Causes of Conflict

I should state at the outset that I have a confession to make. Not quite yet but soon. As a long term practitioner and teacher of negotiation and mediation, it has occurred to me on many occasions…

This is the first of a series of four blog postings written by Nadja Alexander , Michael Leathes , Tina Monberg and Irena Vanenkova. Achieving the promise of mediation in conflicts that threaten the…

“At these times”, said Dumbledore, indicating the stone basin, “I use the Pensieve. One simply siphons the excess thoughts from one’s mind, pours them into the basin, and examines them at one’s…

  A human resources manager recently asked me for a general list of reasons why a mediation might not settle. While part of me wanted to question the idea of settlement as the goal of mediation (see…

It is trite that one of key tasks of a mediator is to sort out what Patton, Stone and Heen in their book “Difficult Conversations” refer to as the “What Happened” conversation. Although they write…

Last Sunday in Edinburgh I took part in a panel on the subject of Intractable Conflict. The principal speaker was Oliver Ramsbotham, Emeritus Professor of Conflict Resolution at the University of…

Many of you will have read of the tragedy this week in Arizona, where a mediation ended in the death of one party, and the serious wounding of their lawyer. Details are still sketchy, but it seems…

 Prior to Christmas I found myself in Jerusalem, Israel – the heart of the heart of the conflict of our time. Here, no one agrees on anything – even the monks from various Christian denominations …

I read a long time ago that lessons for life can be found everywhere as long as we look for them. As with many of these quotes that we read, my response was to nod sagaciously, file it away for…