percent discount."
In the evening you need to return some phone calls, but the
line is tied
up by your thirteen-year-old. Exasperated, you say, "Get off the
phone." The
teenager shouts down the hall, "Why don't you get me my own phone
line?
All my friends have them!"
Each of us faces tough negotiations with an irritable spouse,
a
domineering boss, a rigid salesperson, a tricky customer, or an
impossible
teenager. Under stress, even nice, reasonable people can turn into
angry,
intractable opponents. Negotiations can bog down or break down,
consuming our time, keeping us awake at night, and giving us ulcers.
Broadly defined, negotiation is the process of back-andforth
communication aimed at reaching agreement with others when some of
your interests are shared and some are opposed. Negotiation is not
limited
to the activity of formally sitting across a table discussing a
contentious issue; it is the informal activity you engage in whenever you try to get
something you want from another person.
Think for a moment about how you make important decisions in
your life--the decisions that have the greatest impact on your
performance at work
and your satisfaction at home. How many of those decisions can you
make
.unilaterally and how many do you have to reach with others-through
negotiation? Most people I ask this question answer: "I have to
negotiate
almost all of them." Negotiation is the pre-eminent form of decisionmaking
in personal and professional life.
It is also increasingly the most important means of making
decisions in
the public arena. Even if we aren't pers onally sitting at the table,
our lives
are affected by the outcome of negotiations. When talks between the
school board and teachers' union break down and the teachers go on
strike, our children end up staying home from school. When
negotiations
between our business and a potential purchaser fall through and the
business goes bankrupt, we may lose ourjobs. When discussions between
our government and its adversaries come- to naught, the result may be
war.
In sum, negotiations shape our lives.
Joint Problem-Solving
We may all be negotiators, yet many of us don't like to negotiate.
We see negotiation as stressful confrontation. We see ourselves
faced with an unpleasant choice. If we are soft" in order to
preserve the relationship, we end up giving up our position. If we
are "hard" in order to win our position, we strain the relationship
or perhaps lose it altogether.
There is an alternative: joint problem-solving. It is
neither
exclusively'soft nor hard, but a combination of each. It is soft
on the people, hard on the problem. Instead of attacking each
other, youjointly attack the problem. Instead of glowering across
the table, you sit next to each other facing your common problem.
In short, you turn face-to-face
6
OVERVIEW
confrontation into side-by-side problem-solving. This
is the kind of negotiation Roger Fisher and I described
more than- a decade ago in our book Getting to Yes.
Joint problem-solving revolves around interests instead
of positions. You begin by identifying each side's
interests-the concerns, needs, fears, and desires that
underlie and. motivate your opposing positions. You then
explore different options for meeting those interests.
Your goal is to reach a mutually satisfactory agreement
in an efficient and amicable fashion.
If you are looking for a promotion and raise, for example, and your boss says there's no money in the budget,
the negotiation doesn't stop there. It becomes an
exercise in joint problem-solving. Your boss inquires
about your interests, which may be to pay your children's
tuition and to grow in your job. You brainstorm together
about how to satisfy these interests while staying within
the budget. You may end up agreeing on a new set of
responsibilities, a tuition loan from the company, and
the promise of a raise next year to pay back the loan.
Your basic interests are satisfied; so are your
employer's.
Joint problem-solving can generate better results for
both sides. It saves time and energy by cutting out the
posturing. And it usually leads to better working
relationships and to mutual benefit in the future.
Five Barriers to Cooperation
Skeptics are quick to point out that all this is
easy to say, but hard to do. The principles of
joint problem-solving, they say, are like marriage
vows of mutual support-and fidelity: They no doubt
produce more satisfying relationships, but they are
hard to apply in the real world of stresses and
strains, temptations and tempests.
At the start, You may try to get your opponent to
tackle the problem jointly, but instead you may find
yourselves in a face-to-face confrontation. It is
all too easy to get drawn into a ferocious emotional
battle, to fall back into the familiar routine of
adopting rigid positions, or to let the other side
take advantage of you.
There are real-world barriers that get in the way
of cooperation. The five most common ones are:
Your reaction. The first barrier lies within you.
Human beings are reaction machines. When you're under
stress, or when you encounter a NO, or feel you are
being attacked, you naturally feel like striking back.
Usually this just perpetuates the action-reaction cycle
t hat leaves both sides losers. Or, alternatively, you
may react by impulsively giving in just to end the
negotiation and preserve the relationship. You lose
and, having demonstrated your weakness, you expose
yourself to exploitation by others. The problem you
thus face in negotiation is not only the other side's
difficult behavior but your own reaction, which can
easily perpetuate that behavior.
Their emotion. The next barrier is the other side's
negative emotions. Behind their attacks may lie anger
and hostility. Behind their rigid positions may lie
fear and distrust. Convinced they are right and you
are wrong, they may refuse to listen. Seeing the world
as eat-or-be-eaten, they may feel justified in using
nasty tactics.
Their position. In joint problem-solving, you face
the problem and attack it together. The barrier in
the way is the other side's positional behavior:
their habit of digging-into a position and trying to
get you to give in. Often they know no other way to
negotiate. They are merely using the conventional
negotiating tactics they first learned in the sandbox. In their eyes, the only alternative is for
them to give in-and they certainly don't want to do
that.
Their dissatisfaction. Your goal may be to reach a
mutually satisfactory agreement, but you may
finoithe other side not at all:intereste . d in such
an outcome. They may not see how it will benefit
thein. Even if you can satisfy their interests,
they may fear losing face if they have to back down.
And if it is your idea,: they may reject it for,
that reason alone.
Their power. Finally, if the other side sees the
negotiation as a win-lose proposition, they will be
determined to beat you. They may be guided by the
precept "What's mine is mine. What's yours is
negotiable." If they can get what they want by power
plays, why should they cooperate with you?
Getting past no requires breaking through each of
these five barriers to cooperation: your reaction,
their emotion, their position, their
dissatisfaction, and their power. It is easy to
believe that stonewalling, attacks, and tricks are
just part of the other side's basic nature, and that
there is little you can do to change such difficult
behavior. But you can affect this behavior if you
can deal successfully with its underlying
motivations.
The Breakthrough Strategy
This book lays out a five-step strategy for breaking
through each of these five barriers-the strategy of
breakthrough negotiation.
An analogy from sailing will help explain this
strategy. In -sailing, you rarely if ever get to
your destination by heading straight for it. In
between you and your goal are strong winds and
tides, reefs and shoals, not to speak of storips and
squalls. To get where you want to go, you need to
tack-to zigzag your way toward"your destination.
The same is true in the world of negotiation. -Your desired
destination is a mutually satisfactory
agreement. The direct route-focusing first on
interests and then developing options that satisfy
those interests-seems straightforward and easy. But
in the real world of strong reactions and emotions,
rigid positions, powerful dissatisfactions and
aggressions, you often cannot get to a mutually satisfactory agreement by the direct route.
Instead, you need to navigate past no by tacking-taking an indirect
route.
The essence of the breakthrough strategy is
indirect action. It requires you to do the opposite
of what you naturally feel like doing in difficult
situations. When the other side stonewalls or
attacks, you may feel like responding in kind.
Confronted with hostility, you may argue. Confronted-with unreasonable positions, you may reject.
Confronted with intransigence, you may push..
Confronted with aggression, you may escalate. But
this just leaves you frustrated, playing the other
side's game by their rules.
Your single greatest opportunity as a negotiator
is to change the game. Instead of playing their
way, let them have your way-the way of joint
problem-solving. The great home-run hitter Sadahara
Oh, the Japanese equivalent of Babe Ruth, once
explained his batting secret. Oh said that he looked
on the opposing pitcher as his partner, who with
every pitch was serving up an opportunity for him to
hit a home run. Breakthrough negotiators do the
same: They treat their opponents as negotiating
partners who are presenting an opportunity to reach
a mutually satisfactory agreement.
As in the Japanese martial arts of judo,
jujitsu, and aikido, you need to avoid pitting you
strength directly against your opponent's. Since
efforts to break down the other side's resistance
usually only increase it, you try to go around their
resistance. That is the way to break through.
Breakthrough negotiation is the opposite of
imposing your position on the other side. Rather
than pounding in a new idea from the outside, you
encourage them to reach for it from within. Rather
than telling them@what to do, you let them figure it
out. Rather than pressuring them to change their
mind, you create an environment in which they can
learn. Only they can break through their own
resistance; your job is to help them.
Their resistance to joint problem-solving stems
from the five barriers described above. Your job as
a breakthrough negotiator is to clear away the
barriers that lie between their NO and the YES of a
mutually satisfactory agreement. For each of the
five barriers, there is a corresponding step in the
strategy:
Step One. Since the first barrier is your natural reaction, the,
first step
involves suspending that reaction. To engage in joint problemsolving,
you need to regain your mental balance and stay focused on achieving
what you want. A useful image for getting perspective on the
situation is
to imagine yourself standing on a balcony looking down on your
negotiation. The first step in the breakthrough strategy is to Go to
the
Balcony.
Step Two. The next barrier for you to overcome is the other side's
negative emotions-their defensiveness, fear, suspicion, and hostility.
It is
all too easy to get drawn into an argument, but you need to resist
this
temptation. just asother side regain theirs. To create the right
climate
forjoint problem-solving, you need to defuse their negative emotions.
To
do this, you need to do the opposite of what they expect. They expect
you to behave like an adversary. Instead, you should take their side
by
listening to them, acknowledgi ng their points and their feelings,;
agreeing with them, and showing them respect. If you want to sit side
by
side facing the problem, you will need to Step to Their Side.
Step Three. Now you want to tackle the problem together. This is
hard
to do, however, when the other side digs into their position and tries
to
get you to give in. It's natural to feel like rejecting their
position, but this
will only lead them to dig in further. So do the opposite,, Accept
whatever they say and reframe it as an attempt to deal with the
problem.
For example, take their position and probe behind it: "Tell me more.
Help
me understand why you want that." Act as if they were your partners
genuinely interested in solving the problem. The third step in the
breakthrough strategy is to Reframe.
Step Four. While you may now I have engaged the other side in joint
problem-solving, you may still be far from reaching a mutually
satisfactory
agreement. The other side may be dissatisfied, unconvinced-of the
benefits of agreement. You may feel like pushing them, but this will
only
make them more resistant. So do the opposite. In the words of the
Chinese sage, "'build a golden bridge" from their position to a
mutually
satisfactory solution. You need to bridge the gap between their
interests
and yours. You need to help them save face and make the outcome
look like a victory for them. The fourth step is to Build Them a
Golden
Bridge.
Step Five. Despite your best efforts, the other side may still refuse
to
cooperate, believing they can beat you at the power game. You may be
tempted at this point to escalate. Threats and coercion often.
backfire,
however, and lead to costly and futile battles. The alternative is
to- use
power not to escalate but to educate. Enhance your negotiating power
and use it.to bring them back to the table. Show them that they
cannot
win by themselves but only together with you. The fifth step is to
Use
Power to Educate.
The sequence of the steps is important. You cannot defuse
the other
side's negative emotions unless, you have controlled your own. It.is
hard
to build them a golden bridge unless you have changed the game tojoint
problem.solving. This does not mean that once you have taken one
step,
you have completed it. On the contrary, you need to keep going to the
balcony throughout, the negotiation. As the other side's anger and
frustration resurface, you need to keep stepping to their side. The
process is like a symphony in which the different instruments join in
sequentially and then play their parts throughout.
Breakthrough negotiation can be used with anyone--an
irascible boss,
a temperamental teenager, a hostile co-worker, or an impossible
customer. It can be used by dipl6mats trying to stave off a war,
lawyers
trying to avoid a costly court battle, or spouses trying to keep a
marriage
together.
Because every person and every situation is different, you
will need to
marry the five breakthrough principles with your own knowledge of theparticulars in order to create a strategy that works for you. There
is no
magic recipe that will guarantee your success in every negotiation.
But
with patience, persistence, and the breakthrough strategy, you can
maximize your chances of getting what you want in even the most
difficult
negotiations.
The chapters that follow explain the five breakthrough steps
and
present specific techniques for carrying them out, illustrating their
application with concrete examples. First, however, you will find a
prologue about the key to effective negotiation: preparation.
Material 7
(From: Roger Fisher and William Ury, Getting to Yes , Houghton
Mifflin, 1981)
THE METHOD
2.
Separate the People
from the Problem
3.
Focus on Interests Not Positions
4.
Invent Options for Mutual Gain
5.
Insist on Objective Criteria
Separate the People
from the Problem
Everyone knows how hard it is to deal with a problem without
people misunderstanding each other, getting angry or upset, and
taking things personally.
A union leader says to his men, "All right, who called the
walkout?"
Jones steps forward. "I did. It was that bum foreman
Campbell
again. That was the fifth time in two weeks he sent me out of our
group as a replacement. He's got it in for me, and I'm tired of
it. Why should I get all the dirty work?"
Later the union leader confronts Campbell. "Why do you keep
picking on Jones? He says you've put him on replacement detail
five times in two weeks. What's going on?"
Campbell replies, "I pick Jones because he's the best. I
know I
can trust him to keep things from fouling up in a group without its
point man. I send him on replacement only when it's a key man
missing, otherwise I send Smith or someone else. It's ust that
with the flu going around there've been a lot of point men out. I
never knew Jones objected. I thought he liked the responsibility."
In another real-life situation, an insurance company lawyer
says
to the state insurance commissioner:
"I appreciate your time, Commissioner Thompson. What I'd
like to
talk to you about is some of the problems we've been having with
the presumption clause of the strict-liability
regulations. Basically, we think the way the clause was
written
causes it to have an unfair impact on those insurers whose existing
policies contain rate adjustment limitations, and we would like to
consider ways it might be revised -------."
The Commissioner, interrupting: "Mr. Johnson, your company had ample opportunity to voice any objection it had
during the hearings my department held on those
regulations before they were issued. I ran those
hearings,, Mr. Johnson. I listened to every word of
testimony, and I wrote the final version of the strict-liability
provisions personally. Are you
saying I made
a mistake?"
"No. but............"
"Are you saying I'm unfair?"
"Certainly not, sir, but I think this provision has had
consequences none of us foresaw, and ..........."
"Listen, Johnson, I promised the public when I
campaigned. for this position that I would put an end to
killer hair dryers and $5000 bombs disguised as cars.
And these regulations have done that.
"Your company made a $50 million profit on its strictliability policies last year.
What kind of fool do you
think you can play me for, coming in here talking about
'unfair' regulations and 'unforeseen consequences"? I
don't want to hear another word of that. Good day, Mr.
Johnson."
Now what? Does the insurance company lawyer press the
Commissioner on this point, making him angry and probably
not gettin'g anywhere? His company does a lot of
business in this state. A good relationship with the
Commissioner is important. Should he let the matter
rest, then, even though he is convinced that this
regulation really is unfair, that its longterm effects
are likely to be against the public interest, and that
not even the experts foresaw this problem at the time of
the original hearings?
What is going on in these cases?
Negotiators are people first
A basic fact about negotiation, easy to forget in
corporate and international transactions, is that you are
dealincr not with abstract representatives of the "other
side," but with human beings. They have emotions, deeply
held values, and different backgrounds and viewpoints;
and they are unpredictable. So are you.
This human aspect of negotiation can be either helpful
or disastrous. The process of working out an agreement
may produce a psychological commitment to a mutually
satisfactory outcome. A working relationship where
trust, understanding, respect, and friendship are built
up over time can make each new negotiation smoother and
more efficient '. And people's desire to feel good about
themselves, and their concem for what others will think
of them, can often make them more sensitive to another
negotiator's interests.
On the other hand, people get angry, depressed,
fearful, hostile, frustrated, and offended. They have
egos that are easily threatened. They see the world from
their own personal vantage point, and they frequently
confuse their perceptions with reality. Routinely, they
fail to interpret what you say in the way you intend and
do not mean what you understand them to say.
Misunderstanding can reinforce prejudice and lead to
reactions that produce counterreactions in a vicious
circle; rational exploration of possible solutions
becomes impossible and a negotiation fails. The purpose
of the game becomes scoring points, confirming negative
impressions, and apportioning blame at the expense of the
substantive interests of both parties.
Failing to deal with others sensitively as human beings
prone to human reactions can be disastrous for a
negotiation. Whatever else you are doing at any point
during a negotiation, from preparation to follow-up, it
is worth asking yourself, "Am I paying enough attention
to the people problem?"
Every negotiator has two kinds of interests: in the sub
stance and in, the relationship.
Every negotiator wants to reach an agreement that
satisfies his substantive interests. That is why one
negotiates.. Beyond that, a negotiator also has an
interest in his relationship with the other. side. 'An
antiques dealer wants both to make a profit on the sale
and to turn the customer into a regular one. At- a
minimum, a negotiator wants to maintain a working
relationship good enough to produce an acceptable
agreement if one is possible given each side's interests.
Usually, more is at stake. Most negotiations take place
in the context of an ongoing relationship where it is
important to carry on each negotiation in a way that will
help rather than hinder future relations and future
negotiations. In fact, with many long-term clients,
business partners, family members, fellow professionals,
government officials, or foreign nations, the ongoing
relationship is far more important than the outcome of
any particular negotiation,
The relationship tends to become entangled with the
problem. A major consequence of the "people problem!' in
negotiation is that the parties' relationship tends to
become entangled with their discussions of substance. On
both the giving and receiving end, we are likely to treat
people and problem, as one. Within the family, a
statement such as "The kitchen' is a mess" or "Our bank
account is low" may be intended simply to identify a
problem, but it is likely to be heard as a personal
attack. Anger over a situation may lead you to express
anger toward some human being associated with it in your
mind. Egos tend to become involved in substantive
positions.
Another reason that substantive issues become entangled
with psychological ones is that people draw from comments
on substance unfounded inferences which they then treat
as facts -about:that person's intentions and attitudes
toward them.
Unless we are careful, this process is almost
automatic; we are seldom aware that other explanations
may be equally valid. Thus in the union example, Jones
figured that Campbell, the foreman, had it in for him,
while Campbell thought he was complimenting Jones and
doing him a favor by giving him responsible assignments.
Positional bargaining puts relationship and substance
in conflict. Framing a negotiation as a contest of will
over positions aggravates the entangling process. I see
your position as a statement of how you would like the
negotiation to end; from my point of view it demonstrates
how little you care about our relationship. If I take a
firm position that you consider unreasonable, you assume
that I also think of it as an extreme position; it is
easy to conclude that I do not value our relationship -or, you -- very highly.
Posit ional bargaining deals with a negotiator's
interests both in substance and in a good relationship by
trading one off against the other. If what counts in the
long run for your company is its relationship with the
insurance commissioner, then you will probably let this
matter drop. Or, if you care more about a favorable
solution than being respected or liked by the other side,
you can try to trade relationship for substance. "If you
won't go along with me on this point, then so much for
you. This will be the last time we meet." Yet giving in
on a substantive point may buy no friendship; it may do
nothing more than convince the other side that you can be
taken for a ride.
Separate the relationship from the substance; deal
directly with the people problem
Dealing with a substantive problem and maintaining a good
working relationship need not be conflicting goals if the
parties are committed and psychologically prepared to
treat each separately on its own legitimate merits. Base
the relationship on
accurate perceptions, clear
communication, appropriate emotions, and a forward-looking, purposive
outlook. Deal with
people problems
directly; don't try to solve them with substantive
concessions.
To deal with psychological problems, use, psychological
techniques. Where perceptions are inaccurate, you can
look for ways to educate. If emotions -run high, you can
find ways for each person involved to let off stead,
Where misunderstanding exists, you can work to improve
communication.
To find your way through the jungle of people problems,
it is useful to think in terms of hree basic categories:
perception, emotion, and communication. The various
people problems all fall into one of these three baskets.
In negotiating it is easy to forget that you must deal
not only with their people problems, but also with your
own. Your anger and frustration may obstruct an
agreement beneficial , you. Your perceptions are likely
to be one-sided, and you may not be listening or
communicating adequately. The tech niques which follow
apply equally well to your people problems as to those of
the other side.
Perception
Understanding the other side's thinking is not simply a
useful activity that will help you solve your problem.
Their thinking is the problem.. Whether you are making a
deal or settling a dispute, differences are defined by
the difference between your thinking and theirs. When
two people quarrel, they usually quarrel over an object both may claim a watch - or over an event - each may
contend that the other was at fault in causing an
automobile accident. The same goes for nations. Morocco
and Algeria quarrel over a section of the Western Sahara;
India and Pakistan quarrel over each other's development
of nuclear bombs. In such circumstances people tend to
assume that what they need to know more about is the
object or the event. They study the watch or they
measure the skid marks at the scene of the accident.
They study the Western Sahara or the detailed history of
nuclear weapons development in India and Pakistan.
Ultimately, however, conflict lies not in objective
reality, but in people's heads. Truth is simply one more
argument --perhaps a good one, perhaps not - for dealing
with the difference. The difference itself exists
because it exists in their thinking. Fears, even if ill-founded, are
real fears and need to be
dealt with.
Hopes, even if unrealistic, may cause a war. Facts, even
if established, may do nothing to solve the probfem.
Both parties may agree that one lost the watch and the
other found it, but still disagree over who should get
it. It may finally be established that the auto accident
was caused by the blowout of a tire which had been driven
31,402 miles, but the parties may dispute who should pay
for the damage. The detailed history and geography of
the Western Sahara, :no matter how carefully studied and
documented, is not the stuff with which one puts to rest
that kind of territorial dispute. No study of who
developed what nuclear devices when will put to rest the
conflict between India and Pakistan.
As useful as looking for objective reality can be, it
is ultimately the reality as each side sees it that
constitutes the problem in a negotiation- and opens the
way to a solution.
Put yourself in their shoes. How you see the world
depends on where you sit. People tend to see what they
want to see. Out of a mass of detailed information, they
tend to pick out and focus on those facts that confirm
their prior perceptions and to disregard or misinterpret
those that call their perceptions into question. Each
side in a negotiation may see only the merits of its
case, and only the faults of the other side's.
The ability to see the situation as the other side sees
it, as difficult as it may be, is one of the most
important skills a negotiator can possess. It is not
enough to know that they see things differently. If you
want to influence them, you also need to understand
empathetically the power of their point of view and to
feel the emotional force with which they believe in it.
It is not enough to study them like beetles under a
microscope; you need to know what it feels like to be a
beetle. To accomplish this task you should be prepared
to withhold judgment for a while as you "try on" their
views. They may well bereve that their views are "right'
as strongly as you believe yours are. You may see on the
table a glass half full of cool water. Your spouse may
see a dirty, half-empty glass about to cause a ring on
the mahogany finish.
Consider the contrasting perceptions of a tenant and a
landlady negotiating the renewal of a lease:
TENANT'S PERCEPTIONS
LANDLADYS PERCEPTIONS
The rent is already too high,
been increased
I
The rent has not
for a long time.
With other costs going up, I can't
going up I
afford to pay more for housing.
income
With other costs
need more rental
The apartment needs painting.
apartment heavy
tear.
He has given that
wear and
I know people who pay less for
more
a comparable apartment.
apartment.
I know people who pay
for a comparable
Young people like me can't afYoung people like
him tend to
ford to pay high rents.
make noise and to be hard on
an
apartment,
The rent ought to be low because We landlords should
raise rents the neighborhood is rundown.
in order
to improve the quality of
neighborhood.
I am a desirable tenant with no
me crazy.
dogs or cats.
His hi-fi drives
I always pay the rent whenever
rent until I
she asks for it,
He never pays the
ask for it.
She is cold and distant; she never
I am a
considerate person who
asks me how things are.
never intrudes on a
tenant!s
privacy.
Understanding their point of view is not the same as
agree. ing with it. It is true that a better
understanding of their thinking may lead you to revise
your own views about the merits of a situation. But that
is not a cost of understanding their point of view, it is
a benefit. It allows you to reduce the area of conflict,
and it also helps you advance your newly enlightened
self-interest.
Don't deduce their intentions from your fears. People
tend to assume that whatever they fear, the other side
intends to do. Consider this story from the New York
Times of December 25, 1980: "They met in a bar, where he
offered her a ride home. He took her down unfamiliar
streets. He said it was a shortcut. He got her home so
fast she caught the 10 o'clock news." Why is the ending
so surprising? We made an assumption based on our fears.
It is all too easy to fall into the habit of putting
the worst interpretation on what the other side says or
does.. A suspicious interpretation often follows
naturally from one's existing, perceptions. Moreover, it
seems the "safe" thing to do, and it shows spectators how
bad the other side really is. But the cost of
interpreting whatever they say or do in its most dismal
light is that fresh,ideas in the direction of agreement
are spurned, and subtle changes of position are ignored
or rejected.
Don't blame them for your problem. It is tempting to
hold the other side responsible for your problem. "Your
company is totally unreliable. Every time you service
our rotary gene ator here at the factory, you do a lousy
job and it breaks down again." Blaming is an easy mode to
fall into, particu larly when you feel that the other
side is indeed responsible.
But even if blaming is justified, it is usually
counterrproductive. Under attack, the other side will
become defensive and will resist what you have to say.
They will cease to listen, or they will strike back with
an attack of their own. Assessing blame firmly entangles
the people with the problem.
When you talk about the problem, separate the symptoms
from the person with whom you are talking. "Our rotary
geneiator that you service has broken down again. That
is three times in the last month. The first time it was
the
out of order for an entire week. This factory needs a
functioning generator. I want your advice on how we can
minimize our risk of generator breakdown. Should we
change service companies or what? 19
Discuss each other's perceptions. One way to deal with
differing perceptions is to make them explicit and
discuss them wlih'the other side. As long as you do
this in a frank, honest manner without either side
blaming the other for the problem as each sees it, such
a discussion may provide the understand-: ing they need
to take what you say seriously, and vice-versa. It is
common in a negotiation to treat as "unimportant those
concerns of the other side perceived as not standing in
the way of an agreement. To the contrary,
communicating loudly and convincingly things you are
willing to say that they would like to hear can be one
of the best investments you as a negotiator can make, .
Consider the negotiation over the transfer of
technology which arose at the Law of the Sea
Conference. From 1974 to 1981 some 150 nations
gathered together in New York and Geneva to formulate
rules to govern uses of the ocean from fishing rights
to mining manganese in the deep seabed. At one point,
representatives of the developing countries expressed
keen interest in an exchange of technology; their
countries wanted to be able to acquire from the highly
industriahzed nations advanced technical knowledge and
equipment for deep-seabed mining.
The United States and other developed countries saw
no difficulty in satisfying that desire - and therefore
saw the issue of technology transfer as unimportant.
In one sense it was unimportant to them, but it was a
great mistake for them to treat the subject as
unimportant. By devoting substantial time to working
out the practical arrangements for transferring
technology, they might have made their offer far more
credible and far more attractive to the developing
countries. By dismissing the issue as a matter of
lesser importance to be dealt with later, the
industrialized states gave up a low-cost opportunity to
provide the developing countries with an impressive
achievement and a real incentive to reach agreement on
other issues.
Look for opportunities to act inconsistently with
their per= ceptions. Perhaps the best way to change
their perceptions is to send them a message different
from what they expect. The, visit of Egypt's President
Sadat to Jerusalem in November ,,.1977 provides an
outstanding example of such an action. They saw Egypt
and Sadat as their enemy, the man and a country that
launched a surprise attack on them four years before.
To alter that perception, to help persuade the Israelis
that he too desired peace, Sadat flew to the capital of
his enemies, a disputed capital which not even the
United States, Israel's best friend, had recognized.
Instead of acting as an enemy, Sadat acted as a
partner. Without this dramatic move, it is hard to
imagine the signing of an Egyptian-Israeli peace
treaty,
Give them a stake in the outcome by making sure they
parm ticlipate in the process. If they are not
involved in the process, they are hardly likely to
approve the product. It is that simple. If you go to
the state insurance commissioner prepared for battle
after a long investigation, it is not surprising that
he is going to feel threatened and resist your
conclusions. If -you fail to ask an employee whether
he wants an assignment with responsibility, don't be
surprised to find out that he resents it. If you want
the other side to accept a disagreeable conclusion, it
is crucial that you involve them in the process of
reaching that conclusion.
This is precisely what people tend not to do. When
you have a difficult issue to handle, your instinct is
to leave the hard part until last. "Let's be sure we
have the whole thing worked out before we approach the
Commissioner." The Commissioner, however, is much more
likely to agree to a revision of the regulations if he
feels that he has had a part in drafting it. This way
the revision becomes just one more small step in the
long drafting process that produced his original
regulation rather than someone's attempt to butcher his
completed product.
In South Africa, white moderates were trying at one
point to abolish the discriminatory pass laws. How?
By meeting in an all-white parliamentary committee to
discuss proposals. .Yet, however meritorious those
proposals might prove, they uld be insufficient, not
necessarily because of their'subm stance, but because
they would be the product of a process in which no
blacks were included. The blacks would "We superior
whites are going to figure out how to solve your
problems." It would be the "white man's burden!' all
over again, which was the problem to start with.
Even if the terms of an agreement seem favorable, the
other side may reject them simply out of a suspicion bom
of their exclusion from the drafting process. Agreement
becomes much easier if both parties feel ownership of the
ideas-. The whole process of negotiation becomes
stronger as each side puts their imprimatur bit by bit on
a developing solution. Each criticism of the terms and
consequent change, each concession, is a personal mark
that the negotiator leaves on a proposal. A proposal
evolves that bears enough of the suggestions of both
sides for each to feel it is theirs.
To involve the other side, get them involved early.
Ask their advice. Giving credit generously for ideas
wherever possible will give them a personal stake in
defending those ideas to others. It may be hard to
resist the temptation to take credit for yourself, but
forbearance pays off handsomely. Apart from the
substantive merits, the feeling of participation in the
process is perhaps the single most important factor in
determining whether a negotiator accepts a proposal.
In a sense, the process is the product,
Face-saving:
Make your proposals consistent with
their values. In the English language, "face-saving"
carries a derogatory flavor. People say, "We are doing
that just to let them save face," implying that a little
pretense has been created to allow someone to go along
without feeling badly. The tone implies ridicule.
This is a grave misunderstanding of the role and
importance of face-saving. Face-saving reflects a
person's need to reconcile the stand'he takes in a
negotiation or an agreement with his principles and with
his past words and deeds.
The judicial process concerns itself with the same
subject. 'When a judge writes an opinion on a court
ruling, he is saving face, not only for himself and for
the judicial system, but for the parties. Instead of
just telling one party, "You win," and telling the other,
"You lose," he explains how his decision is consistent
with principle, law, and precedent, He wants to appear
not as arbitrary, but as behaving in a proper fashion.
A negotiator is no different.
Often in a negotiation people will continue to hold out
not because the proposal on the table is inherently
unacceptable, but simply because they want to avoid the
feeling or the appearance of backing down to the other
side. If the substance can be phrased or conceptualized
differently so that it seems a fair outcome, they will
then accept it. Terms negotiated between a major city
and its Hispanic community on municipal jobs were
unacceptable to the mayor - until the agreement was
withdrawn and the mayor was allowed to announce the same
terms as his own decision, carrying out a campaign
promise.
Face-saving involves reconciling an agreement with principle and with the self-image of the negotiators. Its
importance should not be underestimated.
Emotion
In a negotiation, particularly in a bitter dispute,
feelings may be more important than talk. The parties
may be more ready for battle than for cooperatively
working out a solution to a common problem. People often
come to a negotiation realizing that the stakes are high
and feeling threatened. Emotions on one side will
generate emotions on the other. Fear may breed anger,
and anger, fear. Emotions may quickly bring a
negotiation to an impasse or an end.
First recognize and understand emotions, theirs and
yours,
Look at yourself during the negotiation. Are you feeling
nervous? Is your stomach upset? Are you angry at the
other side? Listen to them and get a sense of what their
emotions -are. You may find it useful to write down what
you feel - perhaps fearful, worried, angry - and then how
you might like to feel - confident, relaxed. Do the same
for them.
In dealing with negotiators who represent their organizations, it is easy to treat them as mere mouthpieces
without emotions. It is important to remember that they
too, Eke you, have personal feelings, fears, hopes, and
dreams. Their careers may be at stake. There may be
issues on which they are particularly sensitive and
others on which they are particularly proud. Nor are the
problems of emotion limited to the negotiators,
Constituents have emotions too, A constituent may have an
even more simplistic and adversarial view of the
situation.
Ask yourself what is producing the emotions. Why are you
angry? Why are they angry? Are they responding to past
grievances and looking for revenge? Are emotions
spilling over from one issue to another? Are personal
problems at home interfering with business? In the
Middle East negotiation, Israelis and Palestinians alike
feel a threat to their existence as peoples and have
developed powerful emotions that now permeate even the
most concrete practical issue, like distribution of water
in the West Bank, so that it becomes almost impossible to
discuss and resolve. Because in the larger picture both
peoples feej that their own survival is at stake, they
see every other issue in terms ' of survival.
Make emotions explicit and acknowledge them as
legitimate.
Talk with the people on the other side
about their emotions. Talk'-about your own. It does not
hurt to say, "You know, the people on our side feel we
have been mistreated and are very upset. We're afraid an
agreement will not be kept even if one is reached.
Rational or not, that is our concern. Personally, I
think we may be wrong in fearing this, but that's a
feeling others have. Do the people on your side feel the
same way?" Making your feelings or theirs an explicit
focus of discussion will not only underscore the
seriousness of the problem, it will also make the
negotiations less reactive and more "pro-active." Freed
from the burden of unexpressed emotions,
people will become more likely to work on the problem.
Allow the other side to let off steam. Often, one
effective way to deal with people's anger, frustration,
and other negative emotions is to help them release those
feelings. People obtain psychological release through
the simple process of recounting their grievances. If
you come home wanting to tell your husband about
everything that went wrong at the office, you will become
even more frustrated if he says, "Don't bother telling
me; I'm sure you had a hard day. Let's skip it." The
same is true for negotiators. Letting off steam may make
it easier to talk rationally later. Moreover, if a
negotiator makes an angry speech and thereby shows his
constituency that he
is not being "soft," they may give him a freer hand in
the negotiation. He can then rely on a reputation for
toughness to protect him from criticism later if he
eventually enters into an agreement,
Hence, instead of interrupting polemical speeches or
walking out on the other party, you may decide to control
yourself, sit there, and allow them to pour out their
grievances at you. When constituents are listening, such
occasions may release their frustration as well as the
negotiator' . Perhaps the best strategy to adopt while
the other side lets off steam is to listen quietly
without responding to their attacks, and occasionally to
ask the speaker to continue until he has spoken his last
word. In this way, you offer little support to the inflamatory substance, give the speaker every encouragement
to speak himself out, and leave little or no residue to
fester.
Don't react to emotional outbursts.
Releasing emotions
can prove risky if it leads to an emotional reaction. If
not controlled, it can result in a violent quarrel. One
unusual and effective technique to contain the impact of
emotions was used in the 1950s by the Human Relations
Committee. A labor-management group set up in the steel
industry to handle emerging conflicts before they became
serious problems. The members of the committee adopted
the rule that only one person could get angry at a time.
This made it legitimate for. others not to respond
stormily to an angry outburst. It also made letting off
emotional steam easier by making an out burst itself more
legitimate: "That's OK. It's his turn." The rule has the
further advantage of helping people control their
emotions. Breaking the rule implies that you have lost
selfcontrol, so you lose some face.
Use symbolic gestures. Any lover knows that to end a
quarrel the simple gesture of bringing a red rose goes a
long way. Acts that would produce a construcuve
emotional impact on one side often involve little or no
cost to the other, A note of sympathy., a statement of
regret, a visit to a cemetery, delivering a small present
for a grandchild., shaking hands or embracing, eating
together - all may be priceless opportunities to improve
a hostile emotional situation at small cost. On many
occasions an apology can defuse emotions effectively,
even when you do not acknowledge personal responsibility
for the action or admit an intention to harm. An apology
may be one-of the least costly and most rewarding
investments you, can make.
Communication
Without communication there is no negotiation. Negotiation is a process of communicating back and forth for the
purpose of reaching a joint decision. Communication is
never an easy thing, even between people who have an
enormous background of shared values and experience.
Couples who have lived with each other for thirty years
still have misunstandings every day. It is not
surprising, then, to find poor .communication between
people who do not know each other well and who may feel
hostile and suspicious of one another. Whatever you say,
you should expect that the other side will almost always
hear something different.
There are three big problems in communication. First,
negotiators may not be talking to each other, or at least
not in such a way as to be understood. Frequently each
side has given up on the other and is no longer
attempting any serious communication with it. Instead
they talk merely to impress third parties or their own
constituency. Rather than trying to dance with their
negotiating partner toward a mutually agreeable outcome,,
they try to trip him up. Rather than trying to talk
their partner into a more constructive step, they try to
talk the spectators into taking sides. Effective
communication between the parties is all but impossible
if each plays to the gallery.
Even if you are talking directly and clearly to them,
they may not be hearing,,,.you, This constitutes the
second problem' in communication. Note how often people
don7t seem to -pay enough attention to what you say.
Probably equally often, you would be unable to repeat
what they had said. In a negotiation, you may be so busy
thinking about what you are going to say next, how you
are going to respond to that last point or how you are
going to frame your next argument, that you forget to
listen to what the other side is saying now. Or you may
be listening more attentively to your constituency than
than the other side, Your constituents, after all, are
the ones to whom you will have to account for the results
of the negot,iation. They are the ones you are trying to
satisfy. It is not surprising that you should want to
pay close attention to them. But if you are not hearing
what the other side is saying, there is no communication.
The third communication problem is misunderstanding.
What one says, the other may misinterpret. Even when
negotiators are in the same room, communication from on
to the: other can seem like sending smoke signals in a
high. de Where the parties speak different languages the
chance for misinterpretation is compounded. For example,
in Persian, the word 44 compromise" apparently lacks the
positive meaning it has in English of "'a midway solution
both sides can live with," but has only a negative
meaning as in "her virtue was compromised" or our
integrity was compromised." Similarly, the word
"mediator" in Persian suggests "meddler," someone who is
barging in uninvited. In early 1980 U.N. Secretary
General Waldheim flew to Iran to deal with the hostage
question. His efforts were seriously set back when
Iranian national radio and television broadcast in
Persian a remark he reportedly made on his arrival in
Tehran: "I have come as a mediator to work out a
compromise." Within an hour of the broadcast, his car was
being stoned by angry
What can be done about these three problems of communication?
Listen actively and acknowledge what is being said. The
need for listening is obvious, yet it is difficult to
listen well, especially under the stress of an ongoing
negotiation. Listening enables you to understand their
perceptions, feel their emotions, and hear what they are
trying to say. Active listening improves not only what
you hear, but also what they say. If you pay attention
and interrupt occasionally to say, "Did I understand
correctly that you are saying that ... ?" the other side
will realize that they are not just killing time, not
just going through a routine. They will also feel the
satisfaction of being heard and understood. It has been
said that the cheapest concession you can make to the
other side is to let them know they have been heard.
Standard techniques of good listening are to pay close
attention to what is said, to ask the other party to
spell out carefully and clearly exactly what they mean,
and to request at ideas be repeated if there is any
ambiguity or uncertainty. ',Make it your task while
listening not to phrase a response, ,,but to understand
them as they see themselves. Take in their perceptions,
their needs, and their constraints.
Many consider it a good tactic not to give the other
side's case too much attention, and not to admit any
legitimacy in their point of view. A good negotiator
does just the reverse. Unless you acknowledge what they
are saying and demonstrate that you understand them, they
may believe you have not heard them. When you then try
to explain a different point of view, they will suppose
that you still have not grasped what they mean. They
will say to themselves, "I told him my view, but now he's
saying something different, so he must not have
understood it." Then instead of listening to your point,
they will be considering how to make their argument in a
new way so that this time maybe you will fathom it. So
show that you understand them. "Let me see whether I
follow what you are telling me. From your point of view,
the situation looks like this. . . ."
As you repeat what you understood them- to have said,
phrase it positively from their point of view, making the
strength of their case clear. You might say, "You have
a strong case. Let me see if I can explain it. Heres
the way it strikes me. . Understanding is not agreeing.
One can at the same time understand perfectly and
disagree completely with what the other side is saying.
But unless you can convmce them that you do grasp how
they see it, you may be unable to explain your viewpoint
to them. Once you have made their case for them, then
come back with the problems you find in their proposal.
If you can put their case better than they can, and then
refute it, you maximize the chance of initiating a
constructive dialogue on the merits and minimize the
chance of their believing you have misunderstood them.
Speak to be understood. Talk to the other side. It is
easy to forget sometimes that a negotiation is not a
debate. Nor is it a trial. You are not trying to
persuade some third party. The person you are trying to
persuade is seated at the table with you. If a
negotiation is to be compared with a legal proceeding,
the situation resembles that of two judges trying to
reach agreement on how to decide a case. Try putting
yourself in that role, treating your opposite number as
a fellow judge with whom you are attempting to work out
a joint opinion. In this context it is clearly
unpersuasive to blame the other party for the problem, to
engage in name-calling, or to raise your voice. On the
contrary, it will help to recognize explicitly that they
see the situation differently and to try to go forward as
people with a joint problem.
To reduce the dominating and distracting effect that
the press, home audiences, and third parties may have, it
is -useful to establish private and confidential means of
cmmunicating with the other side. You can also improve
communication by limiting the size of the group meeting.
In the negotiations over the city of Trieste in 1954, for
example, little progress was
made in the talks among Yugoslavia, Britain, and the
United States until the three principal negotiators
abandoned their large delegations and started meeting
alone and informally in a private house. A good case can
be made for changing Woodrow Wilson's appealing slogan
"Open covenants openly arrived at" to "Open covenants
privately arrived at." No matter how many people are
involved in a negotiation, important decisions are
typically made when no more than two people are in the
room.
Speak about yourself, not about them. In many
negotiations, each side explains and condemns at great
length the motivations and intentions of the other side.
It is more persuasive, however, to describe a problem in
terms of its impact on you than in terms of what they did
or why: "I feel let down" instead of "You broke your
word." "We feel discrimim nated against" rather than
"You're a racist." If you make a ,statement about them
that they believe is untrue, they wifl you or get angry;
they will not focus on your concern. But a statement
about how you feel is difficult to challenge. You convey
the same information without provoking a defensive
reaction that will prevent them from taking it in.
Speak for a purpose. Sometimes the problem is not too
little communication, but too much. When anger and
misperm ception are high, some thoughts are best left
unsaid. At other times,, full disclosure of how flexible
you are may make it harder to reach agreement rather than
easier. If you let me know that you would be willing to
sell a house for $40,000, after I have said that I would
be willing to pay as much as $45,000, we may have more
trouble striking a deal than if you had just kept quiet.
The moral is: Before making a significant statement, know
what you want to communicate or find out, and know what
purpose this information will serve.
Prevention works best
The techniques just described for dealing with problems
of perception, emotion, and communication usually work
wen. However, the best time for handling people problems
is before they become people problems. This means
building a personal and organizational relationship with
the other side that can cushion the people on each side
against the knocks of negotiation. It also means
structuring the negotiating game in ways that separate
the substantive problem from the relationship and protect
people's egos from getting involved in substantive
discussions.
Build a working relationship. Knowinia the other side
personally really does help. It is much easier to
attribute diabolical intentions to an unknown abstraction
called the "other side" than to someone you know
personally. Dealing with a classmate, a colleague, a
friend, or even a friend of a friend is quite different
from dealing with a stranger. The more quickly you can
turn a stranger into someone you know. the easier a
negotiation is likely to become. You have less
difficulty understanding where they are coming from. You
a foundation of trust to build upon in a difficult
negotiation. You have smooth " familiar communication
routines. It is easier to defuse tension with a joke or
an informal aside.
The time to develop such a relationship is before -the.
negoti.ation begins. Get to know them and find out about
their likes and dislikes. Find ways to meet them
informally. Try arriving early to chat before the
negotiation is scheduled to start, and linger after it
ends. Benjamin Franklin's favorite technique was to ask
an adversary if he could borrow a certain book. This
would flatter the person and give him the comfortable
feeling of knowing that Franklin owed him a favor.
Face the problem, not the people. If negotiators view
themselves as adversaries in a personal face-to-face
confrontation, it is difficult to separate their
relationship from the substantive problem. In that
context, anything one negotiator says about the problem
seems to be directed personally at the other and is
received that way. Each side tends to become defensive
and reactive and to ignore the other side's legitimate
interests altogether.
A more effective way for the parties to think of
themselves is as partners in a hardheaded, side-by-side
search for a fair agreement advantageous to each.
Like two shipwrecked sailors in a lifeboat at sea
quarreling over limited rations and supplies, negotiators
may begin by seeing each other as adversaries. Each may
view the other as a hindrance. To survive, however,
those two sailors will want to disentangle the objective
problems from the people. They will want to identify the
needs of each, whether for shade, medicine, water, or
food. They will want to go further and treat the meeting
of those needs as a shared problem, along with other
shared problems like keeping watch, catching rainwater,
and getting the lifeboat to shore. Seeing themselves as
engaged in side-by-side efforts to solve a mutual
problem, the sailors will become better able to reconcile
their conflicting .,,interests as well as to advance
their shared interests. Similarly "-,,with two
negotiators. However difficult personal relations may be
between us, you and I become better able to reach an
amicable reconciliation of our various interests when we
accept that task as a shared problem and face it jointly.
To help the other side change from a face-to-face orient
- ation to side-by-side, you might raise the issue with
them explicitly. "Look, we're both lawyers [diplomats,
businessmen, family, etc.]. Unless we try to satisfy your
interests, we are hardly likely to reach an agreement
that satisfies mine, and vice versa. Let's look together
at the problem of how to satisfy our collective
interests." Alternatively, you could start treating the
negotiation as a side-by-side process and by your actions
make it desirable for them to join in.
It helps to sit literally on the same side of a table
and to have in front of you the contract, the map, the
blank pad of paper, or whatever else depicts the problem.
If you have estabm lished a basis for mutual trust, so
much the better. But however precarious your
relationship may be, try to structure the negotiation as
a side-by-side activity in which the two of you - with
your differing interests and perceptions, and your emotional involvement - jointly face a common task. Separatingthe,people from the problem is
not
something
you can do once and, forget about; you have to keep
working
at it. The basic approach is to deal with the people
as human beings and with the problem on its merits.
How to do the latter is the subject of the next three
chapters.
Focus on Interests,
Not Posit'ions
Consider the story of two men quarreling in a library.
One wants the window open and the other wants it closed.
They bicker back and forth about how much to leave it
open: a cract, halfway, three quarters of the way. No
solution satisfies them both.
Enter the librarian. She asks one why he wants the
window open: "To get some fresh air." She asks the other
why he wants it closed: "To avoid the draft." After
thinking a minute, she opens wide a window in the next
room, bringing in fresh air without a draft.
For a wise solution reconcile interests, not positions
This story is typical of many negotiations. Since the
parties' problem appears to be a conflict of positions,
and since their goal is to agree on a position, they
naturally tend to think and talk about positions - and in
the process often reach an impasse.
The librarian could not have invented the solution she
did if she had focused only on the two men's stated
positions of wanting the window open or closed. Instead
she looked to their underlying interests of fresh air and
no draft. This difference between positions and
interests is crucial.
Interests define the problem. The basic problem in
a negotiation lies not in conflicting positions, but in
the conflict between each side's needs, desires,
concerns, and fears. The parties may say:
"I am trying to get him to stop that real estate
development next door."
Or "We disagree. He wants $50,000 for the house. I
won 9t pay a penny more than $47,500."
But on a more basic level the problem is:
"He needs the cash; I want peace and quiet."'
Or "He needs at least $50,000 to settle with his ex-wife.
told my family that I
wouldn7t pay more than
$47,500 for a house."
Such desires and concerns are interests.
Interests,motivate people; they are the silent movers
behind the hubbub of position. 'Your position is
something you have decided upon. Your interests are what
caused you to so decide.
The Egyptian-Israeli peace treaty blocked out at Camp
David in 1978 demonstrates the usefulness of looking"
positions, Israel had occupied the Egyptian Sinai P uli
since the Six Day War of 1967. When Egypt and Israel -s
at down together in 1978 to negotiate a peace, their
positions were incompatible. Israel insisted on keeping
some of the Sinai. Egypt, on the other, hand, insisted
that every inch of the Sinai be returned to Egyptian
sovereignty. Time and again, people drew maps showing
possible boundary lines that would divide the Sinai
between Egypt and Israel. Compromising in this way was
wholly unacceptable to Egypt. To go back to the
situation as it was in 1967 was equally unacceptable to
Israel.
Looking to their interests instead of their positions
made it possible to develop a solution. Israel9s
interest lay in security; they did not want Egyptian
I
tanks poised on their border ready to roll across at any
time. Egypt's interest lay in sovereignty; the Sinai had
been part of Egypt since the time of the Pharaohs, After
centuries of domination by Greeks, Romans, Turks, French,
and British, Egypt had only recently regained full
sovereignty and was not about to cede territory to
another foreign conqueror.
At Camp David, President Sadat of Egypt and Prime Minister Begin of Israel agreed to a plan that would return
the Sinai to complete Egyptian sovereignty and, by
demilitarizing large areas, would still assure Israeli
security. The Egyptian flag would fly everywhere, but
Egyptian tanks would be nowhere near Israel.
Reconciling interests, rather than positions works for
two reasons. First, for every interest there usually
exist several possible positions that could satisfy it.
All too often people simply adopt the most obvious
position, as Israel did, for example, in announcing that
they intended to keep part of the Sinai. When you do
look behind opposed positions for the motivating
interests, you can often find an alternative position
which meets not only your interests but theirs as well.
In the Sinai, demilitarization was one such alternative.
Reconciling interests rather than compromising between
positions also works because behind opposed positions He
many more interests than conflicting ones.
Behind opposed positions lie shared and compatible
interests, as well as conflicting ones. We tend to
assume that because the other side's positions are
opposed to ours, their interests must also be opposed.
If we have an interest in defending ourselves, then they
must want to attack us. If we have an interest in
minimizing the rent, then their interest must be to
maximize it. In many negotiations, however, a close
examination of the underlying interests will reveal the
existence of many more interests that are shared or
compatible than ones that are opposed.
For example, look at the interests a tenant shares with
a prospective landlord:
1.
Both want stability. The landlord wants a stable
tenant; the tenant wants a permanent address.
2.
Both would like to see the apartment well
maintained. The tenant is going to live there; the
landlord wants to increase the value of the apartment as
well as the reputation of the building.
3.
Both are interested in a good relationship with each
other. The landlord wants a tenant who pays the rent
regularly; the tenant wants a responsive landlord who
will carry out the necessary repairs.
differ.
They may have interests that do not conflict but simply
For example:
1.
The tenant may not want to deal with fresh paint to
which he is allergic. The landlord will not want to
pay the costs of repainting all the other apartments.
2.
The landlord would like the security of a down
payment of the first month's rent, and he may want
tomorrow. The tenant, knowing that this is a good
apartment, may be indifferent on the question of paying
tomorrow or later.
When weighed against these shared and divergent
interests, the opposed interests in minimizing the rent
and maximizing the return seem more manageable. The
shared interests will likely result in a long lease, an
agreement to share the cost of improving the apartment,
and efforts by both parties to accommodate each other in
the interest of a good relationship. The divergent
interests may perhaps be reconciled by a down payment
tomorrow and an agreement by the landlord to paint the
apartment provided the tenant buys the paint. The
precise amount of the rent is all that remains to be
settled, and the market for rental apartments may define
that fairly well.
Agreement is often made possible precisely because
interests differ. You and a shoe seller may both like
money and shoes. Relatively, his interest in the thirty
dollars exceeds his interest in the shoes. For you, the
situation is reversed: you like the shoes better than the
thirty dollars. Hence the deal. Shared interests and
differing but complementary interests can both serve as
the building blocks for a wise agreement.
How do you identify interests?
The benefit of looking behind positions for interests
is clear. How to go about it is less clear. A position
is likely to be concrete and explicit; the interests
underlying it may well be unexpressed, intangible, and
perhaps inconsistent, How do you go about understanding
the interests involved in a negotiation, remembering that
figuring out their interests will be at least as
important as figuring out yours?
Ask "Why?" One basic technique is to put yourself in
their shoes. Examine each position they take, and ask
yourself "Why?" Why, for instance, does your landlord
prefer to fix the rent - in a five-year lease - year by
year? The answer ..,you may come up with, to be
protected against increasing costs, is probably one of
his interests. You can also ask the landlord himself why
he takes a particular position. If you do, make clear
that you are asking not for justification of this
position, but for an understanding of the needs, hopes,
fears., or desires that it serves. "What's your basic
concern, Mr. Jones, in wanting the lease to run for no
more than three years?"
Ask "Why not?" Think about their choice. One of the
most useful ways to uncover interests is first to
identify the basic decision that those on the other side
probably see you asking them for, and then to ask
yourself why they have not made that decision. What
interests of theirs stand in the way? If you are trying
to change their minds, the starting point is to figure
out where their minds are now.
In constructing the other side's presently perceived
choice the first question to ask is "Whose decision do I
want to affect?" The second question is what decision
people on the other side now see you asking them to make.
If you have no idea what they think they are being called
on to do, they may not either. That alone may explain
why they are not deciding as you would like.
Now analyze the consequences, as the other side would
probably see them, of agreeing or refusing to make the
decision you are asking for. You may find a checklist of
consequences such as the following helpful in this task:
Impact on my interests
Will I lose or gain political support?
Will colleagues criticize or praise me?
Impact on the group's interests
What will be the short-term consequences? The long-term
consequences?
What will be the economic consequences (political,
legal, psychological, military, etc.)?
*
What will be the effect on outside supporters and
public opmion?
Will the precedent be good or bad?
Will making this decision prevent doing something
better?
Is the action consistent with our principles? Is it
"right"?
Can I do it later if I want?
In this entire process it would be a mistake to try for
great precision. Only rarely will you deal with a
decision-maker who writes down and weighs the pros and
cons. You are trying to understand a very human
choice, not making a mathematical calculation.
Realize that each side has multiple interests. In
almost every negotiation each side will have many
interests, not just one. As a tenant negotiating a
lease, for example, you may want to obtain a favorable
rental agreement, to reach it quickly with little
effort, and to maintain a good working relationship
with your landlord. You will have not only a strong
interest in affecting any agreement you reach, but also
one in effecting an agreement. You will be
simultaneously pursuing both your independent and your
shared interests.
A common error in diagnosing a negotiating situation
is toassume that each person on the other side has the same
interests. This is almost never the case. During the
Vietnam War President Johnson was in the habit of lumping
together all le different members of the government of
North Vietnam, the Vietcong in the south, and their
Soviet and Chinese advisers and calling them collectively
"he." "The enemy has to learn that he can't cross the
United States with impunity. He is going to have to
learn that aggression doesn't pay." It win be difficult
to influence any such "him" (or even "them") to agree to
anything if you fail to appreciate the differing inm
terests of the various people and factions involved.
Thinking of negotiation as a two-person, two-sided
affair can be illuminating, but it should not blind you
to the usual presence of other persons, other sides, and
other influences. In one baseball salary negotiation the
general manager kept insisting that $200,000 was simply
too much for a particular player, although other teams
were paying at least that much to similarly talented
players. In fact the manager felt his
positioil
was
unjustifiable, but he had strict instructions from the
owners to hold firm without explaining why., because were
in financial difficulties that they did not want the
public to hear about.
Whether it is his employer, his client, his employees,
his colleagues, his family, or his wife, every negotiator
has a constituency to whose interests he is sensitive.
To understand that negotiators interests means to
understand the variety of somewhat differing interests
that he needs to take into account,
The most powerftd interests are basic human needs. In
searching for the basic interests behind a declared
position., look particularly for those bedrock concerns
which motivate all people. If you can take care of such
basic needs, you increase the chance both of reaching
agreement and, if an agreem ment is reached, of the other
side's keeping to it. Basic human needs include:
security
economic well-being
a sense of belonging
recognition
control over one's life
As fundamental as they are, basic human needs are easy
to overlook. In many negotiations, we tend to think that
the only interest involved is money. Yet even in a
negotiation over a monetary figure, such as the amount of
alimony to be specified in a separation agreement, much
more can be involved. What does a wife really want in
asking for $500 a week in alimony? Certainly she is
interested in her economic wellbeing, but what else?
Possibly she wants the money in order to feel
psychologically secure. She may also want it for
recognition: to feel that she is treated fairly and as an
equal. Perhaps the husband can ill afford to pay $500 a
week, and perhaps his wife does not need that much, yet
she will likely accept less only if her needs for
security and recognition are met in other ways.
What is true for individuals remains equally true for
groups and nations. Negotiations are not likely to make
much progress as long as one side believes that the
fulfillment of their basic human needs is being
threatened by the other. In negotiations between the
United States and Mexico, the U.S. wanted a low price for
Mexican natural gas. Assuming that this was a
negotiation over money, the U.S. Secretary of Energy
refused to approve a price increase negotiated with the
Mexicans by a U.S. oil consortium. Since the Mexicans
had no other potential buyer at the time, he assumed that
they would then lower their asking price. But the
Mexicans had a strong interest not only in getting a good
price for their gas but also in being treated with
respect and a sense of equality. The U.S. action seemed
like one more attempt to bully Mexico; it produced
enormous anger., Rather than sell their gas, the Mexican
government began to bum it off, and any chance of
agreement on a lower price became politically impossible.
To take another example, in the negotiations over the
future of Northern Ireland, Protestant leaders tend to
ignore the Catholics' need for both belonging and
recognition, for being accepted and treated as equals.
In turn, Catholic leaders often appear to give too little
weight to the Protestants' need to feel secure. Treating
Protestant fears as "their problem" rather than as a
legitimate concern needing attention makes it even more
difficult to negotiate a solution.
Make a list. To sort out the various interests of each
side, it helps to write them down as they occur to you.
This will not only help you remember them; it will also
enable you to improve the quality of your assessment as
you learn new information and to place interests in their
estimated order of importance. Furthermore, it may
stimulate ideas for how to meet these interests.
Talking about interests
The purpose of negotiating is to serve your interests.
The chance of that happening increases when you
communicate them. The other side may not know what your
interests are, and, you may not know theirs. One or both
of you may be focusing on past grievances instead of on
future concerns. Or you may not even be listening to
each other. How do you discuss interests constructivel
without getting locked into rigid positions?
If you want the other side to take your interests into
account, explain to them what those interests are. A
member of a concerned citizens' group complaining about
a construction project in the neighborhood should talk
explicitly about such issues as ensuring children's
safety and getting a good night's sleep. An author who
wants to be able to give a great many of his books away
should discuss the matter with his publisher.
The
publisher has a shared interest in promotion and may be
willing to offer the author a low price.
Make your interests come alive. If you go with a
raging ulcer to see a doctor, you should not hope for
much relief if you describe it as a mild stomachache. It
is your job to have the other side understand exactly how
important and legitimate your interests are.
One guideline is be specific. Concrete details not
only make your description credible, they add impact.
For example: "Three times in the last week, a child was
almost run over by one of your trucks. About eight-thirty Tuesday
morning that huge red
gravel truck of
yours, going north at almost forty miles an hour, had to
swerve and barely missed hitting seven-year-old Loretta
Johnson."
As long as you do not seem to imply that the other
side!s interests are unimportant or illegitimate, you can
afford to take a strong stance in setting forth the
seriousness of your concerns. Inviting the other side to
"correct me ff rm wrong" shows your openness, and if they
do not correct you, it im.plies that they accept your
description of the situation.
Part of the task of impressing the other side with
your interests lies in establishing the legitimacy of
those interests. You want them to feel not that you are
attacking them personally, but rather that the problem
you face legitimately demands attention. You need to
convince them that they might well feel the same way if
they were in your shoes. "Do you have children? How
would you feel if trucks were hurtling at forty miles per
hour down the street where you live?"
Acknowledge their interests as part of the problem.
Each of us tends to be so concerned with his or her own
interests that we pay too little heed to the interests of
others.
People listen better if they feel that you have
understood them. They tend to think that those who
understand them are intelligent and sympathetic people
whose own opinions may be worth listening to. So if you
want the other, side to appreciate your interests, begin
by demonstrating that,.you appreciate theirs.
"As I understand it, your interests as a construction
company are basically to get the job done quickly at
minimum cost, and to preserve your reputation for safety
and responsibility in the city. Have I understood you
correctly? Do you have other important interests?"
In addition to demonstrating that you have understood
their interests it helps to acknowledge that thejr
interests-,are part ot ;he overall,, problem you are.
trying to solve. This is especiary easy to do if you
have shared interests: "It would be terrible for all of
us if one of your trucks hit a child."
Put the problem before your answer. In talking to
someone who represents a construction company, you might
say, "We believe you should build a fence around the
project within forty-eight hours and beginning
immediately should restrict the speed of your trucks on
Oak Street to fifteen miles an hour. Now let me tell you
why...." If you do, you can be quite certain that he will
not be listening to the reasons. He has heard your
position and is no doubt busy preparing arguments'.
against it. He was probably disturbed by your tone or by
the, suggestion itself. As a result, your justification
will slip by him altogether.
If you want someone to listen and understand your
reasoning,, give your interests and reasoning first and
your conclu sions or proposals later. Tell the company
first about the dangers they are creating for young
children and about your sleepless nights. Then they will
be listening carefully., if only to try to figure out
where you will end up on this question. And when you
tell them, they will understand why.
Look forward, not back. It is surprising how often we
simply react to what someone else has said or done. Two
people will often fall into a pattern of discourse that
resembles a negotiation, but really has no such purpose
whatsoever. They disagree with each other over some
issue, and the talk goes back and forth as though they
were seeking agreement. In fact, the argument is being
carried on as a ritual, or simply a pastime. Each is
engaged in scoring points against the other or in
gathering evidence to confirm views about the other that
have long been held and are not about to be changed.
Neither party is seeking agreement or is even trying to
influence the other.
If you ask two people why they are arguing, the answer
will typically identify a cause, not a purpose. Caught
up in a quaffel, whether between husband and wife,
between company and union, or between two businesses,
people are more likely to respond to what the other side
has said or done than to act in pursuit of their own
long-term interests. "They can't treat me like that. If
they think they're going to get away with that, they will
have to think again. I'll show them."
The question "Why?" has two quite different meanings.
One looks backward for a cause and treats our behavior as
determined by prior events. The other looks forward for
a purpose and treats our behavior as subject to our free
will. We need not enter into a philosophical debate
between free will and determinism in order to decide how
to act. Either we have free will or it is determined
that we behave as if we do. In either case, we make
choices. We can choose to look back or to look forward.
You will satisfy your interests better if you talk about
where you would like to go rather than about where you
have come from. Instead of arguing with the other side
about the past about last'quarter's costs (which were too
high), last week's action (taken without adequate
authority), or yesterday's performance (which was less
than expected) - talk about what you want to have happen
in the future. Instead of asking them to justify what
they did yesterday, ask,, "Who should do what tomorrow?"
Be concrete but flexible. In a negotiation you want to
know where you are going and yet be open to fresh ideas.
To avoid having to make a difficult decision on what to
settle for, people will often go into a negotiation with
no other plan than to sit down with the other side and
see what they offer or demand.
How can you move from identifying interests to
developing specific options and still remain flexible
with regard to those options? To convert your interests
into concrete options, ask yourself, "If tomoffow the
other side agrees to go along with me, what do I now
think I would like them to go along with?" To keep your
flexibility, treat each option you formulate as simply
illustrative. Think in terms of more than one option
that meets your interests. "Illustrative specificity" is
the key concept.
Much of what positional bargainers hope to achieve with
an opening position can be accomplished equally well with
an illustrative suggestion that generously takes care of
your interest. For example, in a baseball contract
negotiation, an Agent might say that "$250,000 a year
would be the kind of ure that should satisfy Cortez's
interest in receiving the salary he feels he is worth.
Something on the order of a five-year contract should
meet his need for job security."
Having thought about your interests, you should go into
a meeting not only with one or more specific options that
would meet your legitimate interests but also with an
open mind. An open mind is not an empty one.
Be hard on the problem, soft on the people. You can be
just as hard in talking about your interests as any
negotiator can be in talking about his position.
Having thought about your interests, you should go into
a meeting not only with one or more specific options that
would meet your legitimate interests but also with an
open mind. An open mind is not an empty one.
You can be just as hard in talking about your interests
as any negotiator can be in talking about his position.
In fact, it is usually advisable to be hard. It may not
be wise to commit yourself to your position, but it is
wise to, commit yourself to your interests. This is the
place . in a negotiation to spend your aggressive
energies., The other. side,. being concerned with their
own, interests, will tend to have overly optimistic'
expectations of the range of possible agreements. Often
the wisest solutions, those that produce the maximum gain
for you at, the minimum cost to the other side, are
produced only by strongly advocating your interests. Two
negotiators,, each pushing hard for their interests, will
often stimulate each other"s creativity in thinking up
mutually advantageous solutions,
The construction company, concerned with inflation, may
place a high value on its interest in keeping costs down
and in getting the job done on time, You may have to
shake them up. Some honest emotion,may help restore a
better balance between profits and children's lives. Do
not let your desire to be conciliatory stop you from
doing justice to your problem.
"Surely you're not saying that my son's life is worth
less than the price of a fence. You wouldn't say that
about your son. I don't believe you're an insensitive
person, Mr. jenkins.'Let's figure out how to solve this
problem."
If they feel personally threatened by an attack on the
problem, they may grow defensive -and may cease to
listen. This is why it is important to separate the
people from the problem. Attack the problem without
blaming the people. Go even further and be personally
supportive: Listen to them with respect, show them
courtesy, express your appreciation for their time and
effort, emphasize your concern with meeting their basic
eeds, and so on. Show them that you are attacking the
problem, not them.
One useful rule of thumb is to give positive support to
the human beings on the other side equal in strength to
the vigor with which you emphasize the problem. This
combination of support and attack may seem inconsistent.
Psychologically, it is; the inconsistency helps'make-it
work. A well-known theory of psychology,, the theory of
cognitive dissonance, holds that people dislike
inconsistency and will act to eliminate it. By
attacking a problem,-such as speeding trucks on a
neighborhood-street, and at the same time giving the
company representative positive sup-port, you create
cognitive dissonance for him. To overcome this
dissonance, he will be tempted to dissociate himself from
the problem in order to join you in doing something about
it. Fighting hard on the substantive issues increases
the pressure. for an;effective solution; giving support
to the human beings on the other side tends to improve
your relationship' and to increase ne likelihood of
reaching agreement. It is the combination of support and
attack which works; either alone is likely to be in
sufficient.
Negotiating hard for your interests does not mean
being closed
to the other side's point of view. Quite the
contrary. You can hardly expect the other side to
listen to your interests and discuss the options you
-suggest if you don't take their interests ' into account and show yourself to be open to their
suggestions. Successful negotiation requires being
both firm and open.
Material 8
Wallace and Wolf
CONFLICT THEORY
AND THE CRITIQUE OF SOCIETY
This section covers the conflict theory of Marx and modern
Marxist sociologists,of the Frankfurt School analysts-particularly
Horkheimer, Adorno, Fromm, Marcuse, and Habermas-and
of C. Wright Mills. All the writers in this group are
distinguished by their view of social science; their image of
society as divided hierarchically into exclusive groups; and
their belief in the possibility of an ideal social order. In
general, we refer to them as "critical" theorists because they
all use social science to criticize society, and in particular
the "ruling class," the "power elite," or what is often the
"establishment." However, "critical theory" is also used more
narrowly to refer to the work of the Frankfurt School.
"Critical" conflict theorists believe that social
analysts should not separate their work from their moral
commitments, and they see their theories as a force for
change and progress. They also believe that objectivity is
more or less impossible. For them social science is
inextricably bound up with the particular views of a writer,
which are in turn a function of his or her society, and fact
is consequently inextricable from value. In other words,
they reject the usual scientific view that, whatever
writers' own values, or motives in writing, may be, their
theories stand or fall by whether independent factual
evidence supports them. At the same time, "critical"
conflict theorists feel sure that their own values and
standards are the right ones, and therefore a justified
basis for social critique.
The particular focus of their critique is the way
wealth, status, and power are distributed in society.
Theorists of this type generally see society as divided
rather clearly between a small group of powerful and
privileged people and an exploited or manipulated mass.
They are also inclined to use a "unicausal" theory of social
structure, and to see people's circumstances as primarily
determined by one set of institutions, most often property.
At the same time, they do not believe that society need be
highly segmented and unequal. They contrast the societies
they analyze with a better order of things and often compare
the "irrational" present, in which human development is
stunted, with an ideal and "rational" state of affairs, in
which human potential will be fulfilled. This vision of'a
society based on values which they presume to be absolutely
valid, as well as their concept of "real" human nature, are
the starting points for their criticisms of actual
societies.
74
Conflict Theory
In all of this, Marx is the dominant influence. The
argument that
ideas
are a product of social circumstances and for that
reason not objectively
correct is his. Moreover, although he believed that his own
theory was not open to the charge of being an "ideology" but
was, on the contrary, objectively true, he also regarded his
work as a form of political and moral action-an expression
of the ideas that would guide the proletariat to inevitable
victory. Marxists use the term praxis to describe actions
informed in this way by theoretical considerations and, more
precisely, revolutionary consciousness. In addition, Marx
presented a two-class model of society; divided between
oppressors and oppressed on the basis of property, and
looked forward to the communist utopia in which mankind would
realize its essential nature.
For the most part, conflict theory of this type has developed
in Europe, particularly western Europe. In communist countries,
Marxism or Marxism-Leninism is essentially a state religion and
not open to critical analysis and development. Philosophers,
sociologists, and political theorists, such as Leszek Kolakowski,
who engage in such analysis, are likely to be forced into
exile.24 On the other hand, in western Europe intellectuals have
continued to be greatly influenced by Marx. Although the
organized Communist parties have themselves produced some
important Marxist theorists, such as Antonio Gramsci in Italy,
they too insist on doctrinal orthodoxy; and the major source of
modern critical conflict theory is Marxist intellectuals outside
the party hierarchies.
In America there was a strong Marxist and Communist element
in intellectual life during the 1930s and 1940s. Nevertheless,
although a number of sociologists and economists (such as Norman
Birnbaum and Paul Sweezy) continued to use Marxist categories,
Marxist analysis had little direct impact on American sociology
in the twenty years immediately after the Second World War.
During this period, the only widely known and influential
"critical" sociologist was C. Wright Mills, who was heavily
influenced by Marx but not in any clear sense a Marxist. During
the Vietnam period, however, many younger American sociologists
were involved with the New Left and heavily influenced by various
radical writers, but quite specifically by Marx. Consequently,
both the "critical sociology" of the Frankfurt tradition and
other Marxist and neo-Marxist writings are becoming increasingly
known and influential in American SoCiology.25 Marxian journals
have been founded specifically devoted to this approach.
KARL MARX AND MODERN MARXIST SOCIOLOGY
Karl Marx was born in 1818 in Trier, Germany. His parents
were Jews who had converted to Protestantism to avoid
discrimination and loss of civil rights and, in particular,
to protect his father's law practice. Marx also began to
study law. However, at the University of Berlin, he became
fascinated by the philosophy of Hegel, who interpreted the
whole of history as the process by which "Spirit" (and
consequently humanity) progressed towards complete self-knowledge and
a "rational" and "free" society. Marx became
a Young Hegelian, one of a group of young philosophers who
questioned many parts of the master's teachings while
remaining beholden to his approach. Indeed, in later years,
Marx came to see his own writings as upending Hegel's,
replacing Hegel's emphasis on mind as the crucial
determinant of history with his own "materialist"
philosophy, which demonstrated that material factors
determined events. He also became an antireligious radical,
and after completing his thesis, worked as a writer and
publicist in Paris and Belgium. During this period he wrote
The Communist Manifesto, which sets out a program for a
revolutionary government and outlines his theory of social
structures and social change. When the revolution of 1848
broke out in Germany, he returned to edit a radical newspaper. After the revolution failed, he went into exile
again and settled in London, his home for the rest of his
life.
During much of this period, Marx and his family were
extremely poor; help from his friend, Friedrich Engels, a
socialist textile manufacturer, was vital. Nonetheless, his
theories became increasingly well-known and influential,
especially outside England. He was consulted more and more
frequently by Russian and German radicals and
revolutionaries; and since his death, "Communist" parties
have developed all over the world.26 Their dogma is the
analyses of Marx and Lenin, who led the first "Communist" 27
We shall describe briefly Marx's discussion of the economic
revolution basis of social organization; the classes and
class conflict that arise around economic interests; and the
importance of ideology in both maintaining and undermining a
social order. We shall also consider his comprehensive
theory of social evolution and his prophecy of the ideal
ctxtssless and stateless society to come.28
The Economic Basis of Society
The distinguishing mark of Marxist analysis is that
it identifies economic factors as the fundamental
determinant of social structure and change. Other
spheres of social life and the ideas and values that
people hold are seen as shaped by and dependent on the
nature of economic production. In Schumpeter's
analogy, they play the role of "transmission belts,"
through which the social forces and group interests
created by economic arrangements emerge into social
life.29
Marx distinguished between three aspects of social
organization. They are, first, the "material forces of
production," or the'l,actual methods by which people
produce their livings; second, the "relations of
production" that arise out of them and that include
property relations and rights; and third, the "legal
and political" superstructures and the ideas, or "forms
of social consciousness," that correspond to the first
two. He argued that in production, "men enter into
definite . . . relations of production which correspond
to a definite stage of development of their material
productive forces. The sum total of these relations of
production constitutes the economic structure of
society, the real foundation.... The mode of production
of material life conditions the social, political, and
intellectual lifeprocess in general." 30
In other words, in Marx's view, the actual mode of
production is the basic causal factor that ultimately
determines how societies are organized. In this sense
his is a "materialist" theory of history, whereby "in
changing their mode of production ... (men) change all
their social relations. The hand-mill gives you
society with the feudal lord; the steam-mill society
with the industrial capitalists' At the same time,
however, both the mode and the relations of production-the technology
and the form of economic organization-are the "substructure" that
defines both the nature of
a particular society and its "superstructure" of law,
government, and ideas.
In practice, both Marx and later Marxist writers tend
to pay more attention to the effects of economic
organization than of the mode of production alone.
Indeed, this is a far more plausible approach. There
was little difference in technology between, for
example, the Roman Empire and medieval Europe; yet
their social structures were very different. These
differences were, moreover, often clearly related to
differences in economic organization, such as Rome's
use of numerous slaves and feudalism's system of
serfdom.32 However, if one admits that economic
organization, rather than technology, is the primary
determinant of social structure, one also undermines,
to a considerable degree, Marx's claim that a single
principle "unlocks" the workings of society. If
different forms of economicorganization can coexist
with a given technology, then these forms must
result, at least partly, from other, noneconomic
factors --the ideas and legal principles that Marxism
relegates to the "superstructure," for example, or the
principles of military organization, which Marxists
generally ignore. Thus, many historians would argue
that the different forms of economic organization in
Rome and feudal Europe (and the wide-ranging
differences in their social structure) can themselves
only be understood in terms of their different legal
codes and systems and their different military
organization. A society with a centralized standing
army is obviously different from one in which fighting
is the task of feudal lords who owe service to the king
but who are "paid" with grants of land-of which they
are virtually independent rulers. And in that case,
Marx's "economic theory of history" becomes, as its
critics would argue, an insight of genius into the role
of economic factors but not an all-embracing
explanation.
Class and the Economic Base of Conflict
Marx argued that all forms of economic organization
that had exist at the time he wrote inevitably
generated conflict between social class which were
defined by their common economic position. The
Communist Manifesto opens with a now-famous
declaration: "The history of all hithe existing society
is the history of class struggles. 1133This statement
embod three important but separate propositions. The
first is that people whose economic position, or
"class," is the same also tend to act together a group.
The second is that economic classes are the most
important group to be found in society: their history
is the history of human society. Third is that these
classes are mutually antagonistic, and the outcome
their conflicts defines how society develops. Marx's
theory of class is thus not simpIy a theory of social
structure: it is also a theory of change.
Property and Class Although we have been ascribing
the Marxist concept of class as "economic," Marx actually
used a more specific and restrictive definition. A class is
made up of people who are alike in their relationship to
property: they have none, or they have the same type. 34
Ultimately, the sort of work people do is not what matters.
Thus, manual workers, clerks, technicians, and engineers
belong to the same class because they own and are paid for
their labor. They belong to a different class from
capitalists and landlords, who own the instruments of
production; from serfs, who only partly own their own labor
because they are bound to a given lord and cannot go to work
for someone else; and from slaves, who own no property at
all.
If you look around a university campus, you will find
that the only "factor of production" most people there own
is their labor. In Marxist terms they therefore belong to
the same class: the, proletariat. This will certainly be
true of most of the students and also of a good number of
the faculty, who work for a salary and who, although they
probably own their homes, do not own any "means of
production." On the other hand, some faculty and some
students probably own a fair number of shares of stock; some
mature students may also be running businesses; and,
especially if the campus is M.I.T., some of the faculty are
likely to be founders and owners of high-technology
industries, which are offshoots of their work. Because they
own property of this type, all the people in the second
group belong to another, different class of "capitalists."
Marx, we should note, does not differentiate between
shareholders, who simply provide capital, and entrepreneurs.
35
Marxist theory argues that different classes inevitably
have incompatible interests, because under systems of
property-ownership, if one class makes economic gains, it
must be at the expense of another. According to Marx, each
of the major economic systems that existed in the past
strengthened one particular class, which could then exploit
others. He wrote that "Freeman and slave, patrician and
plebeian, lord and serf' ' guild-master and journeyman, in a
word, oppressor and oppressed, stood in constant opposition
to one another, carried on an uninterrupted, now hidden, now
open fight," and that "An oppressed class is the vital
condition for every society founded on the antagonism of
classes."37 In bourgeois society, capitalists are the
oppressors and the proletariat the oppressed.
In explaining what Marx meant by this, we must reiterate
that Marx's general theory is the work of an analytical
economist. His theory of exploitation is based on an economic theory of value,38 and it is
important to note that in its essentials, his was the value
theory of the "classical" economist Ricardo. Nowadays, the
"labor theory of value" is seen as a distinguishing aspect
of Marxism, because it is only Marxist economists who
continue to hold it. However, in Marx's own time it was
standard theory, and not what he himself would have seen as
his major idea.
Marx states that the value of a commodity is equal to
the quantity of labor that went directly into making it. In
a market economy, workers selling their labor will get for
it the price of the labor that went into "making" them: that
is, the cost of rearing, feeding, clothing, and housing
them. However, what each of them produces at work will very
likely amount to considerably more than this; and this
"surplus value" will go not to them but to the capitalist.
In Marx's theory, any surplus value appropriated by someone
other than the worker is by definition exploitation, because
only labor produces value. All systems of property
therefore involve a basic conflict of interest because one
group expropriates the product of another's labor.39
Modern Marxist and Marxian sociologists retain Marx's
emphasis on property relationships. Norman Birnbaum, for
example, uses Marxist categories to analyze the United
States. He attacks the argument that property ownership is
no longer a crucial determinant of power and opportunity,
and that a meritocratic education system decides people's
success. Birnbaum argues that educational success and
"access to some of the more privileged educational
institutions" are a function of family background. The
"technocratic 61ite" is thus far from being a new group with
interests and objectives quite separate from those of
"capitalists.1140 Rather, Birnbaum contends, it operates
modern organizations in the interests of property" and is
backed by government, with which it has a symbiotic
relationship.
Class Conflict Marx argued that at any one time, it
is class struggle
that
defines the essential character of a society.
It is the product of, on theone hand, the
irreconcilable differences in interest between classes;
and, on the other, the fact that a class's common
interests are so strong that they will encourage its
members to group together for common action. However,
at any given time, the degree to which members of a
class recognize their interests will depend on their
level of class consciousness. The dominant ideas of an
era may stand in the way of their recognizing their
class identity; but so too may the circumstances of
their lives. The French peasants of the nineteenth
century, for example, did not "form a class" in the
active sense, according to Marx, because "there is
merely a local interconnection among these small-holding peasants, and
the identity of their interests
begets no community, no national bond, and no political
organization among them."41 It is the task of the
Marxist to encourage people-and specifically
the members of the exploited proletariat-to recognize
and act upon their
interests:
to encourage and accelerate change and
revolution, as well as
understand its roots. Thus, one of the foremost young
American Marxistsociologists recently argued that
"Class interests in capitalist society are ...
potential objectives." They are "hypotheses about the
objectives of struggles which would occur if the actors
in the struggle had a scientifically correct
understanding of their situations."42
What Marx provides here is a powerful theory of how
groups form in society. However, critics have queried
the degree to which members of a property class do
always have common interests or tend to act in unison.
For example, innovations are favored by those who
introduce them, and feared by all those involved with
established firms, whether as owners, employees, or
union officials. Government policy often benefits one
part of an industry at another's expense, for example,
by limiting imports of cheap foreign coal or oil, and
so increasing energy costs. In America, Northern
businessmen wishing to relocate to small Southern towns
are often opposed by local employers, who fear the
impact of higher wages and benefits, and welcomed by
prospective workers for the same reasons.
Again, Marxists tend to see any change in an
industry'sjob structure which increases the numbers of
differentjobs, productivity bonuses, etc., as a
conscious effort to undermine solidarity and conceal
workers' "fundamental" interests (in organized
struggle) behind their "immediate," individual
interests.43 It is certainly true that a more diverse
job structure in
which pay is linked to individual effort is likely to create
a less unified, or uniformly militant work force; as seems
to be happening, for just these reasons, with the British
miners. Non-Marxist conflict theorists, however, would not
tend to discriminate between real and immediate interests.
They would rather be inclined to say that individuals'
situations have changed; and so, therefore, has the action
which they perceive to be in their best interests. In
consequence, the sorts of groups likely to takejoint action
have also altered.
Culture, Ideology, and Alienation
Marx emphasized that feelings and opinions about people in
power are of major importance: especially whether their position
is viewed as right, or whether people feel exploited and
oppressed. He thesis identified one of the major topics of
conflict theory.44 Marx's own discussion of the role of ideas in
establishing control follows from his argument that the legal,
political, and cultural "superstructure" is ultimately a
reflection of underlying economic relationships. He argued that
people in a class society believe a large number of things that
are not correct but which are rather a form of "ideology" whose
main purpose and effect is to legitimize the position of those
currently in control. Such ideology stands in the way of other
people realizing what their "real" interests are, so that,
Marxists argue, they suffer from false consciousness. To Marx,
religion was an excellent example of this process, an "opium of
the masses" that muted discontent by focusing attention on a
supposedly better world to come.
It is this part of Marx's thought which inspired his and his
followers' criticisms of "objective" social reporting and
analysis, as, in fact, imbued with the authors' prejudices.
However, Marx did not--unlike. later theorists such as the
symbolic interactionists-reject the possibility of quantitative
research as such, since he was sure that his own viewpoint was
scientifically correct. Thus, in order to obtain adequate
information on working class conditions, he drew up a long
questionnaire which was distributed through workers' societies
and groups in France. Questions ranged from "Is your work done
by hand or with the aid of machinery?" to "Do you know any
instances in which the Government has intervened to protect the
workers against the exactions of the employers and their illegal
combinations?"
This questionnaire,45 devised at the very end of Marx's
working life,
is concerned entirely with the "outward" conditions of work.
However, Marx also believed that class society was evil
because, besides fostering exploitation and false
consciousness, the whole nature of its economic life created
alienation. Marx felt that man has an essential nature,
which he believed to be realized through creative work.
(This notion is, we may note, quite different from
Durkheim's, who felt that mankind needed limits and fixed
norms. Durkheim was also concerned at the consequences of
modern industrial society for human development; but his
concept of anomie, or normlessness, appeals greatly to
functionalists.46 For Marx, the division of labor, the
institution of private property, and the whole "cash nexus"
of commercial relationships alienate man not only from what
he produces and the act of producing it, but also from both
himself and his fellows. He views them in terms of the
narrow standards of the workplace, rather than as full
"species-beings."47 Consequently the abolition of property,
and its attendant class relationships, would also end this
alienation.
This part of Marx's thought has been given increasing
attention in recent decades; and its influence is apparent
far beyond strictly "Marxist" writings. Criticisms of the
soullessness of modern work, or the actions of people opting
for a self-supporting and/or communal life, all belong to
the same broad strand of thought as Marx's early writing on
alienation. It should be emphasized, however, that Marx did
not share the romantic view that the country was inherently
superior to the town, and the Industrial Revolution a
catastrophe. On the contrary-capitalism and the wealth it
produced were the necessary preconditions for the Communist
utopia.
Evolution and the Classless Society
Marx's social theory is essentially a theory of
change and evolution, which looks back over the whole
of history, forward to the future, and claims to
explain and understand both. A given economic system
has within it, Marx argued, the seeds of change: its
own logic and the way it works necessarily produce its
successor.
Marxists describe this process in terms of a given
order's "contradictions," which develop over time until
the whole system becomes unworkable, and there is a
violent, revolutionary shift to another order
altogether, the "negation" of the previous one. This
view of development and change as a pattern of inner
conflict is known as dialectical.48 Like many other
elements in his theory, including alienation, Marx's idea of
the dialectic is a reworking of a Hegelian concept.
However, Hegel was interested in the development of self-awareness and
"Spirit." Marx's concern was the evolution of
human society through economic stages.
Marx identified four major types of class society, each
with its "primary classes"-Asiatic, ancient, feudal, and
bourgeois. The Asiatic mode is based on state-controlled
irrigation and a system of royal despotism and ownership of
all land; but Marx treats only the last three in detail as
part of Western history. In each case, change involves the
appearance of new classes. The barbarian military
chieftains who overran the Roman empire replaced ancient
society with a society of feudal overlords and serfs; in
turn they were replaced by the capitalist bourgeoisie, the
adversaries of the proletariat. The next stage, however,
would be different, Marx prophesied: for the contradictions
inherent in capitalism would usher in an ideal communist
society, in which property and classes were abolished and
alienation replaced by self-realization. In dialectical
terms, communist society would "emerge phoenix-like from the
ashes of capitalist society."49
The End of Capitalism
Marx argued that over time
many smaller capitalists, along with the other distinctive
groups of previous eras-small shopkeepers, peasants,
handicraftsmen-would be swallowed up into the proletariat,
their skills obsolete or their capital too small for them to
compete. Only two ever more strongly differentiated classes
would remain. At the same time, capitalists would produce
more and more, on the backs of the exploited work force,
without the market expanding correspondingly. Competition
would then force the capitalists to cut prices and wages,
and the rate of profit would decline towards zero. The
outcome would be misery for the masses-but also revolt and
the end of capitalism.
Thus, Marx argues, "along with the constantly
diminishing number of the magnates of capital, who usurp and
monopolize ... grows the mass of misery, oppression,
slavery, degradation, exploitation; but with this too grows
the revolt of the working-class, a class always increasing
in numbers, and disciplined, united, organized ... The knell
of capitalist private property sounds. The expropriators
are expropriated."50
Marx's forecasts clearly have not been borne out. There
has been neither increasing misery in the West nor a steady
decline in the rate of profit. Moreover, although
production is more "concentrated," ownership is not, and
shareholders are more and more often trade unions ot pension
funds. Marxist analysts, however, have been at pains to
show that the survival of capitalism is temporary.Lenin's
theory of imperialism is the most influential such argument.
In his great work, Capital, Marx remarks that capitalist
countries use their colonies as providers of raw materials,
captive markets for their products, and treasure-grounds to
loot.52 From these remarks, Lenin developed a Marxist
theory of imperialism. He argued that advanced
capitalism's need for ever-expanding markets and
profitable investment opportunities would dictate a
foreign policy of imperialism and of destructive wars
among individual rivals for colonial possessions.53
Imperialism would, temporarily, stave off the time when
profits vanished and capitalism disappeared.
These ideas are pervasive in the arguments both of
Third World politicians and intellectuals, who argue
that the West exploited and exploits their countries,
and of Western critics of their own governments. A
good example is the work of Regis Debray, a young
French Marxist, who spent a period with the South
American guerillas led by Castro's friend and associate, Che Guevara, and who hit world headlines when he
was arrested and imprisoned. Debray argues that the
regimes of South America are an arm of the ruling class
and that under them there is taking place the
"polarization of exploited and exploiters." Meanwhile,
North American imperialism "has increased its forces in
the field" under the guise of assistance-missionaries,
Peace Corps volunteers, technical projects,
sociological research, and the like. "In a word, all
these close-knit networks of control strengthen the
national machinery of domination."54
Critics argue, however, that although governments
often have acted in pursuit of the economic interests
of home investors, the Marxist theory of imperialism is
inadequate and frequently wrong. They charge that it
fails to account for the frequently "imperialist"
policies of noncapitalist countries; for the fact that
imperialism was characteristic of the early days of
capitalism, before falling profits should have
threatened; and for the fact that capitalist countries
often do not act according to economic interest.
Britain, for example, staged a complete military
withdrawal from the oil-producing Persian Gulf states
on which her industry depended.
Closely related to these ideas about imperialism is
"dependency theory," which has developed a view of the
world as divided into "core" and "periphery.55 These
ideas have been developed furthest by Immanuel
Wallerstein in his work on the "Modern World-System." He argues
that the 4 6 core" countries of Western Europe built up economic
domination of the world during the sixteenth century via
geographical expansion. The "periphery" supplies raw materials
for the core's enterprises, and there are parallel differences in
how labor is "controlled." According to Wallerstein, "Free labor
is the form of labor control used for skilled work in core
countries whereas coerced labor is used for less skilled work in
peripheral areas. The combination thereof is the essence of
capitalism."56
However, critics query whether underdeveloped countries were
or
are exploited in the sense of being impoverished by capitalist
production. They point out that nineteenth-century America, for
example, was a major recipient of foreign investments, as are
today's fastest-growing countries, 57
and that some of the richest countries of the "core"-such as
Australiaare predominantly exporters of raw materials. More generally,
Wallerstein's work has been criticized for "economic
determinism," or underemphasizing the importance of political
organization and other noneconomic factors.
Capitalism in America American Marxists are, not
surprisingly, especially
interested in the survival of capitalism; for class-based groupings
are less
evident in the United States than in any other Western industrial
country, and
the advent of socialism does not seem very likely in the near future.
In their
analyses, they place particular emphasis on the role of education.
This is
partly, no doubt, because so many of them developed their views during
the
campus activism of the 1960s, when educational institutions seemed so
important, but also because of the increasing emphasis among modern
Marxist
thinkers on ideology and the importance of the superstructure."
One of the best-known of recent American analyses is very
clearly a
product of the 1960s. Bowles and Gintis' Schooling in Capitalist
America is a
call to arms as well as an academic publication; and one which sees
students
as a revolutionary vanguard. The authors contend that American
education
has always reflected the underlying economic structure-and
specifically the
capitalist nature-of American society.
"A proper organization of educational and economic.,,4fe, we
believe, can
unleash a people's creative powers without recreating the
oppressive
poles of domination and subordinacy, self-esteem and selfhatred,
affluence and deprivation ... (This) will occur only as a
result of a
prolonged struggle... waged by those social classes and
groups who
stand to benefit from the new era. This book is intended to
be a step in
that long march."58
Few sociologists would argue with the proposition that
schooling must
essentially reflect the wider society-even though it
contradicts the traditional
liberal view of education as a potential solution to the
problems of American
life. What Bowles and Gintis argue, however, is that this
part of the
"superstructure" reflects not the demands of industrial
society generally, but
rather of a "potentially explosive" process by capitalists
expropriate "surplus
value," that is, profit.59
Capitalist education, they argue, serves not only to
impart skills which
make workers more productive, but, even more crucially, creates
attitudes
which increase productivity, and defuses class conflict by
legitimating inequality. Specifically, it "legitimates economic inequality by
providing an ...
ostensibly meritocratic mechanism for assigning individuals to unequal
economic positions."60 It also prepares them for work by reproducing,
within
the school, the hierarchical division of labor of the capitalist
workplace.
Students obey teachers, who in turn obey administrators. School work,
like
adult employment, is fragmented; and it is alienating, because
students have
so little control over their education.
Bowles and Gintis cite some interesting empirical studies in
support of their
argument. At work, they note, "the lowest levels ... emphasize rulefollowing,
middle levels, dependability, and the capacity to operate without
direct and
constant supervision, while the higher levels stress the
internalization of the
norms of the enterprise."61 Correspondingly, work by Jeanne Binstock
suggests that the way particular educational establishments operate
reflects
their students' future destination.62 According to Binstock,
institutions that
enroll working-class students, and are geared to staffing lower-level
jobs,
emphasize external compliance-behaving like a "follower." More elite
schools
emphasize leadership, task-orientation and innovation, and
internalization of
norms. This shows in, for example, how far the schools enforce
regulations
about personal conduct, or control extracurricular activities, as well
as in the
looseness of academic structure.
In arguing that these aspects of education are essentially
capitalist,
Bowles and Gintis devote considerable attention to the "origins of
mass public
education," and argue that it was essentially a response to the growth
of the
factory system and the employers' fears of labor unrest. By 1840
roughly
three-quarters of the adult population could already read and write.
"Intellectual skills were not required for most workers on the job . .
. we doubt
that any employer familiar with the daily workings of their textile
mills or other
similar factories would seriously entertain the notion that the
curriculum taught
in the schools of the day had much connection to the productive
capacities of
the workers."63
Some educational reformers of the nineteenth century, like
the great
Horace Mann, clearly wished to create a school system which "knows no
distinction of rich and poor, of bond and free."64 Others, however,
were quite
openly instrumental in their motives, and in exactly the ways Bowles
and Gintis
would expect. The Boston School Committee introduced sewing into the
schools because of the "industrious habits which (it) tends to form";
and the
Springfield School Committee wanted teachers to form habits for life
which
included "order and neatness ... punctuality."65
Bowles and Gintis demonstrate convincingly the value of
looking at
American educational history in terms of conflict as well as (if not
necessarily
instead of) integration and skill learning. The question is how far
they
demonstrate that "capitalism" is the crucial explanation of events;
that the
fundamental conflict will always be between groups defined by their
relationship to property. The work of the great French sociologist
Emile
Durkheim provides a useful comparison 66 for he too was highly
occupied with
education-but as a way of integrating a politically divided country.
,The France
of his day was a country heavily divided, still, by the issues of the
French
Revolution. Its Republican politicians regarded public education as a
way of
capturing the minds of French children and creating a shared secular
patriotism.67 French teachers of the nineteenth century were
encouraged to
regard themselves as missionaries for the Republic, ranged against the
"reactionary" forces of the Church and its allies-the rural
landowners, but also
the Catholic peasantry.68
One may also query whether the history of American education
is
always best analyzed in terms of property-related interests.Randall
Collins,one
of whose own major interests is in education as a source of privilege,
has
argued that education becomes really important for control in
situations
involving alien ethnic or cultural groups, rather than classes.69 As
Bowles and
Gintis themselves report, in Massachusetts it was the relative size of
the new
immigrant Irish community in a town, along with the degree of
overcrowding,
which was most closely associated with school board attempts to
lengthen
time in school.
Although Bowles and Gintis' view of the historic role of
education is that it
preserved capitalism, they also believe (like all Marxists) that
capitalism will
eventually fall victim to its internal contradictions. Writing in the
aftermath of
the 1960s, they argue that "The student movement and the continuing
radicalization of young people's values is an expression of ... the
increasingly
obvious conflicts between the imperatives of profit and the
requirements of
human welfare and progress.1170 More recently, Marxists have come to
emphasize the results of the "non-elite" destination of many students
instead of
the revolutionary role of students as a whole. Theorists like Erik
Olin Wright
believe that there is a constant tendency, under capitalism, to
"deskill"jobs-that
is, reduce them to routine, which makes it easier to supervise and
control
workers. "Thus, capitalists look for innovations which tend to reduce
skill levels
and reduce the autonomy of workers on the job."71 The combination of
overeducated workers and deskilled . obs is seen as a potentially
potent route
to class consciousness. It will make workers who have traditionally
seen
themselves as "middle-class" realize that their interests lie with the
organization
of the whole "working class."
A recent article by Olin Wright and Singelmann72 uses census
data to argue
that the Marxist view is more accurate than the opposite and very
common
argument: that the labor force has become less "proletarianized," more
skilled,
and autonomous. Their case is that, within given industrial sectors,
there is a
clear recent increase in the proportion of jobs which are definitely
"working-class"-in their formulation, jobs in which workers have
little freedom to decide
how to do them. At the same time, the sectors which expanded most in
terms
of overall numbers of jobs were those with relatively more "semiautonomous"jobs, and relatively fewer "proletarian" ones. For the
economy as
a whole, these two shifts tended to cancel each other out.
Nonetheless, the
authors argue, "within given economic sectors, there was a systematic
tendency for those positions with relatively little control over their
labor
processes to expand during the 1960's and for those positions with
high levels
of autonomy to decline."73 Moreover, they predict, "the rest of the
century is
likely to be characterized by a continuing and perhaps intensifying
process of
proletarianization."74
This analysis provides an interesting alternative to the general
view
that industrial countries' populations are increasingly "middleclass." However,
even if Wright and Singelmann turn out to be correct in their
predictions, it is
not obvious that increased "class consciousness" is the probable
result. It
depends very much on what people's expectations really are, and how
quickly
they adjust them; and on how far the population at large shares Marx's
view of
creative work as central to self-fulfillment. A recent survey by Val
Burris
produced no evidence that people who were "overeducated" for their
jobs
move to left-wing positions, or become generally alienated from
politics. The
only discernible effect was a slight decrease in job satisfaction
among the most
highly overeducated.
Class, Society, and the State
Marx's belief in classless society rested on his argument
that
property is the essential determinant of class interest. This implies
that if
everyone has exactly the same relationship to property, there can be
no
class divisions. If no one owns land or capital and there are no
rents and
profits or returns to capital to be paid, labor will get all of its
"surplus
value," and exploitation will end. In other words, abolishing
property will
end social conflict. Orthodox Communists share this view; and other
Marxists and socialists also believe that the abolition of private
property
will remove many of the systematic conflicts they perceive in social
life.
However, not only non-Marxists but also many Marxian analysts, who
share Marx's belief in the primary importance of economic factors,
question whether the abolition of property necessarily abolishes
systematic differences of interest among social groups. Their reason
for
doing so is the existence of state power.
State Power Marx described the state as an instrument of
class rule,
and he saw political domination as a reflection and expression of
conflict
between classes. He therefore argued that, with the establishment of
a
classless society, the state too would be abolished; and instead of a
coercive
structure, there would remain only routine and uncontroversial
administrative
tasks.76 It is not at all obvious, however, that this is likely, as we
can see from
Marx's own description of the state apparatus.
When Marx discussed the role of the state, with its legal
authority,
bureaucracies, law enforcement agents, and armed forces he actually
advanced two propositions-although he nowhere recognized them as
different.
The first was that the state made class exploitation possible by
providing
stability, under which one group was able to remain dominant.77 The
other
was that the state was actually an instrument of class rule (in the
sense of
being an arm of the exploiting class), and its purpose was to advance
the
exploiting class's interests.78 These views imply very different
interpretations of
the role of government officials; for the first, unlike the second,
implies that they
may be seen as a separate group with independent interests, and not
merely
as part of the ruling class. In that case, it is a good deal less
plausible to
suppose that a coercive state apparatus, the distinction between state
and
society, and the potential for conflict over state control will
disappear.
Marx envisaged communist society as one in which scarcity had
vanished-as a result of the achievements of bourgeois capitalism,
which in this respect
he greatly admired. He also talked as though the abolition of
property would
also cause all important differences between people to disappear.
Consequently, there would be a single social will; economic production
would
proceed on the basis of universal consent; and a separate, coercive
state
apparatus would no longer be required. His critics argue that a
society without
scarcity is nowhere apparent; and that even if it were obtainable
there is no
reason to suppose that people would always agree on where factories
should
be sited for example, or whether and for how long school should be
compulsory. Moreover, if scarcity did remain, and production was no
longer
the responsibility of private individuals, state power would be far
more, not
less, important. There would be fierce conflicts over who controlled
the powers
of the state.79 The result (critics contend) would be more like Marx's
"Asiatic
mode" than his communist vision.
An essentially Marxist analysis of the self-interested use of
power in
socialist societies is offered by Milovan Djilas in The New Class. 80
Djilas, who
was a friend of Tito's and vice-president of Yugoslavia, was expelled
from the
Yugoslav Communist Party in 1954 and has served long prison sentences
for
his views. In The New Class, Djilas argues (following Marx) that
classes are
essentially based on the property they control. Abolishing private
property,
however, has not meant the abolition of classes. Instead, he
contends, in
communist countries it has created a new class, the political
bureaucracy,
which controls all property (since all property is the state's) and
uses it to
appropriate to itself power and privilege at the expense of the rest
of the
population:
As in other owning classes, the proof that (the political
bureaucracy) is a special
class lies in its ownership and its special relations to other
classes. In the same way,
the class to which a member belongs is indicated by the material and
other privileges
which ownership brings to him.
As defined by Roman law, property constitutes the use,
enjoyment, and disposition
of material goods. The.Communist political bureaucracy uses, enjoys,
and disposes
of nationalized property.... In practice, the ownership privilege of
the new class
manifests itself as an exclusive right, as a party monopoly, for the
political
bureaucracy to distribute the national income, to set wages, direct
economic
development, and dispose of nationalized and other property. This is
the way it
appears to the ordinary man who considers the Communist functionary as
being very
rich and as a man who does not have to work.81
A more recent Marxian analysis, which develops Djilas'assessment
further, is
that of Ivan Szelenyi, a Hungarian sociologist who was forced to
emigrate when
he would not renounce his views. He argues that, with the development
of
state-socialist economies in the post-Stalin era, a new dominating
class has
developed.82 This is rather broader than the political bureaucracy
described by
Djilas. It is the intelligentsia as a whole which has grasped class
power. In
Eastern Europe, Szelenyi points out, people move constantly between
important "bureaucratic" and "intellectual" positions. Thus:
The present director of one of the comedy theaters in
Budapest is a former high-ranking officer of the political police.
His former boss in the Hungarian
equivalent of the KGB is today the manager of a big salaini
factory. Today one
may be an officer in the political police, but tomorrow one
might be the only
person licensed to produce politicaljokes, or one might
supervise salami
production or sociological research, as a manager or an
academic. The line
between intellectuals and bureaucrats is a very shaky one in
terms of personal
career patterns.... (It) is practically impossible to
distinguish between the
technobureaucracy and the intelligentsia. Their living
standards are practically
identical. It is the level of power which stratifies them.83
Szelenyi argues that state-socialism shows that Marx was
wrong to believe
that property ownership was the major determinant of power. He
believes, at
the same time, that a "historical materialist" perspective in the
Marxian tradition
remains valid. Marx, he argues, defined his classes on the basis of
ownership
relations beca use in a capitalist market economy it was the private
ownership of the
means of production which legitimated expropriation.84
In socialist countries, by contrast, it is not property
ownership and the market
which define income and the distribution of "the surplus"defined by Marxists
as the difference between what labor produces and what
is,,.needed to keep
it alive. Instead, the state expropriates and allocates the
surplus.
"Contemporary state socialism might be characterized by the
antagonism
between redistributors and direct producers.1185 These
"redistributors" use
Marxist ideals to legitimate their seizure of power as
creators of a
"scientifically" planned economy.
Szelenyi (and, by implication, Djilas) are contrasting
socialist countries 'with
Western ones, where they see classes with different relationships to
private
property as still the major groupings. By contrast, conflict
theorists in the
Weberian tradition would tend to see their analyses as strengthening
the case
for discussing power and conflict in terms of several different
categories-class
being one, political power another. Thus, Djilas' major point can be
applied
generally to argue that government employees should be viewed as a
distinctive group with their own interests and power base86 and that
there are
conflicts of interest between those who do and do not benefit from
increased
government spending and activity.87
In this context, Erik Olin Wright's work is of special
interest. It attempts to
show, empirically, that analyzing American society in terms of classes
(in
Marx's sense) is indeed the most fruitful approach to take. In his
Class
Structure and Income Determination, Wright used detailed survey data88
to
examine how well Marxist categories "explain" (that is, can be used to
predict)
income, compared to such common occupational categories as "upper
white
collar," "lower white collar," "lower blue collar," "farmers,"or
"service workers."
Wright defines classes in terms of their members'control over
money and
physical capital, and others' labor. This produces the classic
Marxist
categories of the "bourgeoisie," who control capital and direct labor;
and the
"proletariat," who do neither. However, when he applies these
categories to the
modern workforce, only about I to 2 percent of workers can be
classified as
"bourgeoisie"; and almost half are seen as falling into
"contradictory" class
locations-that is, not quite one thing or another. The latter are
1.
2.
3.
managers and supervisors (30-35 percent of the workforce)
semiautonomous employees
small employers (with "minimal" control over labor)
With so few bourgeoisie, by his definition, in existence, the
survey data
did not actually provide Wright with enough cases for analysis.89 In
practice,
therefore, he looked at five "classes"-small employers, managers,
supervisors,
workers, and petty bourgeoisie (self-employed with no employees).
that
basis he found that class did affect income:
On
People occupying different class positions but with the same level of
education and
occupational status, the same age and seniority on the job, the same
general social
background, and working the same number of hours per year, will still
differ
substantially in their expected incomes. And people in different
class positions can
expect to receive different amounts of additional income per increment
in educational
credentials, even if they do not differ in a variety of other
characteristics.90
Figure 3-1 summarizes, for Wright, what these findings imply about the
workings of American society.91
However, class position actually accounts for only 20 percent
of the
variation in people's incomes-no worse, but also no better, than the
standard (though more complicated) census-based occupational codes. This
figure; the need to put so many people into "contradictory" categories
(which
are not clear Marxist classes at all); and the fact that the
importance of the
bourgeoisie is simply assumed (since it does not appear in the data),
mean
that critics of Marxist analysis are no more convinced than before
that "class"
(used in this sense) is the primary factor in the analysis of society.
Wright, they
would argue, merely shows what we already knowthat your position in
the
labor market affects your income!
Marxist Analysis: An Assessment
Marx's most important contributions to social analysis in general
derive from
two sources: his emphasis on the way that people in the same economic
position tend to group together for common action and his explanation
of why
and how societies differ in terms of the characteristics of the groups
that are
generated by their economic life. As Kolokowski has noted, "No
reasonable
person would deny that the doctrine of historical materialism has been
a
valuable addition to our intellectual equipment ... (I)f it has become
a
commonplace, this is largely thanks to Marx's originality."92 However,
this
insistence on the primacy of economics means that Marxist analysts
have a
tendency to use a "Catch-22" approach. They assume in advance that
economic and business interests lie behind things, proceed to find
them, and
then offer their explanation as "proof " of the original proposition.
But the fact
that on any particular occasion, one can generally find businessmen
and
others seeking to advance their economic interests means neither that
this is
the "real" explanation of what is going on nor that those involved are
necessarily acting in the interests of their class as a whole.
The American South offers a good example of both the
strengths and the
weaknesses of Marxist analysis. Because of its focus on property
relationships,
Marxism identifies the pre-Civil War slave-owning South as a
distinctive social
order based on the ownership of human beings. A great part of the
written
history of the South and the Civil War has tended to interpret the
South as
essentially agrarian and so threatened by industrialization-or as
itself merely a
variant of capitalism, based on the plantation.s. As Eugene Genovese,
the
leading Marxist historian of the South, argues, neither approach
explains the
antagonism between North and South or the Civil War. An agrarian
hinterland
can grow prosperous as a market for manufactured goods and a supplier
of
food; and competition between farmer and industrialist is hardly a
common
cause of war. Or if Lhe South was basically capitalist, why could the
two sides
not reach an accommodations?
However, once we see slavery as the essence of Southern
society and
not just one of its characteristics among many, however morally
repugnant, it is
apparent that the South was fighting to preserve a distinctive world.
Much
about the politics of the South also becomes comprehensible when we
see it
as a defense of this slavery-based social structure against not only
the blacks
who suffered under it but also other potential social groups whose
interests it
did not serve. Thomas Sowell, for example, points out that forced
labor is
always extremely inefficient economically.94 A Southern slave's labor
was
potentially worth much more to him than to his owner, ;ince he would
work far
harder and more productively for himself than forced and driven for
someone
else. Even without adding in the price he would pay just to be free,
"Selling a
slave to the highest bidder would mean selling him to himself"95-a
practice that
was very common among slaveowning profit-maximizing Romans. However,
although this might profit individual slave-owners and the slaves
themselves, it
would certainly have undermined a society whose defining core was
plantation
slavery and whose ethic was fundamentally anticapitalist. Thus, very
severe
legal restrictions developed on the freeing of slaves.
However, Marxist theory does not explain adequately why the
white
population of the South supported this order so wholeheartedly, even
through
the terrible rigors of the Civil War.96 Most whites were not
slaveowning, and
the poorly functioning Southern economy did not serve their economic
interests any more than it did those of nascent industrialists facing
a meager
home market. Their support, we would argue, can only be explained
fully by
the fact that the racial character of Southern society gave every
white an
automatic claim to superior status, so that "The notion that all men
were
created equal contradicted the facts of daily experience for most
Southerners.
"97
Class interests are an even less adequate explanation of the
system of
racial segregation that succeeded slavery, under which the old classes
of
slaves and slave-owners no longer existed. The system of segregation
was
clearly against the interests of industrialists, for it denied skills
to a large
section of their potential work force; and under segregation, white
and black
"proletarians" conspicuously failed to group together to further
shared class
interests. The system did, however, offer benefits to whites as a
whole-and
benefits that were real, not a matter of "false consciousness." Their
race alone
gave them substantial advantages in power and opportunities-better
education,
for example, and less chance of being treated unjustly by the courts
and
police. Moreover, when change did come, it could also hardly be
explained in
terms of class conflict. Rather, it was the outcome of a civil rights
movement,
in which blacks of all classes and the power of the federal government
were
the essential agents of change.
THE FRANKFURT SCHOOL AND CRITICAL THEORY
The work of the controversial group of theorists known as the
"Frankfurt
School" is currently very much in vogue among younger, left-wing
sociologists.
Their analysis of society owes a great deal to Marx, and like him,
they
emphasize the importance of conflicts of interest based on property
relationships. However, they are by no means orthodox Marxists, and
many of
them bitterly attacked a Russian regime they saw as oppressive and
dictatorial.
They owe a major debt to Hegel, and they draw on Marx's early and more
"Hegelian" work, such as his writings on alienation, more than on his
later,
more economic analyses.98 In addition, they are very interested in
uniting
psychoanalysis and Marxism: an effort towards which orthodox Marxism
(or
Marxism-Leninism) is highly unsympathetic. These different influences
are
apparent in the aspects of their "critical theory" described later:
their view of
social science, their critique of mass culture and its place in the
"administered
society," and Habermas' recasting of Marx's evolutionary theory.
The Frankfurt School is so called because of its association
with a single
institution, the Institute of Social Research at the University of
Frankfurt in
Germany. The Institute was founded in 1923 with funds from one of its
members, Felix Weil, and his wealthy father; and its most important
members
were Max Horkheimer (1895-1973), Theodor Adorno (1903-1969), Herbert
Marcuse (1898-1979), and Erich Fromm (1900-1980). All of them came
from
comfortable, middle-class Jewish homes, and all had fled Germany for
America
by the mid-1930s because their political views made the continuation
of the
Institute impossible. Marcuse remained in the United States and
worked for
the American State Department until the Korean War, when he returned
to
academic life. He taught at Columbia, Harvard, Brandeis, and the
University of
California, San Diego. Fromm, who broke with the Institute soon after
his
arrival in America, practiced psychoanalysis in New York and became a
founder and trustee of the William Alanson White Institute of
Psychiatry,
Psychoanalysis, and Psychology. In 1949 he moved to Mexico because of
his
wife's health. There he started the Department of Psychoanalysis at
the
National Autonomous University of Mexico, and founded and directed the
Mexican Psychoanalytic Institute, while still commuting regularly to
the United
States and academic appointments in New York and Michigan.
Adorno and Horkheimer were persuaded by the city and
University of
Frankfurt to return to Germany, where the Institute was reestablished
in
1949.99 During the postwar period, they became estranged from Marcuse.
Horkheimer's attitudes toward liberal capitalism changed; he came to
regard it
as a form of society to be protected against the encroachment of
totalitarian
administration."100 Marcuse regarded this position as a betrayal of
the group's
beliefs.101
The most important younger member of the Frankfurt School is
Jurgen
Habermas, who was born in Dusseldorf in 1929. In 1961, at an
unusually
young age for a German academic, he became professor of philosophy and
sociology at Heidelberg, and in 1964 he was awarded the Chair at
Frankfurt
and made Co-Director of the Philosophical Seminary. He left Frankfurt
in 1971
to become Director of Munich's Max Planck Institute for the Study of
Life in
Technical and Scientific Society, but has since returned to the city.
Although the foremost members of the Frankfurt School were
not
themselves actively involved in politics, their work has been very
influential
among German student radicals in recent years; furtherihore, as we
mentioned
above, Marcuse was a writer of great importance ,to the American New
Left.
Consequently, they are highly controversial and were, for example,
accused by
the Minister President of one Wes( German state of being directly
responsible
for the wave of urban terrorism in Germany. Nevertheless, there was
considerable disagreement between the German student radicals and the
Frankfurt School theorists. Habermas, who became generally known at
this
period, emphasized repeatedly his solidarity with the movement as a
whole,
but he also denounced the views of some of its extremist leaders as
"left-fascism," defended the importance of democratic institutions and
the rule of
law, and attacked the use of violence. Adorno had his classes broken
up by
students who considered him inadequately revolutionary.
Critical Theory and the Nature of Social Science
At the core of the Frankfurt School's approach to social
analysis are two
propositions. The first is that people's ideas are a product of the
society in
which they live. Because our thought is socially formed, they argue,
it is
impossible for us to reach objective knowledge and conclusions, free
of the
influence of our particular era and its conceptual patterns. The
second
proposition is that intellectuals should not try to be objective and
to separate
fact from value judgment in their work. What they should adopt
instead is a
critical attitude to the society they are examining; an attitude that
makes people
aware of what they should do and has as its aim social change.
Equally,
intellectuals should - maintain a critical attitude toward their work;
they should
examine and make explicit its relationship to the current state of
society and
socially created "knowledge."
It does not follow, however, that critical theorists cogsider
one critical
attitude to be as good as another. Unlike Marx, they admit that since
they too
are products of a particular society, their own work is subject to its
influences
and is not uniquely objective. Nevertheless, they also believe that
there are
such things as truth and knowledge and that their normative approach
brings
them closer to these than does mainstream, or "positivist," social
science, 102
with its attempts to separate value judgments from analysis.
In their critique the Frankfurt analysts adopt the
dialectical method of Marx
and Hegel, emphasize the importance of a society's economic
organization,
and argue that "the class-related form of ... work puts its mark on
all human
patterns of reaction."103 Critical theory, Horkheimer argues, "does
not ... fall
victim to the illusion that property and profit no longer play a key
role, an
illusion carefully fostered in' the social sciences."104 By contrast,
"traditional"
theory is itself part of the production process, and so it is "in the
service of an
existing reality."105 The modern economy, Horkheimer argues, "after an
enormous extension of human control over nature, finally hinders
further
development and drives humanity into a new barbarism."106 Critical
theory
incorporates this insight and is "the unfolding of a single
existentialjudgment."107
The ideal standard by which critical theory judges the
present is closer to
the concept of reason as it is used by Hegel and other German
philosophers
than it is to Marx. Horkheimer, for example, argues that "the free
development
of individuals depends on the rational constitution of society"108 and
that in a
rational society, there will cease to be a conflict between mankind's
potentialities and the organization of society around work. However,
what a
"rational" society would be like remains almost totally unclear; and
the Frankfurt
analysts share none of Marx's confidence that it will one day be
realized.
In reply, defenders of traditional social science argue that
whether or not a
writer can avoid incorporating his own values into his work, his
theory, like a
bridge built according to "twentieth-century science," stands or falls
by the
accuracy of the theory's factual predictions-and that these can be
judged
objectively. They also question whether critical theory has any
reason to claim
that it is less context-bound than other approaches. Jurgen Habermas
has
attempted to deal with this latter question and so "legitimate"
critical theory
through the concept of an "ideal-speech situation."109 In such a
situation,
everyone would have an equal chance to argue and question; since they
are
more rational, true positions would prevail. Habermas believes that a
"radical
critique of knowledge" can go beyond the systematically distorted
communication that marks human society, and that utterances can be
"rationally" reconstructed in universal terms-an idea he discusses
under the
label of "universal pragmatics" In this context he criticizes
sociologists (such as
some symbolic interactionists) who confine themselves to individuals'
own
subjective understanding. These should, rather, be integrated with a
critique of
underlying ideologies that are related to social, political, and
economic
conditions, and can conceal and distort experience and communication.
This seems to amount to saying that in the right
circumstances arguments
can be judged objectively after all, and that in an "ideal-speech
situation,"
critical theory and its values and judgments would appear as
objectively
correct because they are based on less distorted communication than
other
approaches. Many critics dispute this claim, arguing that although
facts can be
observed objectively in the ordinary way of things, there are genuine
and
irreconcilable differences of judgment concerning values and what is
good or
best. They also question whether Habermas has really improved on his
predecessors' definition of reason-or rather their lack of it, since
he has not
actually specified the norms which would be defined. I 10
Culture, Personality,
and the Administered Society
The Frankfurt analysts consider themselves "materialists"
because of their
emphasis on the importance of economic organization. During the
1930s, for
example, they argued consistently that fascism was rooted in
capitalism. For
the most part, however, their studies are concerned with aspects of
personality,
culture, and thought, and not with social institutions. Horkheimer,
Adorno, and
their colleagues have always affirmed that thought and personality are
rooted
in the economic system; but unlike more orthodox Marxists they also
argue
that culture and ideology can play an independent role in society and
that pure
economic determinism is simplistic.
Personality and Social Structure Much of the most important
work in
critical theory was carried out at a time when psychoanalysis was
first
becoming widely known and influential. The Frankfurt analysts were
very
interested in analyzing personality and behavior in terms of the
interaction
between the "socioeconomic substructure" and basic psychic drives.
Their
analyses are highly normative, emphasizing the way the economic system
distorts or cripples the personality.
Erich Fromm shows the greatest interest in psychoanalysis.
During the
1930s, when he was a central member of the group, Fromm was interested
in
the way a particular "libidinal" structure, formed and passed on in
the family,
could act as a social cement. At this period he argued that, for
example, the
"capitalist spirit" of rationality, possessiveness, and puritanism was
linked to
anal repression and orderliness. III Later, his analyses centered
around the
idea of "alienation," which he uses rather differently from Marx, to
describe an
individual's psychological experiences of the world.
Fromm argues that alienation is the "central issue ... (in
discussing) the
effects of capitalism on personality."' 12 Under capitalism, workers
and
managers alike are alienated because they are denied such "basic
needs" as
creativity and identity. Their work is entirely impersonal; their
consumption is
also alienated, for they acquire possessions whether or not they use
or
appreciate them; they are motivated by self-interest, not love, in
their
relationships with others; and they see themselves as "doctors" or
"clerks," not
people.113
The Frankfurt analysts indict modern society similarly in
their massive
study of the "authoritarian personality." This is the most famous of
the series on
prejudice and anti-Semitism that Adorno, Horkheimer, and their
colleagues
conducted in America, and presented clearly Adorno's views on the
connections between personality and social structure.114 The
Authoritarian
Personality concluded that the most prejudiced and anti-democratic
individuals
had distinctive personalities and came, on the whole, from homes where
relationships between parent and child were characterized by dominance
and
submission and where family members were very intolerant of a lack of
conformity. In other words, the factors that precipitate prejudice
were clearly
seen as psychological. At the same time, however, Adorno argued that
the
whole sample showed marked similarities in important degrees. The
most
prejudiced individuals simply demonstrated more clearly the overall
and
potentially fascistic cultural pattern produced by the social
structure. The
prejudiced person "must largely be considered the outcome of our
civilization.
The increasing disproportion of the various psychological 'agencies'
within the
total personality is undoubtedly being reinforced by such tendencies
in our
culture as division of labor, the increased importance of monopolies
and
institutions, and the dominance of the idea of exchange and of success
and.,
competition." 115
The Critique of Mass Culture
Critical theory's discussion
of culture
displays the same deep pessimism as does its analysis of personality.
Horkheimer argues that culture and ideology are not a simple
reflection of the
economic substructure, but a semiautonomous realm. They are crucial
in
maintaining and strengthening the existing order: "the obsolete social
order is
quickly patched up ... (and) the antiquated cultural apparatus, in the
form of
the mental state of society's members as well as the network of
concrete
institutions, gains new force."' 16 To the members of the Frankfurt
School,
popular culture is a means of manipulating the inhabitants of a
totally
"administered" society.
Thus, Adorno attacked jazz and popular music for its
standardization, for
distracting people and making them passive, and therefore for
strengthening
the current social order. jazz, he argued, increases alienation. 117
He similarly
despised astrology and the "attraction to the occult," which he called
"a
symptom of the retrogression of consciousness."118 People turn to
astrology,
he argues, in an attempt to lure meaning out of a "frozen" world where
humanity's "domination over nature, by turning into domination over
man,
surpasses all the horrors that man ever had to fear from nature."' I"
Its
practitioners exploit their clients, and by providing psychological
reassurance
they help sustain the current social structure.
In his examination of the Los Angeles Times astrology
column,120 Adorno
notes that the column's implication that work and pleasure are to be
kept
strictly apart befits a society in which people's functions as
producers are
rigidly divided from their consumption. He argues that
The columnist is very well aware of the drudgery of most
subordinate functions in a
hierarchical and bureaucratic setup . . .-(People) are encouraged to
fulfill little and
insignificant set tasks in a machinery. Thus, the admonition to work
and not to allow
oneself to be distracted by any instinctual interference has
frequently the form that
one should attend to one's "chores."
Dismal early A.M., forgotten by plunging into routine chores.
(November 21, 1952, Leo)
Keeping plugging at chores... (December 19, 1952, Sagittarius)
Stick to attending chores... (December 27, 1952, Sagittarius)121
In America, the best-known "critical analysis" of mass
culture remains
Herbert Marcuse's. In One-Dimensional Man he paints a bleak picture
of
modern industrial societies in both the West and the Communist world.
122
Marcuse is more of a technological determinist than his former
colleagues: he
states that technical progress has made possible a "whole system of
domination and coordination" that defeats all protests. Social
control in the
interests of the status quo, including conditioning by the mass media,
is so
powerful that even thought provides no source of criticism: it too is
subordinated. Affluence assimilates into the existing order all those who
once
dissented, and in return for material goods, people give up liberty.
In doing
so, they surrender to "false needs," which are "superimposed upon the
individual by particular social interests in his repression."123
Culture has been
flattened in what Marcuse views as a totalitarian social order which
has
succeeded the previous liberal one and which has become
"onedimensional"
because it has eliminated alternative ideas.
Marcuse's distaste for modern culture has struck a responsive
chord, for
very many of us have at some time been nauseated by yet more T.V.
advertising, or by the thought of life lived in "little boxes all the
same." However,
he has also aroused numerous critics. It is frequently pointed out,
for example,
that Marcuse's own work refutes his claim that all criticism has been
suppressed, and that his writings generally advance little empirical
evidence in
support of his claims. Critics also disagree with his assertion that
all industrial
societies are essentially and similarly totalitarian; and they
question his and
other critical theorists' conviction that they, unlike the mass of
people, know
what people's "real needs" are.
Evolution and Crisis
Unlike Marxism, which is essentially a theory of evolution,
the analyses of the older Frankfurt analysts focus on contemporary
developments.
Recently, however, Jurgen Habermas, the most important active analyst
in the Frankfurt tradition, has recast Marx's theory. He pays
particular
attention to the developments of the last century and the force of
change
apparent in modern society. 124
Habermas divides "social formations" into the categories
shown in
Figure 3-2. "Primitive" societies are comparable to Marx's tribal
ones; "traditional" societies would include both "ancient" and "feudal" ones;
"liberal
capitalist" describes the nineteenth-century capitalism Marx knew; and
our
own Western societies are examples of "organized" capitalism.
Habermas
classifies "state-socialist" societies as "post-capitalist" class
societies "in
view of their political-elitist disposition of the means of
production."125
Habermas' mode of analysis is similar to Marx's in that he
sees
social evolution as a result of crises or "contradictions" inherent in
a given
system. These create "steering problems," which eventually make the
system untenable. However, like other critical theorists, Habermas
emphasizes the role played by people's ideas and consciousness.
Underlying structural changes and contradictions manifest themselves
in
the breakdown of shared values or "normative structures"; and the old
social system disintegrates because such changes threaten people's
feeling of social identity (and therefore social integration).126
In discussing such breakdowns, Habermas focuses very much on
the political organization of societies. "Legitimacy means a
political
order's worthiness to be recognized," he has argued; and "problems of
legitimacy are not a speciality of modern times.... In traditional
societies,
legitimation conflicts typically take the form of prophetic and
messianic
movements that turn against the official version of religious
doctrine."127
This is because it is here that the contradiction between the
privileges of
the dominant ruling class and the normative system of ideas which is
supposed to legitimize them becomes apparent. Examples are the Hebrew
prophets or the heretical movements of the Middle Ages. This does
not,
however, make legitimation crises in the state something separate from
class
conflicts. On the contrary; it is through the development of the
state that
societies moved away from production by and for families to a
situation in
which a dominating class appropriated wealth.
Habermas' focus on ideas as the mechanism of change makes his
treatment very different from that of Marx, who treats the development
of
modern industry as a deus ex machina that catapulted mankind from
feudal.
into capitalist society. Instead, it displays interesting parallels
both with
Schumpeter's approach, where the way capitalism destroys its own
legitimacy
was discussed as the central force behind its inevitable demise; and
with that
of some leading nonradical economic historians, who also focus on the
role of
the state, and of "ideology," in determining how wealth is
distributed. 128
According to Habermas, the distinctive characteristic of
liberal capitalism
is the "depoliticization of the class relationship."129 Before,
control of the state
by a small group was of central importance; whereas under liberal
capitalism
there is self-regulated market commerce, and the state's role is
simply to
maintain the general conditions of capitalistic production, especially
civil law.
Like Weber or Marcuse, Habermas notes the cumulative process of
"rationalization" under capitalism and the corresponding
disintegration of both
traditional habits and the justification of practices by an appeal to
tradition.
Moreover, like Talcott Parsons (to whom he acknowledges an
intellectual
debt),130 he notes the general expansion of the secular domain and a
shift
from "tribal particularism to universalistic and at the same time
individualistic
orientations."131
However, in analyzing the probable development of modern
society,,
Habermas believes that the trend from myth, through religion, to
philosophy
and ideology is of prime importance.132 It means that "normative
validity
claims" (that is, arguments that something ought to be so) must be
justified
more and more explicitly. Instead of relying on appeals to tradition
and
authority, capitalism has based its claim to legitimacy on the notion
that market
exchange between equals is just. However, in a society where
legitimacy rests
on the workings of the market, economic fluctuations are direct
threats to
social integration. Such fluctuations make it apparent to both the
workers and
the owners of the means of production that their market ideology is
incorrect,
that the market is not, in fact, a meetingplace of equals, but a form
of
institutionalized power. 133
In his discussion of contemporary "organized capitalism,"
Habermas is
concerned above all with whether it has resolved this "fundamental
contradiction." His answer is that it has not. There are serious "crisis
tendencies" in
modern Western societies, the most important of which undermine its
legitimacy.
Habermas believes that the transition from liberal to
organized capitalism
involves two changes. The first is the rise of huge, oligopolistic
firms and the
disappearance of competitive capitalism. The second is the
reemergence of
the state, which increasingly replaces and intervenes in the market
(thus
signaling the end of liberal capitalism). In large part, the state's
reemergence
is a response to economic fluctuations and "steering problems." The
state
attempts to regulate the economic cycle and.maintain growth and full
employment; spends on education and research; provides the
infrastructure of
roads and utilities; and reduces the "social and material costs
resulting from
private production" through unemployment benefits, welfare, and the
like. 134
The profit motive and the "continued private appropriation ... of
surplus value"
remain cruc ial, however. 135
The "recoupling" of the state and the economic system
creates, Habermas
argues, an increased need for legitimation; and in a rationalistic
age, the
legitimation must be formal and explicit. Since the old bourgeois
ideology of
fair exchange has broken down, the alternative is a system of "formal
democracy."136 Genuine participation in decision-making would, he
argues,
make people aware of the contradictions in a society where production
is the
state's concern, but "surplus value" is individually appropriated.
This system is fragile, however. Habermas, following Marx,
believes that
the economic system itself is threatened by a falling rate ot profit.
Moreover,
there is likely to be insufficient loyalty to the political system and
a consequent
"legitimation crisis." In its early days, capitalism had the remnants
of tradition to
maintain it. Now its own rationality has undermined traditions, and
previously
unquestioned norms and loyalties are publicly discussed and thereby
weakened. Related changes within the family further destroy the
residues of
tradition and the casts of mind that upheld the capitalist order.137
While
prebourgeois, authoritarian patterns of upbringing survived, people
accepted
rule by an elite rather than demanding participation; 138 but these
patterns are
vanishing, helped on their way by a self-conscious analysis of the
ways we
socialize children. Such an analysis further reduces the
effectiveness of
traditional child-rearing because the latter's force depended on
people not
questioning it.
Finally, the ideology of achievement is also disappearing.
The welfare
state makes hard work less important, and in a modern economy it is
increasingly difficult to reward people for individual effort and hold
them
personally accountable. Habermas looks forward to a time when "the
'pursuit
of happiness' might. . . mean something different-for example, not
accumulating material objects of which one disposes privately, but
bringing
about social relations in which ... satisfaction does not mean the
triumpli of one
over the repressed needs of the other."139 Nonetheless, he is by no
means
confident of the arrival of a "rational" society; and his critics,
including fellow-sociologists of the left, have questioned some of the
essential parts of his
argument.
Habermas' analysis treats as basically self-evident the claim
that a society
must have one consistent legitimating set of norms, accepted by its
inhabitants-a very Parsonian view. However, as van den Berg has
pointed out,
he does not actually provide any proof of this. It is thus quite
possible to
argue that "different value orientations can and do exist within the
same system
without any disastrous effects on its stability"140-that
contradictions do not,
necessarily, produce systemic change. At the same time, the values
and
opinions people have-in the West, but also and notably in state
socialist"
countries such as Russia-call into question Habermas' belief that, in
modern
society, explicit, "rational" legitimation is necessary. In fact,
many Russians
seem to hold extremely traditional values, including passive
acceptance of an
autocratic state, 141 implying that a "modern" state may still be able
to maintain
its legitimacy on "old-fashioned" foundations.
Summary
Critical theorists' analyses of the role of ideas and culture
in social
stability and change, and their discussions of the evolution of modern
society away from nineteenth-century capitalism are their most
important
contributions to social theory. However, many commentators have
attacked their view of social science in general and Marcuse's views
of
modern culture in particular. As we shall see in the next section,
many
theoristsincluding other conflict theorists-also disagree with
critical
theory's continuing emphasis on the role of private property and
profit,
which both Habermas and the older Frankfurt theorists derive from
Marx.
C. WRIGHT MILLS
Among American sociologists, C. Wright Mills (1916-1962) is the best
known modern theorist whose work combines a conflict perspective with
a strong critique of the social order. Mills was born and raised in
Texas;
he never left the state until he was in his twenties, when he won a
research fellowship to the University of Wisconsin. Most of his
academic
career was spent at Columbia, where he was a professor until he died
of
a heart condition while still in his mid-forties.
Mills was subjected to a barrage of criticism, especially in
his later
years when,his writing became increasingly accusatory and polemical.
He also had many admirers and was never quite the "lone wolf " he
considered himself; but he was increasingly agonized and pessimistic
about the immediate future. He believed that immorality was built
into the
American system; and he never voted because he considered political
parties to be manipulative and "irrational" organizations. He also
bitterly
attacked his fellow-intellectuals for abdicating their social
responsibilities
and for putting themselves at the service of men of power while they
hid
behind a mask of "value-free" analysis.
Mills thought that it was possible to create a "good society"
on the
basis of knowledge and that men of knowledge must take responsibility
for its absence.142 He believed in a libertarian socialism, and he
supported the Cuban revolution (and attacked the United
States'reaction
to it) because he hoped that it would combine revolutionary socialism
and freedom. 143 In his sociology, his major themes were the
relationship
between bureaucracy and alienation and the centralization of power in
a
"power elite." Both these subjects were aspects of his attack on
modern
American society.
Alienation and Bureaucracy
Mills argues that the material hardships of the workers of
the past have
been replaced today by a psychological malaise, which is rooted in
workers'
alienation from what they make.144 He sees white-collar workers as
apathetic,
frightened, and molded by mass culture. In modern society, he argues,
"those
who hold power have often come to exercise it in hidden ways: they
have
moved and are moving from authority to manipulation .... The rational
systems
hide their power so that no one sees their sources of authority or
understands
their calculation. For the bureaucracy . . . the world is an object
to be
manipulated."145
In a world of big business and big government, the everincreasing group
of white-collar people lives not by making things, but by helping to
turn what
someone else has made into profits for yet another person. Fewer and
fewer
people own their own productive property and control their own working
lives.
Stable communities and traditional values, which "fixed" people into
society,
have disappeared, and their disappearance throws the whole system of
prestige or status into flux. Like Veblen, Mills believes that status
and self-esteem are closely linked; and the loss of traditional
values, he argues,
undermines people's self-esteem and embroits them in a status "panic."
146 In
fact, Mills' concerns here are curiously like those of Durkheim and
the
functionalists, who see modern society as threatened by normlessness,
or
"anomie." His critics argue that he ignores the freedom that the
breakup of old
and restrictive communities can offer.
Unlike Marx, Mills does not believe that work is necessarily
the crucial
expression of oneself but he does condemn modern bureaucratic
capitalism for
alienating people from both the process and product of work. This is
particularly clear, Mills argues, with white-collar workers like
salespeople,
whose personalities become commodities to be sold and for whom
friendliness
and courtesy are part of the "impersonal means of livelihood."
147Thus, he
claims, "in all work involving the personality market, . . . one's
personality and
personal traits become part of the means of production ... (which) has
carried
self and social alienation to explicit extremes." 148
Mills' emphasis on alienation derives from his concern with
the relationship between character and social structure. Salesmanship, he
argues,
estranges people from themselves and others because they view all
relationships as manipulative. 149 Alienation from work makes people turn
frenziedly to leisure; but the entertainment industry.,,,,,produces
synthetic
excitement, which offers no real release and establishes no deep
common
values.150 Other aspects of social structure strengthen psychological
tendencies that make modern societies liable to fascist or revolutionary
totalitarian
success.151 People's fragmented working environments give them little
understanding of how society works, and they believe that the
interventionist
government is responsible for insecurity and misfortune. An
increasingly
centralized structure with no remaining traditional beliefs and with
permanently
anxious people is, Mills argues, highly vulnerable.
The Power Elite
Mills argues consistently that the growth of large structures
has been
accompanied by a centralization of power and that the men who head
government, corporations, the armed forces, and the unions are very
closely
linked. He carries this part of his analysis the furthest in his
discussion of the
"power elite."152
Mills argues that America is ruled by a "power elite" made up
of people
who hold the dominant positions in political, military, and economic
institutions.
"Within the American society," he writes, "major national power now
resides in
the economic, the political and the military domains ... Within each
of the big
three, the typical institutional unit has become enlarged, has become
administrative, and, in the power of its decisions, has become
centralized ...
(The) means of power at the disposal of centralized decision-making
units have
increased enormously."153
Mills argues, moreover, that the three domains are
interlocked, so that "the
leading men in each of the three domains of power-the warlords, the
corporate
chieftains, the political directorate-tend to come together to form
the power
elite of America: ... The military capitalism of private corporations
exists in a
weakened and formal democratic system containing an already quite
politicized
military order."154 Mills believed that power can be based on factors
other than
property. However, the unity of the elite's institutional interests
brings them
together and maintains a war economy.
Mills' analysis coincided with and reinforced an attitude
toward American
society that was apparent in Eisenhower's denunciation of the
"military-industrial complex." Many nonradical sociologists agree that
econonomic life is increasingly intertwined with the activities of the
government.
However, they argue that it is not simply military expenditures that
are
important, but rather the increased involvement of government in all
spheres of
economic life. Those of us who live in Washington notice how, month
by
month, more and more industrial, trade, and labor associations set up
headquarters in the city's burgeoning office blocks, close to the
federal
government and its power.
Moreover, critics frequently disagree with Mills' perception
of a single
"power elite" pursuing its united interest and excluding others from
influence,155 The argue that powerful interests may-and frequently do
conflict with
each other. "Business," for example, undoubtedly has power. It gets
some of
the measures it wants, and some firms and industries acquire a
protected,
semimonopolistic position from government regulators. For others,
however,
plans are delayed or demolished by decisions about environmental
quality,
prices are set at levels they oppose, or costs are raised by taxes,
government
paperwork, pollution requirements, and the like.
In general, Mills shares with Marxist sociology and the
"elite theorists" a
tendency to see society as divided rather sharply and horizontally
between the
powerful and the powerless. He also shares Marxist and neoMarxist
theorists'
concerns about alienation, the effects of social structure on the
personality, and
the "manipulation" of people by the mass media. At the same time,
however,
Mills clearly belongs to a distinctively American populist tradition,
which does
not regard property as such as the main source of evil in society. To
Mills,
small-scale property ownership and the class of independent
entrepreneurs are
the major safeguards of freedom and security, and he regrets the
waning of
the old American society of independent farmers and businessmen.156
Summary
Of all contemporary sociological theories, those which
combine a
conflict perspective with social critique are the most clearly
associated
with arguments current outside academic life, especially among the
politically involved. The political importance of these theorists is
consequently greater than that of any other group we describe. This
is
especially evident outside the United States; but it is also true
within it, as
we can see from the following excerpt from the Port Huron Statement of
Students for a Democratic Society, a central document of the student
New Left of the 1960s. We find echoes of Marx's economic analysis,
Mills'condemnation of the power elite, critical theory's view that
society is
"administered" and manipulated, and the concern of all these theories
with people's alienation in its statement:
We regard men as infinitely precious and possessed of
unfulfilled capacities for
reason, freedom, and love.... We oppose the depersonalization that
reduces human
beings to the status of things.... We oppose, too, the doctrine of
human
incompetence because it rests essentially on the modern fact that men
have been
"competently" manipulated into incompetence....
The American political system ... frustrates democracy by
confusing the individual
citizen ... and consolidating the irresponsible power of military and
business interests.
We would replace power rooted in possession, privilege or
circumstances by power
and uniqueness rooted in love, reflectiveness, reason and creativity.
As a social
system we seek the establishment of a democracy of individual
participation.... The
economic sphere would have (among its) principles:
that work should involve incentives worthier than money or survival...
that the
economic experience is so personally decisive that the individual must
share in its full
determination.
Major social institutions should be generally organized with
the well being
and dignity of men as the essential measure of success.157
As we shall see in the next section, analytic conflict theory
shares many of the general orientations of the "critical" conflict
perspectives. The belief in an ideal society and the combination
of analysis and moral outrage that the Port Huron Statement
embodies are, however, as foreign to it as they are central to the
work of the "critical" theorists we have just discussed.
Material 9
J.P. Lederach, DISCOVERY
1995)
(From
Preparing for Peace , Syracuse,
So to Whom Do You Turn?
Discovery and Creation of Mediation Models
I have described in some detail the philosophical
roots and goals of an elicitive approach to training, but
the question still remains of how exactly yqu accomplish
these ideals. A familiar saying in Spanish suggests that
"Between what is said and what is done there runs a deep
chasm." In other words, in real life it is never easy to
fully accomplish the ideals and goals we set for ourselves.
Specific to our concerns here, the elicitive format suggests
that it should be possible to build a model of mediation
through a training experience. In the next two chapters, I
will present several approaches and exercises within an
elicitive perspective aimed specifically at model building
in mediation. First, I outline a training process that
builds from people's natural understanding of providing
help. In the following chapter, I suggest how role-play can
be used as a tool for developing mediation models.
Seeking Help: An Elicitive Exercise
In many introductory workshops in North American
mediation, training begins with an overview and description
of the process. The format is often a short descriptive
lecture about the purpose,, structure,, rules,.
expectations, and roles that comprise the mediation process.
Implicit in the opening description are the cultural
assumptions of how the process is accomplished and the
naming of the process and its components. In settings where
I work with groups from cultural and linguistic contexts
other than my own, I have used a different opening exercise,
one that takes several steps back from presenting a process
or naming it. It is built around three key questions. It
can be used as a shorter introductory piece or can easily
provide the material for a longer, more exploratory effort.
The exercise follows these steps for setup and
implementation.
1.
Open the exercise with a statement like this: "I
want everyone to think back to a time when you found
yourself experiencing problems with someone else. You know
things are not right. This can be a problem in your family,
among friends, at work, or in your neighborhood. Now, I
want you to think through this question. If things got
difficult and you felt you needed help with this problem,
who would you go to for help? Get the image of this person
or persons in your mind. Then work on and share the
following with your small group: Why did you choose this
person? What characteristics does he or she have? What do
you expect from this person?"
2.
Invite participants to think on their own for a
short while and then to join a small group. These groups
discuss their various answers and compile a list of ideas to
report back to the large group.
3.
Record the responses on a blackboard, on
newsprint, or on index cards. Index cards are most useful
if a longer exploratory process is desired. In the process
of reporting, people are encouraged to talk about examples
of what they mean or why they chose a certain concept or
characteristic. As the responses come out, ideas that are
repeated are marked or noted.
4.
The final step moves toward a summary and
conclusion, the detail of which varies with the time and
purpose of the exercise. For example, if time is limited
and the exercise is proposed as an initial step leading to
more exploration of real life cases, summarize the emerging
major themes by building from the key and repeated ideas.
On the other hand, if time permits, it can be a very useful
exercise to ask the participants to create their own interpretation and even the beginnings of a model. In this case,
we might follow the storyboarding process.
Storyboarding in Model Creation
Walt Disney developed the process of storyboarding in
outlining and producing cartoons. It has made its way into
conflict resolution as a useful process for identifying
problems and possible solutions. I have been using a
variation of storyboarding in training as a tool for
facilitating the discovery and creation of mediation models
that may be implicit in the culture. In essence, the
storyboarding process involves working with index cards. A
single idea, word, or image is written on each card related
to a given theme. A story is then created by linking and
grouping these cards together by commonality or sequence.
To create a mediation model, I have used the process in the
following format:
1.
First, the most significant and key ideas
identified in the plenary sharing related to the three
questions on seeking help are written, one per index card.
2.
A complete set of these index cards is given back
to each small working group.
3.
Each group then works with the cards, almost as if
they formed a puzzle, reflecting on questions such as: How
do these ideas fit together? Is there a sequence? Are some
ideas describing a particular aspect of providing help?
What would we call this set of ideas or this aspect?
4.
Each group then reports back on how it has
arranged the cards and ideas and is asked, among other
things, to name the key commonalities, or steps, or overall
arrangements that have been identified.
At each step in this process, we can push out the
purpose of the exercise as it relates to the objectives of
an elicitive approach. First, rather than describing a
predefined process, participants are invited to move back
into their own experiences and identifying the elements that
are relevant in seeking and providing help.
Second, as trainers, we move away from the temptation of
naming the process or elements. The exercise tries to keep
names generic and general, such as "help" rather than
"mediation." Participants are the ones who provide concepts
or categories that describe this help.
Third, the direction a training may go is never
predictable. Many people will begin their reflection by
saying, "it depends": "It depends whether I have an economic
problem, or a family problem, or problem with my boss." On
the surface, this may seem to be distracting. From the
ehcitive viewpoint, however, this is precisely the implicit
knowledge that leads to explicit identification and
appropriate model building. For example, in Uganda, one
participant noted that if there were a problem with my
brother we would go to my father or an uncle, but if the
problem is with a neighbor, then we may need to seek out an
elder. What begins to emerge are the ways people think
about conflict, the resources and traditions they are
intuitively aware of, why those are appropriate, and why
they may no longer exist or are not used.
Fourth, working from a small group back to a larger group
enhances the richness and the realism of what is discussed.
This undergirds the proposition that people from the setting
are not only the best resource for coming up with ideas
about how things work; but they are also the best resource
for providing a realistic check about whether an idea is
valid.
Finally, especially if the longer process is followed,
people can begin to push out key characteristics and ideas
about how help is provided in their setting. Further steps
often involve identifying obstacles, what things have been
lost (for example, through modernization or immigration),
what things hold promise that need to be worked on, and
probably most importantly, what we call this process or
processes. For example, in Panama among the Embere and
Wounaan Indians, this early exercise resulted in the
suggestion that providing help was a lot like guiding
someone through the riverways of the dense jungle. For the
remainder of our time we referred to third parties as
guides.
An Example: Help in Central America
Because these descriptions and ideas appear somewhat
abstract in the written form, let me describe several cases
in Central America where time permitted us to look more
carefully at the ideas. I have found that the questions-Who
do you turn to? Why that person? What do you expect from
them?-posed to different groups often identified a number of
common words and themes. In a couple of cases, each of the
words that came out more frequently in response to these
questions was written on a card. People in smaller groups
were then asked to take this set of cards-usually numbering
between twenty and thirty-and arrange them accordingly to
commonality, sequence, or whatever made most sense to them.
On a number of occasions, the following kind of arrangement
or conversation would emerge. For the benefit of the
reader, I have placed quotation marks around words that
emerged with frequency in the initial exercise.
First, key to why certain people are chosen were the
ideas of "trustworthiness," that "we know them," that "they
know us" and can "keep our confidences." These terms often
came together in a single overarching concept: confianza, a
profoundly cultural term that is inadequately translated as
trust or confidence. In several groups, confianza became a
key to understanding how they work at conflict and how they
think about resolution and healing. Confianza points to
relationship building over time, to a sense of "sincerity" a
person has and a feeling of "security" the person "inspires"
in us that we will "not be betrayed." Confianza is a key for
"entry" into the problem and into the person with whom we
have the problem. From the eyes of everyday experience in
Central America, when I have a problem with someone I do not
look for an outside professional. Rather I look for someone
I trust who also knows the other person and is trusted by
them. This kind of person can give "orientation" and
"advice." Through this person, entry is accomplished.
Second, a number of terms often emerged around the idea
of " support, " "talk," and "listening." These almost always
involved a popular term for an informal chat, platicar.
This is more than simply "talking." It involves cultural
understanding of communicative mechanisms for "sharing,"
"exchanging" and "checking things out." Platicar is
fundamentally a way of being with another, of reaffirming
the relationship, and in many more delicate situations of
preparing the way for "dialogue" that may involve
confrontation. Through the platica people feel "supported,"
"heard," "understood," and "accompanied."
Third, people want "help," "advice,"' and "direction."
From others we seek "paths" that can lead us " out of the
problem." Often, in working with the these words and
concepts,, two ideas stood out. First, was the concept of
looking for or giving consejo, or advice. At a popular
level, conflict resolution thinking is advice driven and
sought. But it is not in the sense of giving advice that
North American helping professions may advise against.
Seeking and giving advice often has more to do with
participation in seeking solution-in other words,
brainstorming-than in narrowing to choose action or impose
solution. Looking for advice is seeking the pool of
collective wisdom, seeking support and understanding. Thus,
in the course of a conversation, much advice may be batted
around, providing the seeker with a sense of solidarity and
ideas. Additionally, people often talked about the idea of
ubicarse, which literally is to "locate oneself," or in our
vernacular, "figuring out where I am." Getting advice,
"identifying the problems," providing "orientation" are all
part of figuring out what's going on, where I am, and where
I should go.
Finally, a number of terms emerge around the concern of
how I "get out" of this mess. People look for "solutions"
most often understood as an arreglo, an "arrangement." This
term combines a number of ideas, from "fixing things" and
"putting things back together," to "getting an agreement" or
"understanding." Key to an arreglo is a way of thinking that
is holistic in nature, that is, seeing oneself and the
problem in the context of a network rather than as isolated
from it. Thus, an "arrangement" creates a salida, a common
term meaning a way out, but a way out that maintains the
network and relationship and fosters dignity. In other
words, it saves face.
Pulling these ideas together, one group in Costa Rica
outlined their understanding of how we get in and out of
conflict and provide "help" by building on their terms as
guidelines (see figure 10). It is worth noting that this
overall outline resonates with important metaphors and
images common to the way people think about conflict in a
Central American setting. The language of conflict
describes a journey involving the tasks of getting in,
figuring out where we are, and getting out. In fact, this
set of concepts helps reinforce key cultural premises: a
focus on relationship, trustbuilding, restoration of
community, and use of people in the network. It focuses on
being with others as a mode of restoration rather than
applying technique as a mode of resolving problems.
In terms of model building, we are now in a position to
take a further step. Each of these words-such as confianza
or arreglar has rich cultural and practical meaning and
represents important organizing categories for model
building. These common, everyday terms describing the
action of working on the restoration of relationship and the
resolution of conflict, renamed, become empowering tools.
The model-building exercise rooted these words and processes
within the culture and encouraged participants to name them,
providing categories for further discovery, for exploration,
and for use as the building blocks of a more explicit model.
Important questions can now guide the next steps in
understanding more fully the applicability and
implementation of the model: What are the approaches to
building confianza? How does one pursue la platica? What
are constructive elements for getting situated and arranging
a way out?
Point of Convergence
The prescriptive-elicitive spectrum helps bring to the
surface the question of cultural universality of conflict
resolution and mediation practices. This question was posed
in a sharper manner in a series of training workshops I
conducted with the Northern Ireland Mediation Network.
Having received early training in the North American
mediation model, over the past years, community mediators in
Northern Ireland have sought to "Irishize" the approach-creating a
dilemma. In the Northern Ireland context, the
early and current mediation training provided a vehicle of
enrichment, a new way to look at and deal with conflict,
which clearly created a sense of empowerment. Yet, the
application of the training in real-life cases did not seem
to bear the level of fruit expected in getting people into
the process or carrying it to a successful mediated
conclusion. People would come to trainings to learn models
and skills, but the Irish people would not bring conflicts
to be mediated along the lines proposed by the model. "How
is it," I remember one participant asking, "that we can feel
enlightened by learning the model and simultaneously
uncomfortable that it does not quite fit?"
The question provided a rich and useful device for
further exploration. In my analysis, it helped sharpen the
underlying conviction that a convergence of universal and
particular with prescriptive and elicitive was both possible
and necessary. At a theoretical level, a heuristic
framework was necessary, and at a training level a new tool
was needed. These came together in what I consider to be
one of the most basic of all sociological premises, that
form follows function.
I would suggest we can bring the conflict functionalism
of Coser (1956) together with a social constructionist view
of Schutz (1967) and Blumer (1969). This is one way of
looking at the seminal work of Gulliver (1979), who
attempted broad case and cultural comparison in dispute
resolution in order to establish the basic parameters of
negotiation functions while recognizing the multiplicity of
cultural forms. This approach was the general orientation
of my early investigation into the cultural assumptions of
the North American mediation model (1985), where I suggested
mediation had a set of basic components that needed to
be,met, but that varied significantly in terms of the
specific mechanisms for meeting them. Moving from function
to form is like moving down a spectrum from universal to
particular. As I outlined in chapter 5, the transfer
modality in training rarely distinguishes analytically
between these two. Most conflict-resolution and mediation
training concentrates on "skills transfer," which are the
more particular forms, as if the form was universal, when in
fact the form tends to be more particular to the context and
culture.
With this broad intuition in mind, over the course of the
past year, I have devised and explored a training tool that
suggests a convergence (figure 11). First developed in
Spanish and shared in the Basque Country, and subsequently
in Northern Ireland in early 1994, it remains in an
experimental and rough form. It is built on four
categories. Facets refers to basic aspects and components
necessary for the work of any third-party process
intervening in a social conflict. The functions respond to
a set of key questions related to accomplishing the facets.
The forms begin to answer the questions in terms of broader
strategies and approaches, which are more culturally
constructed for a given setting. The formulas are then seen
as the specific tactics, skills, and mechanisms, or the
technique, by which the forms are implemented.
The facet-function aspects suggest a series of things
that will likely be dealt with in any mediated process.
Based on earlier work and experience, I would outline these
briefly as a circular, interactive process, although for
purposes of analysis these appear as phases in figure 11.
Entry deals with the question of who will emerge as an
acceptable third party and how the process and forum for
dealing with the conflict will be constructed. In general,
in one way or another, what is sought is a mechanism to
bring to the surface and seek remedy for the problem. The
third party, in this sense, provides a way to seek help.
Involved is not only an initial negotiation of the proper
place to lodge the conflict, but also a definition of the
expectations for the roles and process that will be
followed.
Gathering Perspectives, or what is often referred to as
storytelling, responds to the question of "what happened?"
In other words, it opens a space for looking at the past,
providing opportunity for people to express and air their
grievances and concems. Important and widely shared needs
in social conflict include the process of legitimation of
concern through acknowledgement of pain and feelings, past
wrongs and grievances, truth, and responsibflities. Perhaps
most crucial is the element of legitimating a recognition
and acknowledgment of the person or groups involved, in
other words, being heard and taken seriously.
Locating the Conflict grapples with the question "where
are we?" often metaphorically referred to by people in
conflict who are trying to figure out where they are in
relationship to others and problems experienced. It is the
process of attaching meaning to events and people's action
and situating what the conflict is about in order to know
how to deal with it. This is the fundamental need to create
an understanding of the conflict and a common framework that
permits people to move forward.
Arrange and Negotiate answer the dilemma of "how do we
get out?" Here the focus is on dealing with the nature of
the relationship and the issues posed by the conflict.
"Arranging" points toward a broader process of how the
relationship is understood by the those in conflict.
Negotiate deals with the narrower focus of how issues will
be resolved, at times referred to as problemsolving. In the
end, the process will help create paths leading toward
resolution of some aspects of the conflict and redefinition
of the relationship.
Way Out and Agreement deal with the questions of "who
will do what, when?" Agreement tends to be more specific in
terms of concrete expected action and implementation. The
way out, on the other hand, points toward the broader
mechanism that acknowledges ongoing ebb and flow of conflict
in the context of
relationship. In other words, it points, metaphorically,
toward conflict as part of relational journey, where paths
may cross, broaden together, or part their ways.
The form-formula columns outline the increasingly more
specific ways that the facets and functions are met in
particular settings and situations. For the purposes of
demonstrating the application of the tool, I have suggested
in figure 11 two broad comparisons of form and formula
emerging from radically different settings. The first is
the approach that might commonly be used in community
mediation in the United States; the second outlines some
aspects of how conflicts have been handled in elders
conferences in the Somali context. In brief narrative, and
not assuming any attempt here to be comprehensive in either
process, we could suggest the following:
In the community mediation approach, the general form for
entry involves a formal mediator role, often a person who is
trained as a volunteer, or in some instances views himself
or herself as a professional. By formalization, I refer to
the explicit, often written understanding of the role and
expectations. The process is more often than not oriented
toward providing faceto-face encounters between the
disputants and facilitated by the mediator.
The entries under formula are more specific. Disputants
contact a center. They are brought into a process aimed at
gaining acceptance for meeting in a facilitated session.
The session itself is governed by ground rules and takes
place at a neutral location, often the mediation center
itself. Sessions are conceived as blocks of time-usually
two hours or less-and may be carried out in multiple
meetings over several weeks to several months depending on
the complexity of the case. A key in the development of the
mediator role and early process are the mechanisms for
creating trust and a safe atmosphere for the disputants.
Drawing from personal experience and the research of Dr.
A. Y. Farah (1993) on Somali peace conferences in Northwest
Somalia, currently declared Somaliland, we can describe some
characteristics for dealing with inter-clan conflict.
Generally, serious inter-clan conflict will call for the
movement toward creating a guurti or a supreme council of
elders. This involves a collective
coordination over a considerable period of time, where
elders are recognized as having traditional power for
facilitating and arbitrating the process and events and
monitoring the outcomes.
In the severely divided, war-torn context, the formula
for entry involved among other things the use of delegations
of women, who, by marriage, were now connected to one clan "
but who could also safely travel back to their clans of
origin to pass on communication and encourage the initiation
of cross-clan dialogue. The same may be true of a
delegation of recognized elders that travels to meet another
subclan's elders, referred to traditionally as an ergada.
These early contacts make way for a space where fighting is
stopped while consultations emerge.
An open, multiple, and cross-clan peace conference is
preceded often by a combination of intra-sub-subclan
deliberations about grievances, issues and representation
and then a series of iterant,, cross-subclan deliberations
and consultations. Iteration refers to a process whereby no
one meeting or consultation is seen as conclusive, but
remains open and ongoing over time. This consultative
process is where perspectives are gathered, procedural steps
are negotiated, and the basic parameters are set for moving
toward a more explicit forum guided by the guurti. The
preparatory phase may appear like a traveling (literally as
in itinerate) set of inconclusive consultations. In fact,,
setting parameters., negotiating agenda,, and establishing
the beginnings of a reconciliation process are being
conducted. What is described here meets the facets of
entry,. perspective gathering, and locating and arranging in
a circular, iterative process. The process itself builds
from smaller collectives toward a larger collective and
forum-a bottom-up approach to peace building.
The actual forum or peace conference can take the form of
large,, usually public meetings,, marked by lengthy oratory
speeches and the extensive use of poetry People present have
a basic felt right to speak. As a Somali proverb puts it,
"You can deny a Somali his food but not his word." Poetry
remains a revered art form and can move people toward war or
toward reconciliation. As -a formula of conflict resolution
it helps locate and situate grievances and meaning and
justifies views and demands of different groups. It is a
traditional mechanism that has modern parallel in the mass
media's effect on public opinion and conflict analysis in
terms of locating the conflict by arguing for causes,
rights, and responsibilities.
Given these components, the preparation and the conduct of
a peace conference can easily last four to six months.
Throughout, the elders help prepare, moderate, listen, and,
in a number of cases, arbitrate procedural problems, as well
as helping formulate an eventual consensus of the dans on
the substance and relationship. While the open meeting
provides one forum, simultaneously', a variety of inter and
subdan deliberations continue on the side, at times involving lengthy, late-night qu'at sessions. (Quat is a leaf
traditionally chewed and used for facilitating talks.)
In the community mediation model, disputants are expected
to reveal their concerns and feelings. The mediator's tasks
are to provide an atmosphere for hearing and identifying the
issues and to work on the relationship. This is
accomplished, for example, by paraphrasing and posing open
questions to get more information and by helping to identify
a common agenda or list of issues to negotiate as the
process moves toward problem solving.
In the movement toward negotiation and arranging, mediation has a series of common techniques. For example,
mediators will ask disputants to focus on one issue at a
time, to separate their proposed solutions from their
underlying interests, and to brainstorm a variety of options
before they evaluate and move toward a solution. Generally,
the focus of mediation is to discover mutually beneficial
solutions and outcomes.
As these come together in pieces or packages, the
community mediation process recommends formulating them in a
final agreement that is written, concise, and clear. It
usually outlines specific detail around expected actions.
Mediators serve as a reality check in terms of whether the
proposed agreements can be accomphshed. Often, some form of
follow-up contact with the mediators is included in the
final agreement as a mechanism for monitoring or assuring
the implementation.
In the Somali context, the agreements initially achieved
in an oral format have taken written form in the recent
peace conferences (1992-94). They may involve specific and
traditional mechanisms for dealing with cross-clan conflicts
and restitution, for example, the payment of female camels
as compensation. Past grievances and restoration of
relationship have also traditionally been accomplished by
the exchange of women for marriage between two warring
clans as both a symbolic compensation for the loss of life
and a bond of blood connection between the groups (Farah
1993). In many instances, the elders and the elders
councils continue to function as monitors and guarantors of
the peace agreements.
Although brief and incomplete, the comparison provides an
example of convergence in terms of universal/particular and
prescriptive/elicitive. What I am suggesting is that
training on third party roles and mediation can help
participants recognize key needs and functions the process
may serve. On the other hand, the training process must
also recognize the limitations of given forms and formulas
and seek to work with those that are more culturally rooted
and adapted to the nature of the problem and the context
within which it moves.
Facet/Function suggest the usefulness of prescriptive and
universal perspectives. There are shared, common, and, in
that way., transferable ideas and approaches that can be
helpful and can cross-fertilize. Form/Formulas suggest the
usefulness of elicitive and more particular cultural
discovery work. There is a need to innovate, adapt, and
work in appropriate ways in each and every setting. In the
end, as trainers, we must be flexible to pull from both
resources what is needed at a given time and for a given
purpose in the training.
Conclusion
In this chapter, I have attempted to demonstrate the
possibility of approaching training as the challenge of
working together with a group to discover and develop a
model of mediation. In a number of the examples, especially
the Central American- and U.S.-based community mediation, it
is important to note the difference between a more
professional, formalized process and the informal,
traditional mechanisms. The prescriptive and elicitive
approaches are in part the distinction and comparison
between the transfer of a formal, more professional model in
one society, in this case the North American, and the more
informal, folk model of another, as was described in the
Central American model in figure 10. The question then
arises of whether a similar folk model would emerge if an
eficitive approach were to be applied in the North American
setting. And whether, therefore, we are comparing apples
and oranges. In other words, we may not be dealing
exclusively with cultural differences between countries and
societies, but rather with cultural differences between educational levels and economic classes within the same
society.
This concern is not new to the research in some regards.
In fact, the empirical work by Merry and Silbey (1984)
suggested that the models of community mediation tested in
the Northeastern United States, having developed in formal
training under the heavy influence of what they regard as
Western academic concern for rational analysis and problem
solving, did not fit the modalities of more working-class
constituencies, who were looking for different approaches in
seeking remedy.
What I am proposing here is not that the one intervention
model is better than another. Rather, I am pushing for the
expansion of how we approach the training methodology to
include the process of discovery of how people actually
think and go about seeking remedy and solution and how that
knowledge can be tapped as a resource and foundation for
developing models that fit clearly in a given setting.
In sum, an elicitive orientation suggests that we consider
what is present in a cultural setting the basis for
identifying key categories and concepts to use as
foundational building blocks for a conflict resolution
model. It assumes that the culture is a resource and that
participants are capable of identifying and naming their own
realities and tools. Practically, this means they dig into
the mines of their own knowledge and setting. Rather than
learning the language of a new model (for example, the North
American mediation language about information gathering,
assessment, and problem solving), and then needing to ferret
out the implicit assumptions from that model for a
particular cultural context,, the elicitive approach
initiates learning with the implicit but constructive images
and assumptions present in the culture and builds toward an
explicit model. It is therefore necessary for us to have
available a pure elicitive approach in contrast with a pure
prescriptive approach, in order to find the ways that these
provide orientation, options, and convergence in terms of
training methodology.
Material 10
Journal of Peace Research, vol. 28, no. 1, 1991 pp. 85-98
Mediating Conflict in Central
America
PAUL WEHR
Department of Sociology, University of Colorado
JOHN PAUL LEDERACH
Department of Sociology, Eastern Mennonite College
The Esquipulas peace process in Central America is examined
as process, structure and context. It is found to be an
innovative effort in regional conflict resolution. The
study focuses on how mediation has been used in conflict
management within Nicaragua. Trust- or confianza-based
mediation has assumed special importance in the Nicaraguan
case. The emphasis on the confianza relationship in Central
American societies produces a type of mediator known as the
insider-partial, who emerges from within the conflict
situation itself. It differs markedly from the outsider-neutral third
party common to post-industrial society. Its
legitimacy and effectiveness come from the continuing
personal connection of the mediator with the conflict
parties before, during and after the intervention. The
conflict between the Sandinista government and Atlantic
Coast Indian leaders is analyzed to illustrate the use of
confianza-based mediation and its effectiveness when
combined with intervention by outsider-neutrals. The
authors recommend a broadening of the concept of mediation
to include intervention by insider-partials. Their
continuity within and knowledge of the conflict situation
effectively complement the outsider-neutrals' objectivity
and lack of connection with conflictants. Mediator teams
should be carefully selected to include both types,
particularly for interventions in the developing world. It
is recommended, additionally, that mediators attend more to
modifying the mediation context to render it more supportive
of their interventions. The authors conclude that
Esquipulas represents a rich store of mediation experience
for conflict research.
1. Analytical Approach
A regional process of conflict resolution has recently
evolved in Central America the principal framework for which
has been the Esquipulas II agreement of 1987. In this paper
we analyze mediation within Esquipulas, first from a region-wide
perspective, then as it has been used to moderate and
resolve conflicts within Nicaragua. How mediation has been
applied in this historical case may have implications for
how students and practitioners of third party intervention
conceive of the role of mediator.
We begin with a discussion of mediation as a
theoretical concept and how our analysis of the Esquipulas
case and our personal involvement in Nicaraguan mediation
has influenced our conceptualization of the role of
intermediary. We develop the concept of
the Insider-Partial as a
mediator type. We then proceed to discuss the
development of mediation within Esquipulas as an historical
process that moves through time, and produces, responds to
and transforms events. Process implies action and in mediation third parties act to move conflict toward
settlement. Since mediators create this process, who they
are and what they do is necessarily of concern to this
paper. Oscar Arias Sanchez, for example, has been a key
mediator-negotiator in Esquipulas.
We go on to examine the Esquipulas mediation in terms
of the structure it has created for conflict resolution the rules, agenda, principles, timelines and organizations
fashioned to move conflictants toward settlement. The
principle of simultaneity of implementation (Hopmann, 1988)
and the commissions for carrying it out illustrate the
structure of Esquipulas mediation.
We next discuss the Esquipulas mediation as context,
the larger environment influencing third party efforts.
Conflict research has addressed the importance of the
immediate mediation setting for inducing settlement. Just
as important is@the wider context or environment influencing
the conflict toward or away from resolution. In the case of
Esquipulas, that context appears to have been of special
import. The change of US presidential administrations and
the presence of international volunteers and nongovernmental
organizations are noteworthy examples of contextual
determinants of mediation success in Nicaragua.
Our paper concludes with a discussion of some
theoretical and practical implications of the outsider
neutral and insider-partial mediator roles illustrated by
Esquipulas mediation. Our major recommendations are for a
more inclusive set of mediator types and more systematic
selection of mediators to reflect that range. Mediators, we
conclude, must become more aware of the influence of context
on mediation outcomes and how it can be made more supportive
of mediation efforts.
2. Concepts of Mediation
Our concept of mediation has been very much influenced by
our on-site involvement as observer and practitioner in
Central American conflict resolution. One of us spent a
year as mediator of one of the two major conflicts in the
Nicaraguan civil war. The role of mediator has been
characterized in numerous ways in the mediation literature,
reflecting the various levels at which mediators work and
the quite different personalities, skills, attributes and
positions they bring to their work. Our experience in
Central America leads us to add to those characterizations a
model of mediation we see as having particular relevance for
third party intervention in developing nations. We will
first discuss some of those roles and definitions of
mediation, then how our concept relates to them and how it
could expand the concept of mediation.
2.1
The Outsider-Neutral
One
common conceptualization of mediation roots the
mediator's effectiveness in externality (coming from outside
the conflict situation) and neutrality (having no connection
or commitment to either side in the conflict). In the North
American field of intergroup and interpersonal conflict
management, for example, mediation is commonly defined as a
rather narrow, formal activity in which an impartial,
neutral third party facilitates direct negotiation.
Mediator neutrality is reinforced by their coming from
outside the conflict, facilitating settlement, then leaving.
In North America this distance of mediator from disputants
is heavily emphasized. Mediators are referred to as 'third
party neutrals'. Ethics codes bind mediators to that
principle. Mediators' neutrality protects the legitimacy
and authority that are created primarily through their
professional role, position and function - a rational-legal
type of authority as Weber (1922/1957) described it. This
neutrality-based intervener is what we call the OutsiderNeutral.
The outsider-neutrals maintain distance from the disputants
(see Fig. 1). They are chosen because they have no
connection with either side that will affect the outcome and
are thereby judged to be unbiased. Outsider-neutrals are
connected to disputants through the conflict alone, relating
to them only during the mediation process in ways relevant
to the function of mediation. Only small parts of the lives
of conflict parties and interveners intersect: those related
to the conflict.
According to this view, the assurance of neutrality in
mediation creates the necessary perception of mediator
legitimacy, professionalism and fairness. The mediator
works to present a neutral self, to perform credibly in a
way that defines the situation in which the
mediation/negotiation performance takes place as neutral and
impartial (Goffman, 1959). Neutrality and impartiality are
defined negatively, in terms of what the mediator is not.
The third party is not connected to either disputant, is not
biased toward either side, has no investment in any outcome
except settlement and does not expect any special reward
from either side (Moore, 1986, pp. 15-16).
2.2 The International Mediator
International mediation is conceived with much greater
breadth and diversity than is the North American view of
intergroup and interpersonal mediation. The complexity of
international and intercultural disputes calls forth perhaps
a greater variety of mediator roles. And so we find the
mediator-broker (Touval, 1982) and the mediator-conciliator
(Yarrow, 1978) among many others. Each conceptualization
emphasizes a different role played or function performed by
international third parties. Touval's able discussion of
the different mediator roles and conceptualizations suggests
that the concept of international mediator remains somewhat
open. There are other terms that from our review of the
third party literature appear similarly imprecise.
Neutrality, for example, is on occasion to be translated as
evenhandedness, or even balance, as in Yarrow's
characterization of Quaker conciliation as 'balanced
partiality'.
Theorists generally do not see mediator neutrality and
impartiality as requisites for successful international
mediation. In fact in some cases mediator connectedness and
bias prove to facilitate settlement. We do find in the
theory, however, a strong assumption of the importance of
externality for mediation success. The successful mediator
must intervene from outside the conflict situation.
2.3 The Insider-Partial
We suggest an additional mediator role (one that may be
particular to more traditional societies) whose
effectiveness depends
neither on externality nor
neutrality but on quite the opposite attributes internality and partiality. We further suggest, from our
observations of Central American mediation, that the
insider-partial mediator complements quite usefully those
interveners who bring neutrality from outside the conflict
situation.
The insider-partial is the 'mediator from within the
conflict', whose acceptability to the conflictants is rooted
not in distance from the conflict or objectivity regarding
the issues, - but rather in connectedness and trusted
relationships with the conflict parties. The trust comes
partly from the fact that the mediators do not leave the
postnegotiation situation. They are part of it and must
live with the consequences of their work. They must
continue to relate to conflictants who have trusted their
commitment to a just and durable settlement. Such a
mediator is more likely to develop out of more traditional
cultural settings where primary, face-to-face relations
continue to characterize political, economic and social
exchange, and where tradition has been less eroded by
modernity.
In a recent ethnographic study, Lederach (1988) found
that neutrality is not what Central Americans seek for help
in resolving conflict. They look primarily for trust, confianza. In the confianza model (see Fig. 2), authority to
mediate is vested in the third party through a personal
relationship with the disputant(s), rather than by a
secondary role such as external intervener. This is what
Weber (1922/1957) called traditional authority.
Trust-based mediation assumes accumulated, sometimes
intimate knowledge shared by helper and helped. One who can
'deposit confianza' in another knows that person well. They
are connected in many ways, not just through a limited
service performed. As Simmel wrote, 'the more we have in
common with another as whole persons, the more easily will
our totality be involved in every single relation to him
[sic]' (1950, p. 44). In just that sense, the insider
partial does not relate with the conflictants simply through
an intervention. Their trust relationship permits them to
resolve the conflict together.
With respect to trust, the insider-partial is
not the polar opposite of other models. Personal trust is
always a concern in selecting any mediator. But with
insider-partials it is the primary criterion for selection.
They. are recognized above all as having the trust of all
sides. Unlike the outsider-neutral chosen for the absence
of connection with disputants, the insider-partial is
selected precisely for positive connections and attributes,
for what they are and do: they are close to, known by, with
and for each side. This confianza ensures sincerity,
openness and revelation and is a channel through which
negotiation is initiated and pursued.
We propose, then, to add the insider-partial to the
taxonomy of types and roles of international mediators. Its
potential for useful combination with outsider-neutrals and
other types will, we trust, become apparent as we show how
several of them were combined in Esquipulas mediation.
3.
The Esquipulas Process
Esquipulas is the most recent of a series of historical
efforts to resolve interstate conflict and promote regional
integration in Central America: the Central American
Confederation, 1823-38; the Central American Court of
Justice, 1907-17; a regional federation all but ratified in
1923; the Central American Common Market from 1960 onward.
There have been counterforces as well: border conflicts such
as the 1969 so-called Soccer War between El Salvador and
Honduras; the Filibuster Wars of the nineteenth century;
military governments that have favored national over
regional identity. When the Sandinista movement overthrew
the Somoza regime in 1979, such counterforces were holding
in check the region's long-standing desire for self-determination.
The Sandinista revolution radically altered social and
political conflict throughout Central America, most of all
within Nicaragua itself. There it moderated though did not
eliminate class conflict, but it created two new conflicts.
First, the Sandinistas' effort to integrate by force the
Atlantic Coast peoples into a revolutionary state stimulated
armed resistance in the East. Second, the Sandinistas'
Marxist ideological approach to governance and nation-building
encouraged defections from their own ranks. Many
of these dissidents became, along with Somozista elements,
the raw material for a US-organized Contra insurgency after
1982. The more conservative elements in Nicaraguan society,
led by the Catholic hierarchy and those of the upper class
who had remained, came to oppose Sandinista policies and to
give some support to the Contra movement.
The Nicaraguan revolution became increasingly
militarized with the aid and involvement of the USSR and
Cuba. The USsponsored military buildups in El Salvador and
Honduras completed the prospect of a region headed toward
the abyss. As the Contra activity expanded into Honduras
and Costa Rica it inevitably drew those nations into the
Nicaraguan conflict. This transformation of national
conflicts into a regional superpower confrontation moved
neighboring states such as Mexico to initiate formal peace-making
efforts.
3.1 Contadora
Contadora, begun in January 1983 by Panama, Mexico,
Venezuela and Colombia, was an experiment in collective
mediation. Its goal was to detach Central American conflicts from larger US-Soviet competition and to shift them
from military to political and diplomatic levels. The
Contadora Group, consulting with a Central American Group
(presidents of Guatemala, El Salvador, Nicaragua, Costa
Rica, Honduras) and a Contadora Support Group (Peru, Brazil,
Argentina, Uruguay) had produced a draft treaty by
1986. The draft was a blueprint for demilitarizing Central
American conflicts and resolving them through negotiation.
Contadora reached an impasse in mid1986.
Honduras, under pressure from the Reagan Administration with
its growing military presence there, declined to sign the
treaty (Buvollen, 1989a). The USA had alternately ignored
and criticized Contadora while pursuing its military options
throughout the region. The USA was, therefore,
simultaneously subverting the Contadora process
diplomatically (Bagley, 1987) and intensifying the conflicts
Contadora sought to moderate.
While Contadora fell short of its objectives,
viewed within the larger peace process it was considerably
more productive than would appear. Contadora created bases
on which Esquipulas could build. It provided a consultative
history and framework, and a comprehensive and accurate
diagnosis of the region's conflicts. Most important,
perhaps, it was an example of Central American regional
independence. Contadora happened not only without but in
spite of US policy.
Actually, we find much of Contadora in Esquipulas.
Eight Contadora documents are acknowledged as precedents in
the Esquipulas treaty (Gomariz, 1988, p. 355). Contadora
states have subsequently participated in both the
International Verification and Support Commission and the UN
Observer Group-Central America peace-keeping force. It
appears to us, then, that Esquipulas was not a break with
Contadora, as some (Robinson, 1988) may see it, but a
continuation of it within an exclusively Central American
framework.
While Esquipulas built upon Contadora, it was also
motivated by the latter's failures. One such stimulus was
the refusal of Honduras to sign the Contadora Act, a failure
whiich led to Congressional resumption of military aid to
the Contra insurgents. That alarming development motivated
Oscar Arias Sanchez, newly elected president of Costa Rica
to make a new initiative. Arias had been involved in the
final Contadora consultations. With a four-year term before
him in the region's most stable political system, he had
many of the resources needed by an international
intermediary (Young, 1967).
Arias set to work simplifying negotiation objectives.
Contadora's preoccupation with security issues had produced
proposals too complex to work. Arias set aside security as
a temporarily insoluble problem. He circulated a simple
draft agreement among his fellow presidents, Ortega
excepted. His success at simplification is suggested by the
comparative lengths of the 'Acta de Contadora' (22 pp.) and
the Esquipulas agreement (6 pp.).
3.2 The Time Path
By February 1987, Arias was receiving encouragement from his
presidential counterparts. That was met over subsequent
months with increasing opposition from the Reagan
Administration. Its release of the 'Wright-Reagan Plan' two
days before the August Central American Group summit meeting
was perceived by the group as an attempt to undercut the
peace process. Hopmann (1988) credits that perception with
motivating the five presidents to sign the agreement. They
were also urged to sign by certain members of the US
Congress. With the signing of 'Procedimiento para Establecer la Paz Firme y Duradera en Centroamerica' (Gomariz,
1988, pp. 355-361), a framework was created for mediated
negotiation both among the signatory governments and between
them and their respective insurgent opponents.
The agreement set objectives and prescribed specific
measures: demilitarization of conflict through ceasefires,
refusal of support for and use of territory by insurgents;
national reconciliation through negotiated settlements,
amnesty for insurgents, repatriation of refugees;
democratization of political systems through free and open
elections, ending states of emergency, protection of human
rights; continuing regional consultation through periodic
summits and a parliament. Subsequent summits assessed
interim progress, adjusted timetables, invited third party
participation and renegotiated agreements. The San Jose
meeting (1988), for example, led to a Sandinista ceasefire
and negotiations with the Contras. The San Salvador summit
(1989) produced agreement on Nicaraguan elections and Contra
demobilization and repatriation. The Tela agreement (1989)
firmed up the demobilization schedule and its supervision by
the International Commission for Verification and Support.
The Montelimar summit (1990) ratified and reinforced the new
Nicaraguan transition and Contra demobilization agreements
that guided both the transfer of power from the Sandinistas
and Contra disarmament.
By April 1990, Nicaragua, Guatemala and El Salvador all
had national reconciliation commissions in place and
operating. In Nicaragua, the peace process had produced
some striking precedents: an internationally supervised
election and a peaceful transfer of power, the
transformation of a revolutionary government into a
reasonably loyal opposition; a procedure for disarming and
reintegrating insurgents into civilian life. In Nicaragua,
the Esquipulas process had been faithful to the intentions
if not the implementation timetable of the agreement. Elsewhere in Central America, however, Esquipulas had produced
no real peace.
3.3 Leaders in the Process
Three of the Esquipulas participants were responsible for
getting it to work: Oscar Arias of Costa Rica through his
orchestration and mediation; Vinicio Cerezo of Guatemala
through his organizing and hosting of the initial summit,
his insistence that Nicaragua be included as a full
participant, and his subsequent role as its reliable supporter within the group; and Daniel Ortega of Nicaragua
through his negotiating flexibility and important
concessions at key points.
Arias was a central figure as a mediator-negotiator.
Since Costa Rica was already in compliance with
'Procedimiento', he had a special status in the group. He
appeared to combine the erogenous and endogenous approaches
to conflict management (Bercovitch, 1984). Arias's secure
tenure in Costa Rica and his status as Nobel Laureate were
resources to be drawn on. He used a number of obvious
intermediary tactics (Robinson,1988): early private
confrontation of Ortega on the need for Nicaraguan
flexibility; building momentum toward agreement to enlist a
reluctant Honduras; using deadlines and timing of meetings
to preclude US subversion all to produce the Esquipulas II
agreement.
4. The Esquipulas Structure
Three principles determined the structure for implementing
the agreement (Hopmann, 1988): simultaneity (eliminating the
'who goes first' problem - a thorny one with respect to
Contra demobilization and elections); calendarization ('who
does what by which dates'); and transparency ('how we know
that they are doing it'). Commissions were created to apply
those principles: a region-wide Commission for Verification
and Support; a National Commission of Reconciliation in each
nation; subnational Conciliation Commissions where necessary
(see Fig. 3). Commission members were selected for their
moral leadership, for useful connections they had with the
conflicting parties, and for their experience as interme-
diaries. They illustrated the connected, trusted insider-partial
third party. These commissions came to use
outsider-neutral mediators as well and were in turn used by
them. We next examine how the Esquipulas structure was used
rather successfully in Nicaragua.
4.1
TheNationalReconciliation Commission
Because of its international and military impacts, the
Contra-Sandinista conflict was the major concern of
Esquipulas. Cardinal Obando y Bravo was chosen to head the
NRC. He was not selected for his neutrality. His hostility
toward the Sandinistas was well known. But his status as
spiritual leader, his close connections with resistance
elements, and his visibility as a national symbol all
suggested his usefulness as intermediary. The two sides met
under Obando's auspices early in 1988. Several months of
negotiations produced the Sapoa agreement and a subsequent
government ceasefire, though direct talks were then broken
off by the Contras and not resumed for over a year.
Obando's mediation became more instrumental as the 1990
national elections and Contra demobilization approached.
Several sets of delicate negotiations were necessary,
involving at various points the Contra commanders, the
verification and support commission, the Sandinista
government, the UN, the OAS, the UNO opposition and, after
25 April 1990, the Chamorro government. Throughout the
difficult period between the March elections and the April
transfer of power, Cardinal Obando was the most visible
intermediary. It is not clear how active or directive his
mediation was but each time he intervened - Sapoa,
Toncontin, transition negotiations - a major, durable agreement issued from the negotiation.
4.2
The Conciliation Commission The second mediation
effort involved the Sandinista government and the Atlantic
Coast resistance. The Indians and Creoles had historically
been isolated from the Hispanicized Pacific Coast. British
and US manipulation of ethnic divisions had encouraged that
isolation (Brooks, 1989; Hale, 1988). The costenos,
therefore, had been relatively unengaged in the anti-Somoza
rebellion and hardly welcomed a revolutionary Nicaragua.
Sandinista attempts to integrate the East Coast were
met first with suspicion, then with resistance. The
situation swiftly degenerated into armed conflict that sent
30,000 refugees into Honduras and Costa Rica and caused much
destruction particularly in the Miskito northeast. By 1984,
realizing its past errors, the Sandinista government began a
twotrack conciliation strategy. The first track initiated
talks with Atlantic Coast leaders. These would subsequently
result in a National Autonomy Commission (1984), local
ceasefires, elected Peace and Autonomy Commissions (1986),
the drafting of a National Autonomy Law, and its
ratification by a Multi-Ethnic Assembly (1987) (Buvollen,
1989b; Sollis, 1989). This lengthy consultative process
reflected the Atlantic Coast's complex ethnicity, with six
groups speaking four languages. Though these groups num-
bered only 300,000, a tenth of Nicaragua's population, their
region represented well over a third of its land area and
much of its natural resource base.
Essential in this autonomy-building process were
certain well-regarded persons from the East who were
sympathetic to the revolution , thus trusted by both the
Sandinistas and the indigenous leaders (Freeland, 1989, p.
178). Such intermediaries as Myra Cunningham and Humberto
Campbell sustained the dialogue to ultimate agreement. They
are further examples of those insider-partials whose
reservoir of trust and mutually recognized stature among
conflictants, and crosscutting affiliations with both sides,
are so substantial as to permit a mediating function.
The second track involved Sandinista negotiations with
the leaders of the armed resistance who were in exile and
who had joined to form YATAMA in 1987. Their objectives
were the restoration of historical Indian traditions and
territorial rights, not the multi-ethnic regional
independence made possible by the Autonomy Law. Esquipulas
provided a new mediating structure for the Sandinista-YATAMA
conflict.
Whereas the Catholic Church had an important mediating
role in the Sandinista-Contra conflict, here the
intermediary was the Moravian Church. It is the primary
church on the Atlantic Coast just as Catholicism is dominant
in the West. Rooted within the Miskitos, Ramas, Sumos and
Creoles, it had the trust of the various resistance leaders
and was the logical intermediary. In the early 1980s the
Moravian Church, seen as antirevolutionary by the
Sandinistas, had suffered greatly, losing pastors, churches,
schools and hospitals in the SandinistaIndian war. From
1983 on, however, the Moravian Provincial Board and the
Sandinista government had worked to improve relations.
Church leaders had facilitated ceasefires and autonomy
consultations. Board members had been schoolmates of key
resistance leaders and had maintained those ties.
It was not surprising, therefore, that YATAMA asked
Moravian leaders to mediate Sandinista-YATAMA negotiations.
The government, too, accepted the Moravians in this role,
while acknowledging that they were neither neutral nor
impartial. As Interior Minister Tomas Borge put it, 'They
are more there than here'. With some balance provided by
appointees from the West, the team began mediating direct
talks in January 1988. The Moravian Provincial Board,
Gustavo Parajon of CEPAD (a Protestant relief organization)
and member of the National Reconciliation Commission, and
John Paul Lederach of the Mennonite Central Committee
(another relief and development agency) were named members
of this Conciliation Commission.
Throughout 1988 the Commission mediated under serious
constraints. The North/CIA Contra operatives were doing all
possible to inhibit a Sandinista-Indian agreement, since
that would preclude a united Nicaraguan resistance. The
mediators were kept on the move by CIA-funded kidnap ping
threats and assassination attempts against them as they went
about their work. Competition among YATAMA leaders and
Sandinista indecision also slowed progress, but by late 1988
agreement had been reached on 60% of the issues. Not until
September 1989, however, was full agreement publicly
acknowledged with the added intervention of former US
president Jimmy Carter.
The Conciliation Commission mediation reflected the
confianza-inspired, insider-partial model discussed earlier.
Its success depended not on neutrality or externality but on
continuing relationships of trust its members had with the
conflictants. During face-to-face negotiation phases,
Commission members lived side by side with YATAMA leaders.
They ate and relaxed with both sides together. Their
knowledge and connections were used by each side to explain
its views and objectives to the other. The Commission,
therefore, was much more connected to disputants than in
neutrality-based mediation.
Its functions were broad rather than narrow. Its
range of tasks stretched from arranging travel and daily
schedules for disputants and resolving their family problems
to negotiating a ceasefire in a war involving several
national governments. Such a diverse mix is not beyond the
scope of international third party intervention (Pruitt &
Rubin, 1986), but it suggests the multidimensional role of
the insider-partial rather than the narrower specialized one
of the outsider-neutral. The commissioners' legitimacy as
mediators came not from their distance from the conflict but
from their personal connections that inspired the
disputants' trust. That trust relationship with the
conflict parties created safe negotiating space.
The Commission's legitimacy as third party also issued
from the duration and depth of their functions., The
outsider-neutral usually leaves a conflict soon after
settlement. The insider-partial, the confianza model of
mediation, implies a continuing mediator-disputant
connection. The Moravians and CEPAD have continued to work
with both sides in peace development ever since the 1988
ceasefire.
The Commission's multiple functions were carried out at
different levels of the conflict. They worked on Peace and
Autonomy Commissions, thus connecting with that process at
the local level. They accompanied exiled leaders to their
home villages as part of the reconciliation process. At the
national level, the Commission mediated the SandinistaYATAMA
negotiation. Internationally, it worked with Nicaraguan
refugees in Honduras and Costa Rica and brought East Coast
exiles together from three nations to form the YATAMA
negotiating team. Given these multiple and continuing
conciliation functions at several levels, Commission
mediators were generalists rather than specialists. Their
effectiveness depended equally on who they were in relation
to the conflictants (not who they were not) and what they
did (not what they did not do).
Insider-partial mediation had produced a tentative
settlement. But final and public agreement was facilitated
by an outsiderneutral, Jimmy Carter who, as chair of the
Council of Freely Elected Heads of State, had come to
Nicaragua to monitor the 1990 elections for fairness and
legitimacy. He offered to mediate any remaining Sandinista-YATAMA
differences, maintaining that Indian leaders had to
be free to return to participate in the electoral campaign.
Carter asked that YATAMA be offered the same
conditions for political reintegration extended to the
Contras - renounce armed struggle, participate in the
political system, encourage demobilization of all armed
insurgents. The sides agreed publicly to conditions earlier
arrived at and within a week of the Carter-Borge meeting,
Brooklyn Rivera and other leaders were returning to
Nicaragua. Carter made good use of his leverage - the
Sandinistas very much wanted his certification of the
elections. Timing was also working for him. The pressures
of the impending election and its high visibility in the
world produced disputant flexibility that was absent a year
earlier. Carter went on to serve other useful third party
functions, as a monitor and conciliator during the elections
themselves, and in the difficult post-election transition
period.
In the resolution of the Sandinista-YATAMA
conflict we have seen how insider-partial and outsider-neutral
intermediaries were used at different times and in
different settings. The autonomy conciliation relied
heavily upon those intermediaries who were trusted by both
sides because they belonged to both. Within Esquipulas, the
Conciliation Commission pursued the Sandinista-YATAMA
conflict with considerable success as 'mediators from
within' who had the trust of both sides. Finally, the
Carter intervention broke the impasse, permitting YATAMA
leaders to return, thus further ing the democratization and
demilitarization goals of Esquipulas. These disparate
approaches to mediation were mutually complementary. All of
them required considerable trust in the mediators. The
evenhanded external mediator combined with the trusted
intermediaries engaged in long-term peacemaking within
Nicaragua to moderate that conflict. All may well continue
to intervene, for intercoastal, interethnic and interpersonal conflict in Nicaragua has no end in sight.
There is a second set of outsider-neutrals that we
should mention here. These were the mediating agencies
structured into the conflict through the International
Commission of Verification and Support, provided for in the
Esquipulas agreement but not actually created until the Tela
summit of August 1989. This Commission carried out the repatriation, disarming and resettlement of Contra troops.
Represented on the ICVS were the Organization of American
States, the Contadora groups and the UN Observer Group-Central America
with its contingent of 800 Spanish and
Venezuelan peace-keeping troops. Structured into Esquipulas
to validate and monitor its achievements, then, were three
international governmental organizations with a major
concern for the plan's success - the UN, the OAS and the
Contadora Group. By June of 1990, the commission had
disarmed 11,000 of 15,000 insurgents and guaranteed a
peaceful Sandinista-to-opposition transfer of power, surely
one of history's most successful peace-keeping operations.
5. The Esquipulas Context
We have presented Esquipulas mediation both as a process
over time and in terms of the intermediary structures
developed to implement it. A third perspective for understanding it is through its broader conflict environment.
That context was created largely by actors not directly
involved in the mediation.
Certainly Reagan's Contra option rapidly lost momentum in
the waning of his second term. Civil wars in Central
America quickly lost their East-West cast as the Reagan-Gorbachev
friendship began to thaw the Cold War. Decisions
in Washington and Moscow to end military aid to the Nicaraguan conflictants did much to reinforce the efforts of
Esquipulas mediators.
When Reagan left office in 1989, his Central America
policy team went with him. That group had labored mightily
to sink Esquipulas and discredit Oscar Arias. Arias
mistrusted Assistant Secretary of State Elliott Abrams. It
was reported by a key Costa Rican official that he had
postponed an Esquipulas summit meeting until Abrams had left
office.
The US Congress influenced the mediation context both
in its encouragement of Contadora through Jim Wright,
Christopher Dodd and others, and by opening space for the
Arias initiatives through its Iran-Contra investigations in
the summer of 1986. Precisely when Contadora had stalled,
those revelations exposed the deep divisions in
congressional opinion over Reagan Central America policies divisions which renewed the regional search for
alternatives. It also permitted a progressive decoupling of
the Sandinista-YATAMA conflict from the Contra war, a
separation which made both easier to resolve. Senator
Kennedy, at the request of Indian rights organizations,
pressured the Sandinistas to be more flexible on the rights
of the indigenous peoples. The American Indian Movement's
involvement was influential though ambiguous in its
consequences for settling the Sandinista-Atlantic Coast
conflict.
Arias's Nobel Peace Prize gave Esquipulas new
legitimacy. It heartened the mediators, renewed support in
the US Congress for negotiated settlement, and further
engaged European governments and publics in the peace
process. The award punctuated the substantial support for
both Nicaraguan development and Esquipulas that was already
coming from Europe.
The United Nations came to influence the Esquipulas
context more and more toward negotiated settlement. The
General Assembly resolution of 27 June 1989 stimulated
agreement at the Tela summit on a 'Joint Plan for the
Voluntary Demobilization, Repatriation and Relocation of the
Nicaraguan Resistance'. Subsequent UN funding and staffing
of the UNOG-Central America and its peace-keeping contingent
proved invaluable in disarming and reintegrating Nicaraguan
insurgents. Its third party presence must be given much
credit for the peaceful transfer of power in Nicaragua in
1990.
Citizen volunteers from North America and Europe were
important shapers of the mediation context. They worked
from both ends of the problem, at home and in the field. In
the USA, peace activists influenced government policy
directly toward political and diplomatic settlement and away
from military confrontation. The Central America peace
lobby in the US, through such groups as Friendship Cities,
Witness for Peace, Sanctuary, Pledge of Resistance and
CISPES helped build public and congressional support for
Esquipulas.
In Central America, such peace movement organizations
provided a sympathetic third party' presence that worked to
moderate conflict. Thousands of people visited and lived in
Nicaragua, El Salvador and Guatemala as volunteer
generalists, technical experts, human rights escorts and
representatives of municipal governments and labor unions.
This citizen third party presence moderated conflict,
producing a more supportive mediation environment. It
encouraged flexibility of Central American governments, who
wished to appear reasonable and non-violent. It reduced
violence through its on-site reportinglaof military and
paramilitary action. It represented to Central Americans a
larger citizen movement in North America and Europe that was
pressing for policy changes and sending direct assistance to
alleviate suffering. The reaction to the Contra killing of
US volunteer Benjamin Linder in 1987 suggested the
importance of such a presence for restraining
militarization.
Many of these persons were working.in Nicaragua under
the auspices of nongovernmental organizations. These NGOs
had a longstanding presence in the region, responding to
conflict in the usual ways of lobbying for policy changes
and providing civilian war relief. But we saw emerging in
the Esquipulas context a broader, more active NGO role in
peace-making, notably mediation by Protestant and Catholic
representatives, and secular organizations like the Carter
Center in Atlanta. The Moravian Church, CEPAD and the
Mennonite Central Committee provided mediators and sites.
They channeled resources for the negotiation from a
mediation support network including the World Council of
Churches. The Moravian Church in Nicaragua has been still
more broadly engaged in conflict transformation (Lederach,
1990) - the continuous involvement of sympathetic third
parties to move a conflict from latent to overt and
negotiation stages. That is a long-term effort involving
empowerment of weaker parties, trust-building, conflict
skills development and other requisites for transforming a
conflict situation into sustainable peace.
6.
Theoretical Considerations and Practical
Implications
By mid-1990, Esquipulas had been only partially
successful in moving the region toward stable peace.
In El Salvador and Guatemala, civil conflict and state
repression continued to undermine economies and kill
thousands, though there were preliminary insurgentgovernment negotiations underway in both cases.
Critics of Esquipulas will point out that Nicaragua has
been the focus for change. Conflict-producing
conditions in other participating states have received
little attention at Esquipulas meetings. The principle
of simultaneity has not been applied in that respect.
The Nicaraguan conflicts, on the other hand, appeared
to be well on their way toward successful management. An
end to military confrontation, disarming and reintegration
of insurgents, the end of conscription and major reductions
in military forces, a classic pluralist election and
peaceful transfer of power, an autonomy process for
integrating Atlantic and Pacific regions. All of those
achievements were reached within or with the help of
Esquipulas. It may be that a conflict management model had
to be developed in Nicaragua before other Esquipulas states
with more deeply rooted problems with social conflict and
state violence, could open to the process. Time and events
will tell.
Our study of Esquipulas raises some theoretical and
practical issues. Should the conceptualization of mediator
roles be broadened to embrace developing world variants such
as the Insider-Partial? Should identification and selection
of mediators be more systematically done, with greater care
for drawing upon and creatively mixing the external and
internal conflict moderation resources available? Should
more attention be given by international mediators to modifying the wider context to be more supportive of their
intervention?
6.1
Expanding the Mediator Concept
Our study suggests that the field would do well to agree on
a simple, inclusive definition of mediation, differentiating
the mediator roles as research and practice reveal them. We
prefer to define mediation simply as third-party-facilitated
negotiation, and the mediator as one(s) 'who attempts to
help the principals reach a voluntary agreement' (Pruitt &
Rubin, 1986, p. 166). Within such a simple, inclusive
definition a hundred flowers can bloom, so to speak.
Esquipulas has produced some variations on the basic
mediation theme that we have not found in the literature.
We have suggested the concept of the insider-partial to
reflect a type very visible in Nicaraguan mediation. We
distinguished that from the outsider-neutral concept characterizing mediation in North America, and from
international mediator roles which generally assume that
third parties must come from outside the conflict situation.
We have shown how the I-P and O-N polar opposites interacted
synergistically in Nicaraguan mediation. It may be,
however, that externality and neutrality are dimensions, or
continua, along which every mediator falls. Those
dimensions may be independent of one another, rather than
interdependent as the types we suggest imply.
If the O-N and I-P types are valid, however, each
bringing different strengths to the same conflict, as did
Jimmy Carter and the Conciliation Commission, what practical
consequences might issue from teaming them up as
counterparts in a mediation? They might not work together
physically, but would consult, divide up functions, coordinate interventions and, the like. If these are distinct
types, each of which performs different but equally
important functions in mediated negotiation, that would
influence the mediator selection process. In any event, it
would seem useful to explore the I-P concept further.
Though we have presented it here as a region-specific,
culture-determined model, it might have equally useful
functions in the postindustrial.societies of the world.
Esquipulas suggests other additions to the range of
mediator roles. We noted the way Oscar Arias appeared to
act as both mediator and negotiator. He, too, was internal
to the conflict situation, had the trust of all parties, yet
had a status apart. The mediator-negotiator of Esquipulas
appears to have some precedents in the Kissinger of the Yom
Kippur War negotiation (Rubin, 1981) and the Walesa (1987)
of Polish Solidarity, both of whom seem to have played such
a dual role. If it is not a new genre, should it at least
be included in the range of mediator types? Would there be
a place as well for the mediator-legitimizer characterized
by Obando y Bravo, whose role went much beyond providing
good offices. The full weight of the Church's moral
authority in his person appears to have legitimated such
negotiation and guaranteed the implementation of its
outcomes.
One question raised by such a discussion is whether
mediator selection in such cases should not be more
conscious and deliberate than it normally is, according to
mediator functions required and persons and agencies
available? If, for example, the Carter and Conciliation
Commission interventions had been coordinated, each
performing different, complementary functions, a year of
time might have been saved. We are suggesting that the
selection of mediators could and should be a more systematic
and informed process.
6.2
Modifying the Mediation Context
Our study has suggested the importance of the mediation
context - the events, persons and attitudes influencing the
mediation from a distance. Time and again in Esquipulas
negotiation was transported out of impasse by a context
transformed. A striking example was the agreement of August
1989 between the Sandinista government and the United
National Opposition for free and open elections. It was
reached in a televised marathon negotiation reminiscent of
that which legitimized Polish Solidarity in 1980 (Wehr,
1985). The Sandinista-UNO accord triggered the breakthrough
three days later for the Tela agreement on. Contra
demobilization. The context had been transformed to permit
this.
Both supportive and obstructive forces in the mediation
context, while not controllable by mediators, are amenable
to their influence. If the larger environment were seen as
more integral to mediation success, third party interveners
could map that context to identify key influentials, a
preliminary step to creating more support for negotiated
settlement. Could mediators have a more direct influence on
mass communicators, for example, who frame the issues,
characterize the actors, present the options and largely
determine whether a context encourages or discourages
mediated settlement? The mass media were exceptionally
influential in the context of Nicaraguan mediation (Chomsky,
1987). Should a mediation team include someone with
exclusive responsibility for mapping the context for ways to
render it more supportive of the intervention?
An important mediation-supportive element in the
Esquipulas context was the presence of conflict moderators,
the 'sympathetic third parties' described earlier. Conflict
moderation is the third party's most important function. It
is a more realistic goal than permanent resolution, which is
rarely possi'ble (Touval, 1982). Does the Esquipulas
experience show the conflict moderating sympathetic third
parties to be so useful in the mediation context that a
conscious effort should be made to include them as a desirable component of international third party interventions?
6.3
Mediation from within the Conflict
Esquipulas has revealed to us how rich may be the indigenous
resources for conflict moderation and negotiated settlement
in developing areas of the world. The insiderpartial, the
mediator-negotiator, the mediator-legitimizer, the
sympathetic third party are conflict management roles that
are probably useful beyond Central America as well. The
effective combining of such local resources with external
third parties in Esquipulas can be seen as a contribution to
the theory and practice of international third party
intervention. We suspect that international mediation would
be more effective were the various external and internal
mediators and the moderators within the
context tobe systematically identified and enlisted: a
deliberate citizen volunteer
presence, a mixed team of outsider-neutrals and insider-partials, a
resident conflict transformation group working
on a deep-seated conflict situation.
It remains to be seen whether the Esquipulas innovation in
conflict management will produce positive results in other
Central American states as it has in Nicaragua. Continuing
involvement of the UN and other international interveners
will help determine those results. Thus far, however,
Esquipulas represents a major step forward in regional
conflict management, a model well worth the attention of
scholars and practitioners alike.
Material 11
(From M. Deutsch, The Resolution of Conflict , 1973)
FACTORS INFLUENCING THE RESOLUTION OF CONFLICT
INTRODUCTION
The purpose of this chapter is to summarize the typical
features of destructive and constructive conflicts. The emphasis
will be on the contrast between competitive and cooperative
processes of conflict resolution. In this connection, we shall
also discuss the processes of perception and commitment that tend
to reinforce and augment whichever mode of conflict resolution
has been initiated. Next, we shall consider the factors that
determine which mode of conflict resolution will be dominant.
Underlying this discussion is the assumption that conflict
between parties with cooperative rather than competitive
relations is likely to be less destructive. Yet, it is obvious
that the relations between conflicting parties may be
incorrigibly competitive. Under such circumstances, the
regulation of conflict to limit its destructiveness becomes an
objective. In this context, we shall discuss the circumstances
affecting the likelihood of effective conflict regulation.
Finally, we shall consider some of the special issues relating to
conflicts between the weak and the strong.
THE COURSE OF DESTRUCTIVE CONFLICT
Destructive conflict is characterized by a tendency to
expand and escalate. As a result, such conflict often becomes
independent of its initiating causes and is likely to continue after
these have become irrelevant or have been forgotten. Expansion occurs
along the various dimensions of conflict: the size and number of the
immediate issues involved; the number of motives and participants
implicated on each side of the issue; the size and number of the
principles and precedents that are perceived to be at stake- the costs
that the participantsare
willing to bear in relation to the
conflict; the number of norms of moral conduct from which behavior
toward the other side is exempted; and the intensity of negative
attitudes toward the other side.
The processes involved in the intensification of conflict may
be
said, as Coleman (1957, p. 14) has expressed it, "to create a 'Gresham's Law of Conflict: the harmful and dangerous elements drive out
those which would keep the conflict within bounds." Paralleling the
expansion of the scope of conflict, there is an increasing reliance
upon a strategy of power and upon the tactics of threat, coercion, and
deception. Correspondingly, there is a shift away from a strategy of
persuasion and from the tactics of conciliation, minimization of
differences,, and enhancement of mutual understanding and goodwill.
Within each of the conflicting parties, there is increasing pressure
for uniformity of opinion and a tendency for leadership and control to
be taken over by those elements that are militantly organized for
waging conflict through combat and taken away from those that are more
conciliatory.
The tendency to escalate conflict results from the
conjunction of
three interrelated processes: (1) competitive processes involved in
the attempt to win the conflict; (2) processes of misperception and
biased perception; and (3) processes of commitment arising out of
pressures for cognitive and social consistency. These processes give
rise to a mutually reinforcing cycle of relations that generate
actions and reactions that intensify conflict.
Other factors, of course, may serve to limit and encapsulate
conflict
so that a spiraling intensification does not develop. Here, we refer
to such factors as: the number and strength of the existing
cooperative bonds, cross-cutting identifications, common allegiances
and memberships among the conflicting parties; the existence of
values, institutions, procedures, and groups that are organized to
help limit and regulate conflict; and the salience and significance of
the costs of intensifying conflict. If these conflict-limiting
factors are weak, it may be difficult to prevent a competitive
conflict from expanding in scope. Even if they are strong,
misjudgment and the pressures arising out of tendencies to be rigidly
self-consistent may make it difficult to keep a competitive conflict
encapsulated.
Competitive effects. In chapter 2, I characterized the
essential
distinctions between a cooperative and competitive process and described their social psychological features in some detail. Here, I
shall only highlight some of the main features of the competitive
process, those that tend to perpetuate and escalate conflict.
Typically, a competitive process tends to produce the following
effects:
1.
Communication between the conflicting parties is
unreliable and
impoverished. The available communication channels and opportunities
are not utilized, or they are used in an attempt to mislead or intimidate the other. Little confidence is placed in information that
is obtained directly from the other; espionage and other circuitous
means of obtaining information are relied upon. The poor communi-
cation enhances the possibility of error and misinformation of the
sort that is likely to reinforce the preexisting orientations and
expectations toward the other. Thus the ability to notice and respond
to the other's shifts away from a win-lose orientation becomes
impaired.
2.
It stimulates the view that the solution of the conflict
can only
be imposed by one side or the other by means of superior force, deception, or cleverness. The enhancement of one's own power and the
complementary minimization of the other's power become objectives. The
attempt by each of the conflicting parties to create or maintain a
power difference favorable to his own side tends to expand the scope
of the conflict from a focus on the immediate issue in dispute to a
conflict over the power to impose one's preference upon the other.
3. It leads to a suspicious, hostile attitude that increases
the
sensitivity to differences and threats while minimizing the awareness
of similarities. This, in turn, makes the usually accepted norms of
conduct and morality that govern one's behavior toward others who are
similar to oneself less applicable. Hence, it permits behavior toward
the other that would be considered outrageous if directed toward
someone like oneself. Since neither side is likely to grant moral
superiority to the other, the conflict is likely to escalate as one
side or the other engages in behavior that is morally outrageous to
the other.
Misjudgment and misperception. In our preceding discussion
of the
effects of competition, it was evident that impoverished communication, hostile attitudes, and oversensitivity to differences could lead
to distorted views of the other that could intensify and perpetuate
conflict. In addition to the distortions that are natural to the
competitive process, there are other distortions that commonly occur
in the course of interaction. Elsewhere (Deutsch 1962, 1965), 1 have
described some of the common sources of misperception in interactional
situations. Many of these misperceptions function to transform a
conflict into a competitive struggle-even if the conflict did not
emerge from a competitive relationship.
Let me illustrate with the implications of a simple
psychological
principle: the perception of any act is determined both by our perception of the act itself and by our perception of the context within
which the act occurs. The contexts of social acts are often not immediately given through perception, and often they are not obvious.
When the context is not obvious, we tend to assume a familiar contextone that seems likely in terms of our own past experience. Since both
the present situations and the past experiences of the actor and
perceiver may be rather different, it is not surprising that the two
individuals will interpret the same act quite differently.
Misunderstandings of this sort are very likely, of course, when the
actor and the perceiver come from different cultural backgrounds and
are not fully informed about these differences. A period of rapid
social change also makes such misunderstandings widespread as the gap
between the past and the present widens.
Given the fact that the ability to place oneself in the
other's
shoes is notoriously underemployed and underdeveloped in most people,
and also given that this ability is impaired by stress and inadequate
information, it is to be expected that certain typical biases will
emerge in the perceptions of actions during conflict. Thus since most
people are strongly motivated to maintain a favorable view of
themselves but are less strongly motivated to hold such a view of
others, it is not surprising that there is a bias toward perceiving
one's own behavior toward the other as being more benevolent and more
legitimate than the other's behavior toward oneself. This is a simple
restatement of a welldemonstrated psychological truth: namely, that
the evaluation of an act is affected by the evaluation of its sourceand the source is part of the context of behavior. For example,
research has shown that American students are likely to rate more
favorably an action of the United States directed toward the Soviet
Union than the same action directed by the Soviet Union toward the
United States. We are likely to view American espionage activities in
the Soviet Union as more benevolent than similar activities by Soviet
agents in the United States.
If each side in a conflict tends to perceive its own motives
and behavior as more benevolent and legitimate than those of the other side,
it is evident that the conflict will spiral upward in intensity. If
Acme perceives its actions as a benevolent and legitimate way of
interfering with actions that Bolt has no right to engage in, Acme
will be surprised by the intensity of Bolt's hostile response and will
have to escalate its counteraction to negate Bolt's response. But how
else is Bolt likely to act if he perceives his own actions as wellmotivated? And how unlikely is he not to respond to Acme's escalation
with counterescalation if he is capable of doing so? To the extent
that there is a biased perception of benevolence and legitimacy, one
could also expect that there will be a parallel bias in what is
considered to be an equitable agreement for resolving conflict: should
not differential legitimacy be differentially rewarded? The biased
perception of what is a fair compromise makes agreement more difficult
and thus extends conflict. Another consequence of the biased
perception of benevolence and legitimacy is reflected in the
asymmetries between trust and suspicion and between cooperation and
competition. Trust, when violated, is more likely to turn into
suspicion than negated suspicion is to turn into trust. Similarly, it
is easier to move from cooperation to competition than in the other
direction.
There are, of course, other types of processes leading to
misperceptions and misjudgments. In addition to the distortions arising from
the pressures for self-consistency and social conformity (which are
discussed below), the intensification of conflict may induce stress
and tension beyond a moderate optimal level and this overactivation,
in turn, may lead to an impairment of perceptual and cognitive processes in several ways. It may reduce the range of perceived alternatives; it may reduce the time perspective in such a way as to cause a
focus on the immediate rather than the overall consequences of the
perceived alternatives; it may polarize thought so that percepts will
tend to take on a simplistic cast of being black or white, for or
against, good or evil; it may lead to stereotyped responses; it may
increase the susceptibility to fear- or hope-inciting rumors; it may
increase defensiveness; it may increase the pressures for social
conformity. In effect, excessive tension reduces the intellectual
resources available for discovering new ways of coping with a problem
or new ideas for resolving a conflict. Intensification of conflict is
the likely result as simplistic thinking and the polarization of
thought push the participants to view their alternatives as being
limited to victory or defeat.
Paradoxically, it should also be noted that the availability
of
intellectual and other resources that can be used for waging conflict
may make it difficult, at the onset of conflict, to forecast the
outcome of an attempt to impose one's preference upon the other. Less
inventive species than man can pretty well predict the outcome of a
contest by force through aggressive gesturing and other displays of
combat potential; thus they rarely have to engage in combat to settle
"who shall get what, when." However, the versatility of man's
techniques for achieving domination over other men makes it likely
that combat will arise because the combatants have discordant
judgments of the potential outcomes. Unlike his hairy ancestors, the
"naked ape" cannot agree in advance who will win. Misjudgment of the
other side's willingness and capability with respect to fighting has
sometimes turned controversy into combat as increased tension has
narrowed the perceived outcomes of conflict to victory or defeat.
Process of commitment. It has long been recognized that
people tend
to act in accord with their beliefs; more recently, Festinger has
emphasized in his theory of cognitive dissonance that the converse is
also often true: people tend to make their beliefs and attitudes
accord with their actions (see chapter 3 for a further discussion).
This pressure for self-consistency may lead to an unwitting
involvement in and intensification of conflict because one's actions
have to be justified to oneself and to others. The tragic course of
American involvement in the civil war in Vietnam provides an
illustration.
In an unpublished paper presented a number of years ago
(Deutsch
1966b), I wrote:
How did we get involved in this ridiculous and tragic
situation: a situation in which American lives and resources
are being expended in defense of a people who are being more
grievously injured and who are becoming more bitterly
antagonistic to us the more deeply we become involved in
their internal conflict? How is it that we have become so
obsessed with the war in South Vietnam that we are willing
to jettison our plans for achieving a Great Society at home,
neglect the more important problems in South America and
India, and risk destroying our leadership abroad?
The most direct statement of the reason for our continued
involvement is the fact that we are involved: our continued
involvement justifies our past involvement. Once involved
it is exceedingly difficult to disengage and to admit,
thereby, how purposeless and unwitting our past involvement
has been. I am stating, in other words, that we are not
involved because of any large strategic or moral purpose and
that any such purposes we now impute to our involvement are
ex post facto rationalizations.
As a nation, we stumbled into the conflict in South
Vietnam. At every step of increasing involvement, we were
led to believe that with some small additional help
(economic aid, then military advisers, then the use of
American heliocopters, then the combat use of American
soldiers, then massive air intervention by American planes,
then bombing of the North, then massive intervention of
American troops, and so on) we would not risk a major
conflict but yet would help to build an independent, stable
country that could stand on its own feet. We have over and
over again acted on the tempting assumption that with just a
little more investment we would prevent the whole thing from
going down the drain.
This type of assumption. is one with which we are familiar
in connection with the psychology of gambling. We all know
of the losing gambler getting deeper and deeper into a hole,
who keeps on betting with the hope that by so doing he will
recover his initial losses. Not all losing gamblers submit
to the gambler's temptation, of course. But those whose
sense of omnipotence is at stake, those who are too proud to
recognize that they cannot overcome the odds against them
are vulnerable to this type of disastrous temptation.
In addition to the gambler's temptation, I shall describe
briefly three other processes of gradual and unwitting
commitment. One is the previously discussed process of
dissonance-reduction. As Festinger (1961) has pointed out:
"Rats and people come to love the things for which they have
suffered." Presumably they do so in order to reduce the
dissonance induced by the suffering, and their method of
dissonance-reduction is to enhance the attractiveness of the
choice which led to their suffering: only if what one chose
was really worthwhile would all of the associated suffering
be tolerable. Did we not increase what we perceived to be
at stake in the Vietnam conflict as it has become more and
more costly for us? Were we not told that our national
honor, our influence as a world leader, and our national
security were in the balance in the conflict over this
tragic little land?
Silvan Tomkins (Tomkins and Izard 1965) has described a
process of circular, incremental magnification which also
helps to explain the widening of involvement and the
monopolization of thought. He suggests that it occurs if
there is a sequence of events of this type: threat,
successful defense, breakdown of defense and re-emergence of
threat; second successful defense, second breakdown of
defense and re-emergence of threat, and so on until an expectation is generated that no matter how successful a
defense against a dreaded contingency may seem, it will
prove unavailing and require yet another defense. This
process is circular and incremental since each new threat
requires a more desperate defense, and the successful
breakdown of each newly improved defense generates a
magnification of the nature of the threat and the concurrent
effect which it evokes. The increasing and obsessive
preoccupation of American officials with Vietnam may, in
part, reflect just such a process: time and time again, they
assumed that a new and more powerful defense or assault
against the Vietcong would do the trick only to find that a
new and more powerful military commitment was required.
Let me, finally, turn to an everyday process of unwitting
involvement: situational entrapment. The characteristic of
this process is that behavior is typically initiated under
the assumption that the environment is compliant rather than
reactive-that it responds as a tool for one's purposes
rather than as a self-maintaining system. Well-intentioned
actions sometimes produce effects opposite to those intended
because the actions do not take into account the characteristics of the setting in which they take place. By now,
we are all aware that an unintended consequence of some
public health measures in Latin America was the population
explosion. Only now are we beginning to recognize that some
consequences of the types of aid we have given to
underdeveloped countries are to hinder their economic
development and to foster a need for ever-increasing aid.
Similarly, one may propose that the nature of the American
intervention in Vietnam served to weaken the opposition to
the Vietcong, demoralize those in Vietnam who were able and
willing to rely on the Vietnamese to solve their problems
without foreign control, increase the strength and
resolution of the Vietcong, and otherwise produce the
responses which required an increasing involvement and
commitment of American resources and men just to prevent an
immediate overturn of the situation.
A destructive conflict such as the one in Vietnam can be
brought to a conclusion because the costs of continuing the
conflict become so large in relation to any values that might be
obtained through its continuance to one or both sides that its
senselessness becomes compellingly apparent. The senselessness
is likely to be most apparent to those who have not been the
decision makers, and thus have little need to justify the
conflict, and to those who bear the costs most strongly.
Destructive conflict can also be aborted before running its full
course if there is a strong enough community or strong third parties who can compel the conflicting parties to end their
violence. We in the United States are in the unfortunate
position that, relative to our prestige and power, there is
neither a disinterested third party nor an international
community that is powerful enough to motivate us to accept a
compromise when we think our own interests may be enhanced by the
outcome of a competitive struggle. Peace in Vietnam might have
occurred much earlier if the United Nations, or even our friends,
could have influenced us.
THE COURSE OF PRODUCTIVE CONFLICT
The question I wish to consider now is whether there are any
distinguishing features in the process of resolving conflict that
lead to constructive outcomes. Do lively, productive
controversies have common patterns that are distinctive from
those characterizing deadly quarrels?
I had expected to find in the social science
literature more help in answering these questions than I have
found so far. For example, the writings on personality
development unfortunately have little to say about productive
conflict; the focus is on pathological conflict. Yet, each of us
knows from his own personal experiences as well as from the
biographies of such men as Freud, Darwin, and St. Augustine that
intense inner conflict is often (but not necessarily) the prelude
to major emotional and intellectual growth. Similarly, the
voluminous literature on social conflict neglects productive
conflict between groups. It is true that the long standing
negative view of social conflict has yielded to an outlook that
stresses the social functions of conflict. Nevertheless, apart
from the writings of people connected with the nonviolence
movement, little attempt has been made to distinguish between
conflicts that achieve social change through a process that is
mutually rewarding to the parties involved in the conflict and
one that is not. Yet, change can take place either through a
process of confrontation, which is costly to the conflicting
groups, or it can take place through a process of problem
solving, which is mutually rewarding to the conflicting groups.
My own predilections have led me to the hunch that the major
features of productive conflict resolution would be similar, at
the social level, to the processes involved in creative thinking.
Let me first turn to the processes involved in creative thinking.
For an incisive, critical survey of the existing literature, see
Stein (1968).
Creative Thinking. The creative process has been
described as consisting of several overlapping phases. Although
various authors differ slightly in characterizing the phases they
all suggest some sequence such as (1) an initial period that
leads to the experiencing and recognition of a problem that is
sufficiently arousing to motivate efforts to solve it; (2) a
period of concentrated effort to solve the problem ,"through
routine, readily available, or habitual actions; (3) an
experience of frustration, tension, and discomfort that follows
the failure of customary processes to solve the problem and leads
to a temporary withdrawal from the problem; (4) the perception of
the problem from a different perspective and its reformulation in
a way that permits -new orientations to a solution to emerge; (5)
the appearance of a tentative solution in a moment of insight,
often accompanied by a sense of exhilaration; (6) the elaboration
of the solution and the testing of it against reality; and
finally, (7) the communication of the solution to relevant
audiences.
There are three key psychological elements in this
process: (1) the arousal of an appropriate level of motivation to
solve the problem; (2) the development of the conditions that
permit the reformulation of the problem once an impasse has been
reached; and (3) the concurrent availability of diverse ideas
that can be flexibly combined into novel and varied patterns.
Each of these key elements is subject to influence from social
conditions and the personalities of the problem solvers.
Thus consider the arousal of an optimal level of
motivation, a level sufficient to sustain problem-solving efforts
despite frustrations and impasses and yet not so intense that it
overwhelms or prevents distancing from the problem. Neither
undue smugness, satisfaction with things as they are, a sense of
helplessness, terror, nor rage is likely to lead to an optimal
motivation to recognize and face a problem or conflict. Nor will
a passive readiness to acquiesce to the demands of the
environment, nor even the willingness to fit oneself into the
environment no matter how poorly it fits oneself. Optimal
motivation presupposes an alert readiness to be dissatisfied with
things as they are and a freedom to confront one's environment
without excessive fear combined with a confidence in one's
capacities to persist in the face of obstacles. The intensity of
motivation that is optimal will vary with the effectiveness with
which it can be controlled: the more effective the controls, the
more intense the motivation can be without having disruptive
consequences.
Thus one of the creative functions of conflict
resides in its ability to arouse motivation to solve a problem
that might otherwise go unattended. A scholar who exposes his
theories and research to the scrutiny of his peers may be
stimulated to a deeper analysis when he is confronted with
conflicting data and theoretical analysis by a colleague.
Similarly, individuals and groups who have authority and power
and who are satisfied with the status quo may be aroused to
recognize problems and be motivated to work on them as opposition
from the dissatisfied makes the customary relations and
arrangements unworkable and unrewarding and/or as they are helped
to perceive the possibilities of more satisfying relations and
arrangements. Acceptance of the necessity for a change in the
status quo, rather than a rigid, defensive adherence to
previously existing positions, is most likely, however, when the
circumstances arousing new motivations suggest courses of action
that contain minimal threat to the social or self-esteem of those
who must change.
Thus although acute dissatisfaction with things as
they are and the motivation to recognize and work at problems are
necessary for creative solutions, these things are not
sufficient. The circumstances conducive to the creative
breaking-through of impasses are varied, but they have in common
that "they provide the individual with an environment in which he
does not feel threatened and in which he does not feel under
pressure. He is relaxed but alert" (Stein 1968). Threat induces
defensiveness and reduces both the tolerance of ambiguity and the
openness to the new and unfamiliar; excessive tension leads to a
primitivization and a stereotyping of thought processes. As
Rokeach has pointed out, threat and excessive tension lead to the
closed rather than open mind. To entertain novel ideas that may
at first seem wild and implausible, to question initial
assumptions of the framework within which the problem or conflict
occurs, the individual needs the freedom or courage to express
himself without fear of censure. In addition, he needs to become
sufficiently detached from his original viewpoints to be able to
see the conflict from new perspectives.
Although an unpressured and unthreatening environment
facilitates the restructuring of a problem or conflict and, by so
doing, makes it more amenable to solution, the ability to
reformulate a problem and develop solutions is, in turn,
dependent upon the availability of cognitive resources. Ideas
are important to the creative resolution of conflict, and any
factors that broaden the range of ideas and alternatives
cognitively available to the participants in a conflict will be
useful. Intelligence, the exposure to diverse experiences, an
interest in ideas, a preference for the novel and complex, a
receptivity to metaphors and analogies, the capacity to make
remote associations, an independence of judgment, and the ability
to play with ideas are some of the per@onal factors that
characterize creative problem solvers. The availability of ideas
is also dependent upon such social conditions as the opportunity
to communicate with and be exposed to other people who may have
relevant and unfamiliar ideas (i.e., experts, impartial outsiders, people facing similar or analogous situations), a social
atmosphere that values innovation and originality and encourages
the exchange of ideas, a social tradition that fosters the
optimistic view that, with effort and time, constructive
solutions can be discovered or invented to problems that
initially seem intractable.
The application of full cognitive resources to the discovery
and invention of constructive solutions to conflict is relatively
rare. Many more resources are available for the waging of
conflict. The research and development expenditures on
techniques of conflict waging or conflict suppression, as well as
the actual expenditures on conflict waging, dwarf the
expenditures for peace building. This is obviously true at the
national level, where military expenditures dominate our national
budget. I would contend that this is also true at the interpersonal and intergroup levels. At the interpersonal level, most of
us receive considerable training in waging or suppressing
conflict, and we have elaborate institutions for dealing with
adversary relations and for custodial care of the psychological
casualties of interpersonal conflict. In contrast, there is
little formal training in the techniques of constructive conflict
resolution, and the institutional resources for helping people to
resolve conflicts are meager indeed.
Cooperative problem solving. In a cooperative context, a
conflict can be viewed as a common problem in which the
conflicting parties have the joint interest of reaching a
mutually satisfactory solution. As I have stressed throughout
this work, there is nothing inherent in most conflicts that makes
it impossible for the resolution of conflict to take place
through a cooperative process. It is, of course, true that the
occurrence of cooperative conflict resolution is less likely in
certain circumstances and in certain types of conflict than in
others. We shall consider some of the predisposing circumstances
in a later section.
As our discussion of cooperation in chapter 2 indicated,
there
was a number of reasons why a cooperative process is likely to
lead to productive conflict resolution:
1.
It aids open and honest communication of relevant
information between the participants. The freedom to share
information enables the parties to go beneath the manifest to the
underlying issues involved in the conflict and, thereby, to
facilitate the meaningful and accurate definition of the problems
they are confronting together. It also enables each party to
benefit from the knowledge possessed by the other and thus to
face the joint problem with greater intellectual resources. In
addition, open and honest communication reduces the likelihood of
the development of misunderstandings that can lead to confusion
and mistrust.
2.
It encourages the recognition of the legitimacy of the
other's interests and of the necessity to search for a solution
that is responsive to the needs of each side. It tends to limit
rather than expand the scope of conflicting interests and thus
minimizes the need for defensiveness. It enables the
participants to approach the mutually acknowledged problem in a
way that utilizes their special talents and enables them to
substitute for one another in their joint work so that
duplication of effort is reduced. Attempts at influence tend to
be limited to processes of persuasion. The enhancement of mutual
resources and mutual power becomes the objective.
3.
It leads to a trusting, friendly attitude, which
increases
sensitivity to similarities and common interests, while
minimizing the salience of differences. It stimulates a
convergence of beliefs and values.
It can be seen that a cooperative process produces many of
the
characteristics that are conducive to creative problem solvingopenness, lack of defensiveness, and full utilization of
available resources. However, in itself, cooperation does not
insure that problemsolving efforts will be successful. Such
other factors as the imaginativeness, experience, and flexibility
of the parties involved are also determinative. Nevertheless, if
the cooperative relationship is one to which both parties are
strongly committed, it can withstand failure and temporarily
deactivate or postpone an apparently irreconcilable conflict.
Or, if the conflict cannot be delayed, cooperative relations will
help to contain it so that the contest for supremacy can occur
under agreed upon rules.
Benevolent misperception. Just as competitive processes tend
to produce characteristic forms of misperception and misjudgment,
so, too, with cooperative processes. Cooperation tends to
minimize differences and enhance the perception of the other's
benevolence. These typical distortions often have the effect of
dampening conflict and making escalation unlikely. The
consequence of benevolent misperceptions is to limit the
frequency and intensity of experienced opposition. It is thus
not surprising that research has shown that more happily married
as compared with less happily married couples are more often
characterized by benevolent misperceptions of their mates rather
than by an accurate view of the doubts and hostilities
entertained by their spouses. It is also not surprising that
other research (Keiffer 1968) has suggested that people with
mutually cooperative expectations and orientations may engage in
premature cooperation." They may not explore their differences
sufficiently or confront the issues between them with enough
depth to enable them to come to a well-grounded, stable
agreement. "Premature cooperation" may lead to a superficial,
unsatisfying, and unstable agreement before the underlying issues
in the conflict have been worked through.
Cooperative commitment. Earlier, I discussed several
processes
of unwitting involvement and commitment to a course of
competitive action: dissonance reduction, the gambler's fallacy,
circular, incremental magnification, and situational entrapment.
These processes, similarly, can seduce one into being more deeply
involved in a cooperative relationship even when the relationship
is having little fruitful consequence. Past investments, already
established facilities, procedures, and institutions, obligations
to third parties, and situational pressures may operate to bind
one to a cooperative relationship. This is so even when the
emotional attachments to the other and the perceived utility of
the relationship do not by themselves warrant its continuation.
The bonds of a cooperative relationship may be cemented in
loyalty, obligation, conformity, guilt, or convenience as well as
in personal attachment and personal gain. The existence of bonds
other than those based on utility and personal attitude provides
a basis for continuity and stability in the face of fluctuations
in personal attitude and personal gains.
FACTORS AFFECTING THE COURSE OF CONFLICT
In the preceding sections, I have described the typical features
of constructive and destructive conflicts. Now I turn to a
consideration of the factors that influence the course that a
conflict takes. There are, inevitably, endless specific matters
that may affect whether or not a conflict takes a constructive or
a destructive direction. It is useful to have some simplifying
idea that emphasizes central determinants and permits a
proliferation of specific detail as this becomes necessary. In
reviewing the work presented thus far in this volume-my earlier
theoretical analysis of the effects of cooperation and
competition upon group process and my subsequent work on factors
influencing whether a cooperative or a competitive relationship
would develop (which has been described under such labels as
"trust and suspicion," "bargaining," and "conflict resolution")-a
major simplifying idea has occurred to me which I shall label
Deutsch's crude law of social relations. It is that the
characteristic processes and effects elicited by a given type of
social relationship (cooperative or competitive) tend also to
elicit that type of social relationship. Thus the strategy of
power and the tactics of coercion, threat, and deception result
from, and also result in, a competitive relationship. Similarly,
the strategy of mutual problem solving and the tactics of
persuasion, openness, and mutual enhancement elicit, and also are
elicited by, a cooperative orientation.
Table 13.1 presents in condensed, outline form some of
the basic ideas involved in my analysis of the effect of
cooperation and competition that was presented in chapter 2. In
review, the theory states that the effects of one person's
actions upon another will be a function of the nature of their
interdependence and the nature of the action that takes place.
Skillfully executed actions of an antagonist will elicit rather
different responses than skillful actions from an ally, but a
bumbling collaborator may evoke as much negative reaction as an
adroit opponent. The theory links type of interdependence and
type of action with three basic social-psychological processes-which I
have labeled substitutability, cathexis, and
inducibility-and it then proliferates a variety of socialpsychological consequences from these processes as they are
affected by the variables with which the theory is concerned.
Here, I wish to focus attention on the consequences.
The point is that if you take a situation in which there is a
mixture of cooperative and competitive elements (most bargaining
and conflict situations are of this nature), you can move it in
one direction or the other by creating as initial states the
typical consequences of effective cooperation and competition.
All this may be summarized by saying that "cooperation breeds
cooperation, while competition breeds competition." However, such
a summary is much too condensed; there are other factors
determining the course of conflict resolution in addition to the
type of social process involved. Below is an outline of factors
affecting conflict resolution that highlights crucial determinants.
Process
In table 13.1, the last column presents, in summary form,
some of the key consequences of effective actions in a
cooperative and a competitive relationship. Above, we have
indicated that these characteristic effects tend, as
initiating conditions, to elicit the same processes that
have given rise to them. Thus a conflict orientation that
highlights mutual interests, seeks the enhancement of mutual
power, and defines the conflict as a mutual problem is more
likely to take a constructive course than an orientation
that emphasizes antagonistic interests, seeks to maximize
power differences, and defines the conflict in winlose
terms. Similarly, a trusting, friendly orientation to the
other, with a positive interest in the other's welfare and a
readiness to respond helpfully to the other's needs and
requests, is less likely to lead to a destructive conflict
then a suspicious, hostile attitude, with a readiness to
exploit the other's needs and weaknesses and a negative
responsiveness to the other's requests. A perceived
similarity in beliefs and values, a sense of common bonds
and interests between oneself and the other, is more likely
to produce a constructive conflict than a sense of opposed
beliefs and values. Full, open, honest communication free
of malevolent distortion, which is persuasive rather than
coercive in form and intent, is less likely to lead to
destructive conflict than blocked, misleading, or autistic
communication.
Prior Relationship
The stronger and more salient the existing cooperative as
compared with the competitive bonds linking the conflicting
parties, the more likely it is that a conflict will be
resolved cooperatively. The total strength of the
cooperative bonds is a function of their importance as well
as their number. There are obviously many different types
of bonds: superordinate goals, mutually facilitating interests, common allegiances and values, linkages to a common
community, and the like. These bonds are important to the
extent that they serve significant needs successfully. Thus
experiences of successful prior cooperative relationships
between two individuals or groups enhance the likelihood of
present cooperation; experiences of failure and
disillusionment in attempts to cooperate make such
cooperation unlikely. On the other hand, the past
experience of costly competitive conflict does not
necessarily enhance the probability of cooperation,
although this is a possible result.
The Nature of the Conflict
There are several fundamental dimensions of conflict that I
would like to spotlight here: the size of the conflict, the
centrality of the issues involved, the rigidity of the
issues, the number of issues involved and their
interconnectedness, the consensus on issue importance, and
the degree to which the conflict is acknowledged.
Conflict size. We have seen earlier that one of the
characteristics of destructive conflicts is that they tend
to grow in size. In a corresponding way, the research
reported in chapter 11 and the theoretical discussion of
intrapsychic and intergroup conflict strongly indicate that
larger conflicts are more likely to take a destructive
course than smaller ones. I have suggested in chapter 11
that conflict size might ,be defined as being equal to the
expected difference in the value of the outcomes that a
person would receive if he wins, compared with the values
that he would receive if the other wins the conflict. An
implication of this definition is that the more concordant
the views and interests of the conflicting parties are, the
smaller will be the size of their conflict. A conflict may
be big because the participants perceive themselves to have
important interests that are in opposition to one another,
or it may be large, despite the congruence of their
interests, because they have opposing views of how to pursue
their important mutual interests-each thinking that his own
proposed course would be favorable and the other's would be
disastrous to their common interests. Thus to reduce the
size of conflict, one may focus on diminishing the perceived
opposition in values and interests of the conflicting
partiesor on decreasing the perceived opposition in their
beliefs and policies about achieving their common values and
interests as well as on shrinking the perceived importance
of what is at stake in the conflict.
There are various techniques that can be employed to
diminish perceived opposition in interests or beliefs; these
include controlled communication (Burton 1969), role
reversal (Cohen 1950; Rapoport 1960), and encounter group
exercises (Schutz 1967). These techniques essentially
assume that perceived opposition can be reduced if the
conflicting parties can be led to see how much they have in
common, if their differences can be seen in the context of
their similarities and agreements. They also commonly
assume that if misunderstandings are eliminated through
improved, open, full, direct communication between the
parties, their perceived differences will decrease. While
this is often the case, removal of misunderstanding
sometimes sharpens the awareness of conflicting interests or
beliefs, an awareness that had been beclouded by benevolent
misunderstandings (Johnson 1967).
It is somewhat surprising that, in the literature dealing
with the therapeutic management of conflict, there has been
relatively little focus on what Fisher (1964) has labeled
issue control. Controlling the importance of what is
perceived to be at stake in a conflict may be one of the
most effective ways of preventing the conflict from taking a
destructive course. Many conflicts may be defined in a way
that either magnifies or minimizes the size of the disputed
issues. In general, "here-now-this" conflicts, which are
localized in terms of a given time and place and specified
in terms of particular, delimited actions and their
consequences, are much easier to resolve constructively than
conflicts that are defined in terms of principles,
precedents, rights, etc., so that the issues transcend time
and space and are generalized beyond the specific action to
personalities, groups, races, or other large social units or
categories. Thus when a quarrel starts to center on
personalities or group membership rather than specific
actions, it usually takes a nonproductive turn. Similarly,
when a discussion focuses on rights or principles rather
than on what is specifically taking place at a given time
and locale, it is not likely to be fruitful.
There is, however, an asymmetry about conflict size that
should be noted. Insofar as a conflict involves a change in
the status quo, keeping the conflict small may favor lack of
change. This is particularly likely to be the case when
there is a social inertia or bias in favor of the status
quo. In such an instance, those who wish to bring about
change may have to enlarge the conflict sufficiently to
motivate those who see no reason to be interested in
altering things as they are. Thus those endeavoring to
preserve the status quo may seek to minimize conflict so
that it seems not worth bothering about, while those attempting to bring about a change may try to enhance it so
that it can become a focus of concerned attention.
Issue rigidity. The perceived lack of satisfactory
alternatives or substitutes for the methods of achieving the
outcomes or for the actual outcomes initially at stake in
the conflict makes for issue rigidity. If an academician
wants a salary increase and will not accept a promotion
as a substitute, he and his financially pressed
university may find themselves embroiled in an
irreconcilable conflict, a conflict that would be
readily resolved if a promotion were an acceptable
alternative. Sometimes, motivational and intellectual
limitations may lead the parties to perceive issues
more rigidly than reality dictates-as when an insecure
child stubbornly insists that he cannot make "duty"
except in his own potty. However, it is also evident
that a harsh reality may very much limit the
possibility of finding acceptable substitutes and
narrowly restrict the possibilities open to the
conflicting parties. If there is insufficient food,
shelter, clothing, medicine, or anything else required
for physical and psychological survival, conflict over
such necessities will often take on a desperate
quality.
Issue rigidity is not only determined by the
psychological and environmental resources available to
the conflicting parties but also by the nature of the
issue. Certain issues are less conducive to conflict
resolution than others. "Greater power over the
other," "victory over the other," "having more status
than the other" are rigid definitions of conflict,
since it is impossible on any given issue for each
party in conflict to have outcomes that are superior to
the other's.
Centrality of the issues. Any issue that infringes
upon something considered to be vital to a person's
physical well-being, socio-economic position, self-esteem, or defense
against anxiety is central. The
more central an issue is considered to be, the more
likely it is to be viewed as an important or large
issue and the more apt it is to be defined as a rigid
one. Thus conflicts over issues that are considered to
be central by both sides are often the most
irreconcilable ones. The centrality of an issue is
determined not only by the substantive significance of
the issue, or by what values are perceived to be at
stake, but also by the perceived vulnerability of the
person. The more vulnerable a person considers himself
to be in a given area, the more likely it is that he
will view an issue bearing upon that area as a central
one. There are, of course, immense differences among
people in how wide a margin of security they require in
order not to feel vulnerable. Those who require a
large margin will generally seek to avoid conflict over
central issues and, if cornered into such a conflict,
will often experience it as a life-and-death struggle
with no holds barred. Thus to avoid provoking the
other to engage in a desperate struggle, one should
avoid challenging him in his vulnerable, central
regions.
The number and interdependence of the issues. A conflict
in which the winner takes all and the loser gets nothing is
likely to be more bitterly contested than one in which there
are victories for both sides. If victories are possible for
both, there is no longer one winner and one loser; rather
there is a winner for each issue in the conflict. Thus it
seems evident that, if a "single" conflict can be broken
down into a number of separate issues so that it is no
longer an all-or-nothing matter, the conflict is less likely
to take a destructive course. It would, of course, do
little good if all the separate issues were so
interconnected that a loss on one inevitably implied a loss
on all the others.
Consensus on the importance of different issues. Just as
breaking down a large bundle of issues into its separate
components may favor the sense of multiple victors, so may a
lack of consensus on the significance of the issues. If one
side considers issue A to be important and B to be
insignificant while the other thinks that A is of little
importand B is crucial, it is apparent that their
disagreement in valuing the issues will facilitate the
resolution of a conflict between them over the two issues.
Consciousness of the issues. In chapter 3, we pointed
out that unacknowledged or unconscious conflict is
considered harder to resolve than conflict that is
recognized by the parties involved. Similarly, conflict
between parties who do not recognize the existence and
legitimacy of one another is more likely to be destructive
than if they do. There are two major forms of
unacknowledged conflict: displaced conflict and latent or
repressed conflict. In displaced conflict, the conflict is
shifted from the issue of primary concern to another
associated issue. (See chapter 1 for a further discussion of
the types of conflict.) Thus a man and wife who have an
unacknowledged conflict about affection may displace their
conflict into the sexual arena. They may anticipate that it
would be less painful to argue about the frequency and
timing of sexual relations than to discuss their needs for
affectionate regard from one another.
The fashionable assumption in social science writing,
except among behavior therapists, is that it is unproductive
to deal with the manifest conflict unless the underlying
conflict is also surfaced and faced. However, there are
enough recorded instances of successful experiences in
dealing with manifest conflict and thus paving the way to a
productive confrontation of unacknowledged conflicts to
question whether this assumption is universally valid.
Successful management of the manifest conflict may give the
conflicting parties the courage to face the more fundamental
conflict, which was previously too anxiety-arousing to
recognize. Nevertheless, it seems reasonable to expect
that, unless the underlying conflict is ultimately faced, it
will remain a breeding ground for various new manifest
conflicts.
Repressed, latent conflict occurs when one of the
conflicting parties is sufficiently dominant to make the
weaker party forego any overt, conflicting behavior in
pursuit of its objectives. The common result of such
repression is the build-up of a malaise in the subordinate
party, which takes such various forms as depression,
listlessness, passive aggressiveness, and psychosomatic
ailments-all accompanied by an underlying pent-up rage.
Repressed conflict has malconsequences not only for the
suppressed party but also for the dominant one. In addition
to the passive resistance and the continuous threat of a
violent outbreak of the pent-up rage from the repressed, it
creates attitudes of ,superiority in the dominant that
interfere with a cooperative confrontation of the issues in
dispute once the conflict has surfaced.
The Characteristics of the Parties in Conflict
The ideologies, personalities, social positions, and
personal resources of the conflicting parties all play a
role in determining whether a given conflict will take a
cooperative or a competitive course. They do so in two
primary ways. First, they may lead directly to a more favorable evaluation of one process or the other. Thus the
strategy and tactics associated with competitive struggle
may seem more manly or intriguing than those associated with
cooperation. Consider the contrasting popular images of the
soldier and the diplomat. Or, one's image of self as tough,
invincible, and unbeatable may lead one to expect that there
is more to gain from competition than from cooperation.
Second, they may evoke an interaction process that may
result in misunderstanding and negative feelings and may, in
turn, stimulate a competitive orientation to the conflict.
Alternately, the characteristics of the parties may create a
social process that will engender a sense of mutual
understanding and compatibility which, in turn, may give
rise to a cooperative orientation. That is, certain types
of people will rub one another the wrong way and as a result
be negative in their orientation, while other pairings of
people will find one another very congenial, and, as a
consequence, they will be cooperatively oriented.
There has, as yet, been only a small amount of systematic
research on the personal determinants of conflict behavior.
Terhune (1970 a, b) has provided an excellent recent survey
of this research. My discussion, which follows below, is
indebted to Terhune's summary but is not confined to it.
First of all, it is important to note that the
magnitude of the effect of personality variables is very
much influenced by the situation. The more competitive or
threatening the situation (as determined by such factors as
the available outcomes and the behavior of the other side),
the smaller is the difference in behavior among different
personality types. In such situations, people of various
personality types all tend to be pushed toward competitive
behavior. On the other hand, a cooperative situation
permits the various personality types to display different
behavior (see Kelley and Stahelski 1970, for related
research).
Second, the personal characteristics of one side cannot
fruitfully be considered apart from those of the other side.
Thus, if both sides have high aspirations, so that each
wants the major share of the available outcome, then a
cooperative process is less likely than if their aspirations
permit both to be satisfied. The latter would be the case
if both had low aspirations or if one had low and the other
had high aspirations. It is evident that some personality
characteristics lead to cornp'atibility when each member of
an interacting pair displays the characteristic; with other
characteristics, compatibility is fostered by dissimilarity.
Similarities in beliefs, attitudes, and values-i.e., in
basic perspectives-are usually conducive to compatibility
and, hence, to cooperative resolutions of conflict.
Exceptions to this generalization occur in relation to
competitive (dog-eat-dog) conceptions of the world and also
in relation to ideologies and doctrines, which, although
similar in conception, claim priority or preeminence for
their adherents. Dissimilarity in outlook often leads to
antagonistic relations because it is experienced as a
fundamental threat to one's conception of reality and thus
to one's security. On the other hand, similarity between
members of a dyad in the need to dominate, to lead, to have
high status, or to possess a given person or object
exclusively may foster competition, whereas dissimilarity
may evoke cooperation.
Clinical research on married couples (Dicks 1967)
suggests that married couples are likely to deal with
conflicts most productively when they have similar beliefs,
attitudes, and values but a complementary dissimilarity in
overt and covert needs, so that, for example,
the husband's
overt independence and covert dependence are complemented by
the wife's overt dependence and covert independence. Presumably, each spouse obtains vicarious release of his own
covert strivings from the other's overt behavior; he also
obtains direct satisfaction in their reciprocal overt and
covert roles.
It is reasonable to hypothesize that certain
personality traits are compatible with a wide range of
personalities, while other traits will be congenial to only
a few. Thus Terhune (1970) reports that such personality
characteristics as aggressiveness, authoritarianism, need
for dominance, suspiciousness, dogmatism, tendency to
derogate others, exploitativeness, and Machiavellianism tend
to produce costly conflict and that cooperation is more
likely to result from personalities that are egalitarian,
trusting, open-minded, tolerant of ambiguity, high in need
for achievement, favorable in their view of human nature.
In other words, a bossy person or a suspicious person is
likely to rub more people the wrong way and apt to have a
narrower range of cooperative relations than a person who is
egalitarian or trusting. The former types are, as a
consequence of their experiences, less likely to expect
others to be cooperative and are thus more apt to have
pessimistic views about the possibilities of initiating a
successful cooperative process.
Internal conflict and dissension within the respective
parties to conflict is another characteristic that may
affect the course of conflict between them. Internal
conflict may result in increased external belligerence as a
tactic to increase internal cohesiveness, or it may lead to
external weakness and possibly tempt the other side to
obtain a competitive advantage. Internal instability also
interferes with cooperative conflict resolution by making it
difficult to work out a durable, dependable agreement.
Estimations of Success
Many conflicts have an unplanned, expressive character in
which the course of action taken is an expression of both
the quality of the relationship between the participants and
the characteristics of the individual participants. Other
conflicts are guided by an instrumental orientation in which
courses of action are consciously evaluated and chosen in
terms of how likely they are to lead to satisfying outcomes.
Many factors influencing the estimations of success of the
different processes of conflict resolution could be listed.
Those who perceive themselves to have a clear superiority in
power are likely to favor an unregulated competitive
process; those who perceive themselves as having a legal
superiority in "rights" are likely to favor adversary relations that are regulated by legal institutions; those who
are concerned with the long-range relationships, with the
ability to work together in the future, are more likely to
favor a cooperative process. Similarly, those who have'been
excluded from the cooperative process and expect the
regulations to be stacked against them may think of the
competitive process as the only one offering any potential
of satisfaction.
Third Parties
The attitudes, strength, and resources of interested
third parties are often crucial determinants of the course
of conflict. Conflict between the conflicting principals
may be instigated or aggravated by a third party wittingly
or unwittingly-as, for example, when a child struggling with
his own oedipal feelings attempts to provoke a quarrel
between his parents. As the phrase tertium gaudens
suggests, third parties can often obtain power-by playing
two potential rivals off each other. The conditions under
which this can be done successfully are not well understood.
Research by Geis (1964) suggests, however, that those who
are high rather than low in Machiavellianism are apt to be
more successful in doing it.
The intervention of third parties is often constructive
(see chapter 8, experiment IV). The mere intervention of an
outsider in the conflict may serve to unify the conflicting
parties against the outsider: both the conflicting parties
may agree that it is their private conflict and both may
fear or resent the intrusion of an outsider into their private affairs. It is not unusual for a violently quarreling
couple to turn aggressively against someone who tries to
intervene in their slugfest. Here, the third party
inadvertently, by his intervention, activates and makes more
salient the cohesive bonds between the conflicting parties.
Third parties who are prestigeful, powerful and skillful may
deliberately facilitate a constructive resolution of a
conflict by using their prestige and power to encourage such
a resolution and by helping provide the problem-solving
resources (institutions, facilities, personnel, social
norms, and procedures) to expedite discovery of a mutually
satisfactory solution. The next section considers in
greater detail the role of third parties in the regulation
of conflict.
THE REGULATION OF CONFLICT
It is evident that conflict can be limited and controlled by
institutional forms .(e.g., collective bargaining, the
judicial system), social roles (mediators, conciliators,
referees, judges, policemen), social norms (fairness,
justice, equality, nonviolence, integrity of communication,
etc.), rules for conducting negotiations (when to initiate
and terminate negotiations, how to set an agenda, how to
present demands, etc.), and specific procedures (hinting
versus explicit communication, public versus private
sessions, etc.). These societal forms may be aimed at
regulating how force may be employed, as in the code of a
duel of honor or in certain rules of warfare; or it may be
an attempt to ascertain the basic power. relations of the
disputants without resort to a power struggle, as is often
the case in the negotiations of collective bargaining and
international relations; or it may be oriented toward
removing power as the basis for determining the outcome of
conflict, as is often the case in judicial processes.
With regard to regulated conflict, it is pertinent to
ask three central questions: (1) What are the conditions
necessary for the institutionalization and regulation of
conflict? (2) What are the conditions that make it likely
that the regulations will be adhered to by the parties in
conflict? and (3) What are the conditions under which the
institutions and procedures will be used to wage conflict
competitively or to resolve it cooperatively? Why would
adversaries engage in a duel of honor rather than attempt to
kill one another without regard to any rules? In a duel,
when would a duelist prefer to die rather than to cheat?
Under what conditions will the duelists use the rules to
attempt to kill one another, and under what conditions will
they use the same rules to restore mutual honor and esteem?
The Development of Conflict Regulation
For conflict regulation to develop, several preconditions
seem required. First of all, the conflicting parties must
themselves be organized. As Dahrendorf (1959, p. 226) has
pointed out: "So long as conflicting forces are diffuse,
incoherent aggregates, regulation is virtually impossible."
Unless each party is sufficiently internally coherent and
stable to act as an organized unit so that the actions of
its components are controlled and unified in relation to the
conflict, it is evident that regulation cannot be
effectively developed or maintained. Thus one is not
likely to engage in a duel of honor with an opponent
who is so unstable and impulsive that his actions are
uncontrollable-and it cannot be predicted with
confidence that he will follow the rules.
Second, each party to a conflict must be willing to
recognize the legitimacy of the other party and be
committed to accepting the outcome of the regulated
conflict, even if it is considered to be unfavorable to
his interest. For example, an employer who is
confronted with demands from a number of his workers
may feel that those demands do not represent the wants
of the majority of his employees and may refuse to
recognize them. Under such conditions, it is unlikely
that the conflict between the employer and his workers
will be limited and regulated by rules and procedures
that are acceptable to both sides. Also, if either an
employer or a union makes clear its intention to refuse
to accept the outcome of a regulated conflict if it
believes the outcome is undesirable, there is little
incentive for the other side to submit to being
regulated. Similarly, it is hard to have a duel of
honor if your opponent is not willing to accept your
right to challenge him. Nor are you likely to
participate in such a duel if you know that your opponent will attempt to have you injured in some
underhanded way if he is defeated fairly by you.
Third, it should be noted that the conflicts that
are regulated are not likely to be the unprecedented
ones. A conflict that is recurrent provides a base of
experience for developing the procedures, institutions,
facilities, and social roles for limiting its
destructiveness, It would be reassuring to be able to
report some evidence that demonstrates that repeated
experience with-a given type of conflict leads to its
more productive management. Unfortunately, I could
find no significant research bearing upon this issue.
Finally, and perhaps most importantly, the
regulation of conflict is most likely to develop when
both sides to a conflict are part of a common
community. This is so for several reasons. The
community may be adversely affected by an unrestrained
conflict and may, hence, exert pressures on the
conflicting parties to regulate and limit their
conflict and to follow the rules once they have been
agreed upon. In addition, as members of a common
community having similar values, traditions, and
language, it may be easier for the conflicting parties
to agree on rules and procedures for regulating the
conflict than if they do not have this correspondence
of background. Also, a common community is likely to
help provide the knowledge, resources, and facilities
that can expedite the development of methods of
regulating a conflict. Prior experience with similar
conflicts may have led the cornmunity to develop
institutions and procedures for dealing with the type
of conflict in which the parties are engaged. A duel
of honor presupposes that the duelists have a common
code of honor, a code to which all members of a given
community will adhere if they want to be esteemed
within that community. It also presupposes a set of
social roles and procedures that have been carefully
articulated within the community and that help to limit
and specify the actions that may be taken by the
adversaries.
Adherence to the Rules
A full examination of the conditions that influence
whether rules (norms, agreements, contracts, laws, and
the like) are adhered to or violated would lead to a
discussion of the different forms of rule violation and
social deviance, their genesis and control. Such an
undertaking is beyond the scope of this work. However,
it seems reasonable to assert that adherence to the
rules is more likely when:
1.
The rules are known. How accessible is the
information about the rules? How much publicity have
they been given and through what media of
communication? How motivated and able is the individual to acquire and absorb knowledge of the rules?
2.
The rules are clear, unambiguous, and
consistent. How easy is it to understand the rules,
and how clear are their implications? If one conforms
to one rule, does this lead to a violation of other
rules becausethe rules are not internally consistent?
3.
The rules are not perceived to be biased against
one's own interests.How fair are the rules? Do they
give the adversary an advantagehe would not otherwise
have?
4.
The other adheres to the rules. With how much
confidence can one predict that the other side will
also follow the rules if one abides by them? If the
other violates the rules, will it be out of ignorance
or mischief?
5.
Violations are quickly known by significant
others. If violations of the rules occur, how quickly
will they be identified? How much advantage will the
violator gain before the violation is detected? Who
will know of the violations, and how influential are
they?
6.
6.There is significant social approval for adherence
and significantsocial disapproval for violations. How
strong are the internalized values of conscience in the
conflicting parties? Do important people and groups in
the community care about whether the rules are
supported or violated? Are esteem and other social
benefits granted for adherence to the rules, and are
there significant negative sanctions for those who
violate them?
7.
Adherence to the rules has been rewarding in
the past. Have the prior experiences with the rules
been rewarding or frustrating? Is there a legacy of
trust or suspicion with regard to the rules and the way
they have been administered in the past?
8.
One would like to be able to employ the rules
in the future. Do the adversaries envision a future
that will be better because they have worked toward the
preservation of the current system of rules, or is the
outcome of the specific conflict more important to them
than the preservation of the system? Is the system of
conflict regulation held in such disrepute that the
conflict participant is more concerned with detroying
the system than with resolving the specific conflict?