ABSTRACT
This part of the book is about the way interests and values interact during conflict. Insights from the literature on the sociology of conflict provide a basis for the theoretical article presented here, originally published in 1973 (Human Relations). The key idea, supported by experimental research, is that different values (or ideologies) intensify conflicts over interests. But there is more to the interplay between types of conflict than this finding. When this interplay is considered through time, we observe the pushes and pulls of the contrasting values on the course of a conflict. Disputants are pushed toward the more moderate members of their group; they are also pulled in the direction of the more extreme members. These alternating currents are managed by mechanisms that offset polarizing the conflict and described in a propositional format. They are evaluated by both experiments and case studies. The case analyses are particularly valuable for tracing the dynamics through long chronologies as shown in a 1995 chapter that evaluates a negotiation following the Aquino election in the Philippines. Other perspectives on these types of conflict and interventions that may soften the impacts of value conflicts are also discussed in this part.
