Lecture 2 hours/week
Seminar 2 hours/week
This course is interactive. Working in small groups, students will discuss, analyze, interpret, practise, evaluate, and provide feedback about advanced interpersonal conflict skills and strategies. Working individually with the instructor, each student will also write three reflective journals; students choose case studies from their personal experiences, and relate them to course concepts, readings, and exercises that they find meaningful and relevant to their own practices of negotiation and dialogue.
1. Conflict cycles and the effects of intervention
2. Theories of communication and conflict
- varieties of negotiation and dialogue
- context and conflict
- the special role of dialogue in conflict, conciliation, and reconciliation
3. Case studies in communication and conflict
- social and political conflicts
- organizational conflicts
- the role of dialogue and negotiation in policy and process design
4. Media treatments and everyday experiences of negotiation and dialogue
- theories of conflict: game theory, uses of simulation
- theories of dialogue: classically-based models, modern approaches, Truth and Reconciliation
5. Negotiation practice
- applying interpersonal communication and negotiation skills to large-scale conflicts
- creating a dialogue community that supports engagement in difficult, even intractable situations
6. View and discuss documentary and cinematic treatments of historical conflicts
- historical context vs. current perspective-taking
- the Rashomon Effect, uncertainty, and the competition of so-called narratives
7. Applying ethical problem-solving and interest-based negotiation in the workplace
- shifting from positions to interests
- using communication to create effective and efficient feedback systems
- negotiating roles and responsibilities
8. Mass media, social media, and conflict
- how all levels of media – from private messaging to mass dissemination – act as systems of conflict intervention
- how conflict is promoted through the biased framing of unwanted groups
- the role of re-framing in promoting peace
9. Student-organized sessions with dialogue and/or negotiation practitioners
- planning, facilitating, and reporting on a class dialogue session with a professional practitioner, exploring one of the course themes [guests to be arranged by instructor]
10. Student-led dialogue on the implications of case-studies and research projects for further study of dialogue and negotiation
Knowledge:
Students who successfully complete this course will
- identify the nature of, and outcomes associated with, different approaches to conflict management, decision making, negotiation, and dialogue
- identify how to deal sensibly with commonly used strategies that seek to use competition, manipulation, and power dynamics to gain advantage in conflict and negotiation
- identify how leaders and interveners influence others in conflict
- identify how media, culture, and interests intersect to shape the course of conflict
Skills:
Students who successfully complete this course will
- articulate a personal set of strategies for communication and collaborative problem-solving that work with a variety of styles
- apply active listening and ethical problem solving to project case studies and in class-based conflict analysis exercises
- apply skills that support and/or facilitate teamwork, dialogue, and collaborative decision-making in the course’s class sessions
- apply course concepts to the research and critical analysis of a conflict related to one of the following course themes:
- conflict styles and intervention: building on the concepts of conflict analysis introduced in earlier courses
- applying communication theory: dialogue and negotiation as instrumental discourse processes
- the cultures of dialogue and negotiation: social relations of groups that engage in dialogue and negotiation
- framing and perspective: how dialogue and negotiation are used strategically and tactically in conflict and competition
- dialogue, negotiation, and the media: understanding how public discourse frames conflict; understanding why it matters
- planning, facilitating, and improving dialogue and negotiation events: dialogue and negotiation as experiential learning. Understanding how one can use this learning to enhance one’s work life, community life, and private life
Attitudes:
Students who successfully complete this course will
- take into account their personal challenges associated with managing interpersonal conflict
- articulate a personal strategy for self-reflection and continued application of course concepts
- take into account the importance of their values and the values of others when managing interpersonal conflict
Instructors may use a student’s record of attendance and/or level of active participation in the course as part of the student’s graded performance. Where this occurs, expectations and grade calculations regarding class attendance and participation will be clearly defined in the Instructor Course Outline.
Students may conduct research as part of their coursework in this class. Instructors for the course are responsible for ensuring that student research projects comply with College policies on ethical conduct for research involving humans, which can require obtaining Informed Consent from participants and getting the approval of the ÁñÁ«ÊÓƵ Research Ethics Board prior to conducting the research.
Assessment will be based on course objectives and will be carried out in accordance with the ÁñÁ«ÊÓƵ Evaluation Policy. An evaluation schedule is presented at the beginning of the course. This is a graded course.
Example evaluation schedule:
| Reflective journals (3 @10%) | 30% |
| Group research project and presentation | 40% |
|
Team report on dialogue guest session |
10% |
| Attendance/professionalism/participation | 20% |
| Total | 100% |
A list of required textbooks and materials is provided for students at the beginning of the semester. Example texts include:
- digital access to all required reading, including case studies, book chapters, and journal articles
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