Conflict Outcomes Research Articles

The Venezuelan castro-communist counterinsurgency (1960-1968) and the fight for emergent democratic governments

ABSTRACT Democracies, handicapped by constitutional conventions and structural mechanisms which enforce the practice of humanitarian ethics, are less well-equipped to address counterinsurgencies (COIN) than popularly-unaccountable authoritarian regimes. Although commonly asserted in academic and popular channels, this statement belies a greater truth: that democracies actually outperform authoritarian governments as it relates to COIN conflict outcome. This paper makes the argument for the waging of effective COIN by emergent democracies through the analysis of the successful Venezuelan anti-Castro-Communist counterinsurgency of the 1960s. The Rómulo Betancourt (1958–1964) and Raúl Leoni (1964–1969) administrations’ tempered and humane response to urban and rural Castro-Communist violence decisively won the backing of the Venezuelan people and mortally wounded the insurgent support base. Once military operational and tactical missteps that prolonged the conflict are accounted for, the Venezuelan COIN of the 1960s can serve as an exportable model for newly emergent democracies seeking to wage war within constitutional conventions.

Squeeze-Out and Business Valuation in Germany – A Law and Economics Analysis of Judicial Decision-Making

Abstract As an outcome of the scientific conflict within business valuation theory in the German-speaking area, New Political Economy of Business Valuation has developed a possible approach to explain the dissemination of neoclassical valuation concepts in theory and practice. This explanatory model, designed by Quill (2016), is extended by Follert (2020) to include the share valuation in squeeze-out cases for the compensation of minority shareholders. For this purpose, the different actors in the legal mediation procedure (“Spruchverfahren”)—the judge, the auditor as expert, and the conflicting parties—are modeled based on their stereotypical interests. The aim of the present paper is to introduce international scientific community to the scientific conflict between the proponents of investment-theoretical and those of the finance-theoretical conception, and to discuss the role of judicial decision-making from a legal-economic perspective. We would like to illustrate why a judge could benefit from the use of finance-theoretical valuation methods based on the neoclassical capital asset pricing model recommended by the relevant standard (so-called standard 1) of the “Institut der Wirtschaftsprüfer in Deutschland IDW” (Institute of Public Auditors in Germany) (“IDW S 1”). The analysis takes a socioeconomic perspective and argues that judicial valuation is primarily influenced by the judges’ tendency to promote their own reputation and by social pressure from their professional environment and different interest groups. This paper adds a further perspective to New Political Economy of Business Valuation. Moreover, the close link between jurisprudence, economics and business economics theory is pointed out. Although the approach presented deals with the squeeze-out under German law, it may be applicable to squeeze-out arrangements in other countries as well, as long as the basic assumptions apply in their legal systems.

The Presence of a Mobile Phone Does Not (Necessarily) Change the Fundamental Processes of Face-to-Face Relational Conflict

This study extends research examining the presence of mobile phones during interpersonal interactions into the context of serial arguments between dating couples. Fifty-eight dating couples (N = 116) had two 10-minute face-to-face serial argument conversations in a laboratory-controlled experiment when technology was either present or absent. The most salient findings were consistent with longstanding findings in the conflict literature: positive communication was associated positively with desirable outcomes (conversational satisfaction, perceived resolvability, and conversation effectiveness) whereas negative behaviors were inversely related to desirable conflict outcomes. Overall, results showed little evidence that the presence of a participant’s smartphone affected the quality of serial argument conversations, but biological sex moderated the impact of technology on conversation satisfaction and perceived conversation effectiveness, such that technology presence negatively impacted women more than men. These findings suggest that the presence of mobile phones does not fundamentally alter effective conflict engagement in general, but there are likely circumstances in which the presence of mobile phones is important.

Please Help Us (or Don’t): External Interventions and Negotiated Settlements in Civil Conflicts

How do different types of external intervention affect the likelihood of a negotiated settlement in civil conflicts? Drawing on the negotiation literature, which shows that the nature of the parties’ “best alternative to a negotiated agreement (BATNA)” influences the bargaining process between them, we argue different types of intervention affect governments’ and rebel groups’ BATNAs in different ways. This, in turn, affects the likelihood of a negotiated settlement. To test this argument, we address the fact that interventions are nonrandom, and that characteristics of civil conflicts that lead to different types of intervention also influence the likelihood of a negotiated settlement. We therefore use a two-stage statistical model. The first stage predicts the likelihood of different types of intervention, and drawing on those results, the second stage analyzes the likelihood of a negotiated settlement. The results provide insights into how different types of intervention affect civil conflict outcomes.

How Nonnative Speakers Experience Conflict at Work: The Influence of Stereotype Threat

The trend towards globalization increases the likelihood that organizations will employ persons with nonnative accents. Many people with nonnative accents are aware that they sound different, but for the most part, their experiences have been largely ignored in organizational research. Our research begins to rectify this omission by examining how nonnative speakers think, act and perceive the results of, conflict situations. We investigate the experiences of nonnative speakers in three studies, in which we examine 1) whether nonnative speakers experience stereotype threat in workplace conflict situations with native speakers, 2) whether stereotype threat is associated with certain conflict managing behaviors (e.g. yielding and avoiding), and 3) the relationship between stereotype threat, satisfaction with conflict outcomes and processes, and objective conflict outcomes. Findings suggest that nonnative speakers experience stereotype threat when interacting with native speakers in conflict situations and the experience of stereotype threat can lead to more passive conflict behaviors. Stereotype threat was also associated with less satisfaction with conflict outcomes and goal-attainment as well as lower objective conflict outcomes. Theoretical and practical implications of these results as well as directions for future research are discussed.

The Role of Individual Differences in Negotiation and Conflict Outcomes

The session includes four research presentations that address the role of personality, gender, and other individual differences in negotiation and conflict contexts. The papers adopt different yet related theoretical perspectives while focusing on a variety of behaviours and outcomes relevant to the negotiation context – ranging from planning behaviours, conflict expression, warmth and competence perceptions, and integrative joint gains. This session hopes to push the current thinking in the field by identifying critical individual differences that can impact how negotiations and conflicts play out both in terms of intrapersonal and interpersonal effects. We have an excellent lineup of authors and a discussant who is an authority in the field of negotiations. Expert Views on the Big Five Antecedents to Effective Negotiation Presenter: Daisung Jang; U. of Queensland Presenter: Hillary Anger Elfenbein; Washington U. in St. Louis Presenter: William Bottom; Washington U. in St. Louis Do Women Face Backlash for Negotiating Assertively or Aggressively? Presenter: Nazli M. Bhatia; Catolica Lisbon School of Business and Economics Presenter: Robin L. Pinkley; Southern Methodist U. Presenter: Zoe Barsness; U. of Washington, Tacoma Presenter: Julia Bear; Stony Brook U.-State U. of New York Presenter: Dustin J. Sleesman; U. of Delaware Individual Well-Being and Interpersonal Conflict Expression Presenter: Matthew A. Diabes; Carnegie Mellon U. - Tepper School of Business Presenter: Laurie R. Weingart; Carnegie Mellon U. Presenter: Taya R. Cohen; Carnegie Mellon U. - Tepper School of Business How Congruence on Propensity to Distrust Impacts Joint Integrative Gains? Presenter: Ruchi Sinha; U. of South Australia Presenter: Sudeep Sharma; U. of Illinois Springfield Presenter: Hillary Anger Elfenbein; Washington U. in St. Louis

Unpacking Antecedents and Outcomes of Work-Family Conflict: A Mega- Meta-Analytic Path Analysis

Although research on the relationship between the Big Five personality traits and substance use is well-established, the notion of how these traits predict substance use needs more theoretical attention and empirical evidence. Building upon Conservation of Resources theory and the self-medication hypothesis, we conducted a mega-meta analytic path analysis examining the relationships among the Big Five traits, work-to-family conflict (WFC) and family-to-work conflict (FWC), anxiety and depression, and substance use. By coding existing meta-analyses on bivariate relationships in our model, we accumulated a 10-by-10 correlation matrix as input to a path modeling software program. We found that agreeableness and conscientiousness predicted substance use through both WFC and FWC and depression as well as through FWC and anxiety. Extraversion and openness-to- experience had relatively weaker influences on substance use through WFC, anxiety, and depression. Neuroticism was the strongest driver of the two forms of conflict, the two mental health conditions, and substance use. From this model it can be inferred that WFC and FWC may be generative mechanisms by which the impact of personality is transmitted to mental health outcomes when analyzed via the Conservation of Resources lens.

The Art and Science of Disagreeing: How to Create More Effective Conversations About Opposing Views

Disagreement is an unavoidable part of social life. Because no two people hold identical beliefs, knowledge, values, or goals, opposing viewpoints are bound to arise at some point in the pursuit of personal and collective interests in professional organizations, civic spaces, and personal relationships. A large literature has suggested that engaging with diverse viewpoints can create numerous benefits. However, people often struggle to handle disagreement constructively. The presence of contradictory opinions often gives rise to negative affect, biased information processing, and negative inferences about the other side, resulting in either argumentation and escalated conflicts or disengagement and avoidance. Such reactions keep people from reaping the benefits of diverse viewpoints and threaten the prosperity of organizations and our society as a whole. How can people engage with disagreement more effectively through dialogues? This symposium aims to introduce four innovative empirical papers that investigate different aspects of effective conversations about opposing views ranging from affective experiences to communication medium and language to interpersonal processes. Each paper identifies an important barrier to effective communication and offers a unique practical solution to help people create more productive conversations when disagreement arises. Moreover, this symposium showcases a broad range of research methods for studying conflict of opinions, including randomized experiments in lab and field settings, archival analysis, content analysis, and machine learning techniques. Taken together, this symposium provides attendees interested in communication and conflicts in organizational and civic life with new ideas and methodologies for future research as well as insights into effective interventions to meet a wide variety of communication challenges. The Unexpected Affective Benefits of Counter-Arguing Presenter: Charles A. Dorison; Northwestern Kellogg School of Management Presenter: Julia Alexandra Minson; Harvard Kennedy School Resolving Conflict Through Conversation: The Role of Communication Medium in Conflict Outcomes Presenter: Juliana Schroeder; U. of California, Berkeley Conversational Receptiveness: Improving Engagement with Opposing Views Presenter: Michael Yeomans; Harvard Business School Thank You, Because...: Discussing Differences While Finding Common Ground Presenter: Xuan Zhao; U. of Chicago Booth School of business Presenter: Heather M. Caruso; UCLA Anderson School of Management Presenter: Jane Risen; U. of Chicago Booth School of business

Is Religion a Barrier to Peace? Religious Influence on Violent Intrastate Conflict Termination

ABSTRACT In recent years, a burgeoning literature has emerged on the relationship between religion and conflict. Contradictory theories address the dynamics and termination of religious violent conflicts. Some studies focus on the destructive role of religion, arguing that religious conflicts are longer, more violent, and intractable. Others argue that religion has an ambivalent role, both destructive and constructive, and recognize religion as a force for peacebuilding. This study focuses on the relationship between religion and conflict termination by examining termination outcomes, based on the length and the level of violence, as well as incidents of reoccurrence. The study quantitatively examines 118 domestic conflicts between 1990 and 2014, utilizing the Political Instability Task Force and Religion and State datasets. The findings suggest that religious conflicts are likely to last longer than non-religious ones. However, the study reveals that religion has no strong significant influence on conflict termination as well as on the reoccurrence of conflicts and the violence level.

Commentary on the Legal Practice of Database Protection Protection of Allied Rights to Database: V Kontakte Ltd. v. Dabl Ltd.

Analysis of causes and outcome of recent judicial conflict between solid database companies.

Guerra económica, inteligencia económica

En este artículo se analizarán las implicaciones de los aspectos geoeconómicos en la seguridad humana, exponiendo la evolución de su importancia a lo largo de la historia y la compleja e interconectada realidad actual.A través del estudio de los mecanismos de defensa y ataque económicos, se analizará así mismo la importancia del recurso económico en el juego de poder mundial y sus efectos en lo que se conoce ya como “guerra económica”, dentro del marco de amenaza híbrida.A la vista de la transcendencia que los aspectos económicos tienen en el nacimiento, desarrollo y desenlace de los conflictos, armados o no, nos preguntamos si existe una manera de prever sus consecuencias, anticiparse a sus efectos y, lo que es más importante, influir en su aparición y desarrollo, y si esta manera es la implementación de un sistema de inteligencia económica.

Parliament in action: Drug withdrawals and policy changes in the U.K.

Previous studies on changes in health policies theorize such changes either as crises responses, or as the outcome of longer-term stakeholder conflicts. In this paper, we propose that parliaments function as overlooked, intermediate actors that contribute to translating the interests of stakeholders into policy changes. We study the role of parliament connecting policy makers and stakeholders in the context of drug regulation. Based on three high-profile cases of drug withdrawals between 1991 and 2005 in the United Kingdom (triazolam, rofecoxib, and co-proxamol), we distinguish partisan-political, individual-idiosyncratic, and collective-institutional pathways of parliamentary action on drug withdrawals. Distinguishing direct and indirect actions, we argue that indirect courses of action, including advocacy and educational work, can be just as effective as regular legislative endeavours, under certain conditions.

The Clash of Economic and Religious Fundamentalism in Aslam's The Blind Man's Garden

This study aims to understand the clashes between American economic fundamentalists and Islamic religious fundamentalists in South Asia regarding Nadeem Aslam's The Blind Man's Garden (2013). The study explores that the economic entrepreneurs of the neo-imperialists give birth to counterproductive acts of religiosity. It shows how the ugliness of economic hunger is adroitly hidden behind the polished face of globalization, just as the priggish and snobbish religiosity of Muslim fundamentalists encloses their avarice for power and wealth. Using Tariq Ali's theory of Clashes of Fundamentalisms, the study proves that the root cause of civilizational clashes is the outcome of conflicts of interests between Western economic fundamentalists and Muslim religious fundamentalists. The study concludes the economic, political, cultural and strategic motives working behind the goals of establishing neo-imperialism through the elimination of borders for neo-liberalist gains in the wake of the war on terror.

Franchisees with multiple stakeholder roles: perceptions and conflict in franchise networks

ABSTRACT Although the causes of conflict in networks and interorganizational relationships have long been investigated, scholars have overlooked the importance of stakeholders with multiple roles in eliciting managerial (mis)perceptions and potential for conflict. We find that franchisees take on multiple stakeholder roles, as customers, employees, investors, and business partners. Drawing from agency and stakeholder theories, we empirically demonstrate that the franchisor’s perception of franchisees’ multiple stakeholder roles affects managerial support and conflict outcomes in franchisor-franchisee relationships. The primary data support our claims that when franchisees are viewed as investors and business partners, franchisors increase the level of support offered and franchise systems experience less conflict.

Wise Reasoning About the Future Is Associated With Adaptive Interpersonal Feelings After Relational Challenges

Two prospective studies examine how wise reasoning about an anticipated conflict interaction—intellectual humility, recognition of uncertainty and change, consideration and integration of different perspectives—is associated with interpersonal feelings and closeness to the interaction partner after the challenging interaction. In Study 1 (N = 243) and preregistered replication Study 2 (N = 234), participants who reasoned more wisely before an anticipated conflict interaction felt more positively toward and closer to the person involved in the conflict afterward. We explored three avenues accompanying effects of wise reasoning about the future for interpersonal outcomes: conflict outcome, perception of the interaction as fair and satisfying, and sense of meaning in the conflict experience. Path models indicated that sense of meaning was a consistent factor accounting for the positive effect of prospective wise reasoning for relational well-being. We discuss implications for research on prospection, wisdom, and well-being.

SDG 13 and the entwining of climate and sustainability metagovernance: an archaeological–genealogical analysis of goals-based climate governance

PurposeThis paper brings insights from accounting scholarship to the measurement and reporting challenges of metagovernance approaches to sustainable development. Where scholarship on metagovernance—the combination of market, hierarchical and network governance—proposes deductive approaches to such challenges, we contend that a historically informed “abductive” approach offers valuable insight into the realpolitik of intergovernmental frameworks.Design/methodology/approachThe paper adopts a Foucauldian “archaeological–genealogical” method to investigate the inclusion of climate change as a Sustainable Development Goal (SDG). It analyses more than 100 documents and texts, tracking the statement forms that crystallise prevailing truth claims across the development of climate and SDG metagovernance.FindingsWe show how the truth claims now enshrined in the Paris Agreement on Climate Change constrained the conceptualisation and operationalisation of SDG 13: Take urgent action to combat climate change and its impacts. The paper thereby reframes recent measurement and reporting challenges as outcomes of conceptual conflicts between the technicist emphasis of divisions within the United Nations and the truth claims enshrined in intergovernmental agreements.Originality/valueThis paper demonstrates how an archaeological–genealogical approach may start to address the measurement and reporting challenges facing climate and SDG metagovernance. It also highlights that the two degrees target on climate change has a manifest variability of interpretation and shows how this characteristic has become pivotal to operationalising climate metagovernance in a manner that respects the sovereignty of developing nations.

Power and punishment influence negotiations over parental care

Abstract Asymmetries in power (the ability to influence the outcome of conflict) are ubiquitous in social interactions because interacting individuals are rarely identical. It is well documented that asymmetries in power influence the outcome of reproductive conflict in social groups. Yet power asymmetries have received little attention in the context of negotiations between caring parents, which is surprising given that parents are often markedly different in size. Here we built on an existing negotiation model to examine how power and punishment influence negotiations over care. We incorporated power asymmetry by allowing the more-powerful parent, rank 1, to inflict punishment on the less-powerful parent, rank 2. We then determined when punishment will be favored by selection and how it would affect the negotiated behavioral response of each parent. We found that with power and punishment, a reduction in one parent’s effort results in partial compensation by the other parent. However, the degree of compensation is asymmetric: the rank 2 compensates more than the rank 1. As a result, the fitness of rank 1 increases and the fitness of rank 2 decreases, relative to the original negotiation model. Furthermore, because power and punishment enable one parent to extract greater effort from the other, offspring can do better, that is, receive more total effort, when there is power and punishment involved in negotiations over care. These results reveal how power and punishment alter the outcome of conflict between parents and affect offspring, providing insights into the evolutionary consequences of exerting power in negotiations.

Gruesomeness conveys formidability: Perpetrators of gratuitously grisly acts are conceptualized as larger, stronger, and more likely to win.

While associated with extreme terrorist organizations in modern times, extensive accounts of grisly acts of violence exist in the archeological, historical, and ethnographic records. Though reasons for this dramatic form of violence are multifaceted and diverse, one possibility is that violence beyond what is required to win a conflict is a method by which violent actors communicate to others that they are formidable opponents. The formidability representation hypothesis predicts that formidability is cognitively represented using the dimensions of envisioned bodily size and strength. We tested the informational ramifications of gruesome acts using two vignette studies depicting individuals who either did or did not grievously damage the corpse of a deceased foe. Participants rated the individual's height, bodily size, and strength, as well as his aggressiveness, motivation, and the capacity to vanquish opponents in future conflicts. Results indicate that, as predicted, committing gruesome acts of violence enhances perceptions of formidability as measured both by envisioned bodily size and strength and expectations regarding the outcomes of agonistic conflicts. Moreover, the gruesome actor was perceived as more aggressive and more motivated to overcome his enemies, and this mediated the increase in conceptualized size and strength. These results both provide further evidence for the formidability representation hypothesis and support the thesis that overtly grisly violence is tactically employed, in part, because it conveys information about the perpetrator's formidability.

Interstate War Battle dataset (1823–2003)

Extant scholarship on interstate war and conflict resolution predominantly utilizes formal models, case studies, and statistical models with wars as the unit of analysis to assess the impact of battlefield activity on war duration and termination. As such, longstanding views of war have not been tested systematically using intraconflict measures, and deeper studies of war dynamics have also been hampered. I address these gaps by creating and introducing the Interstate War Battle (IWB) dataset, which captures the outcomes and dates of 1,708 battles across 97 interstate wars since 1823. This article describes the sources used to create these data, provides definitions, and presents descriptive statistics for the basic battle data and several daily-level measures constructed from them. I then use the data to test the implications of two major theoretical perspectives on conflict termination: the informational view, which emphasizes convergence in beliefs through battlefield activity; and Zartman’s ripeness theory, which highlights costly stalemates in fighting. I find suggestive evidence for informational views and little support for ripeness theory: new battlefield outcomes promote negotiated settlements, while battlefield stagnation undermines them. The IWB dataset has significant implications, highlights future research topics, and motivates a renewed research agenda on the empirical study of conflict.

Mutually Assured Distrust: Ideology and Commitment Problems in Civil Wars

Within the study of intrastate armed conflicts, many scholars rely on a bargaining model when explaining why some civil wars are intractable. Primarily, scholars posit that commitment problems represent a key barrier to settling conflicts through negotiations. Yet, some civil wars are more easily resolved than others. If commitment problems are a universal feature of civil wars, what explains why commitment problems are more salient in some conflicts as compared to others? We argue that ideological differences between combatants enhance commitment problems in civil wars. Assuming that ideology is used by combatants to generate support, concessions that violate the ideological goals of each side may alienate supporters. With extreme ideological polarization, concessions may be viewed as relative as opposed to absolute, making it difficult for either side to credibly commit to offer concessions. To test these claims, we quantitatively examine the duration and outcome of all intrastate conflicts from 1975 to 2011.