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AbstractThis article proposes rethinking democratic conflict management by acknowledging the increasingly important role policy plays in it. As the debate on the health of democracy intensifies, research on how democracies manage and absorb political and societal conflicts becomes broadly relevant. Existing theories and perspectives view conflict management through the lens of elections and other institutional mechanisms, or they examine the social and economic preconditions for successful conflict management while inadequately understanding how policies contribute to conflict management. The article develops a theoretical framework that allows for the analysis of how policies' material and interpretive effects influence societal conflicts and thereby strengthen (or weaken) democracy. While the article focuses on hypothesis-generation rather than hypothesis-testing, it draws on a large variety of policy and case examples to corroborate and illustrate the theoretical expectations embodied in the framework. Insights into policy's role in democratic conflict management expand our understanding of the challenges to democracy in the twenty-first century and create new possibilities for comparative, policy-focused research into what makes democracy work.

<div><p><em>Conflict is a very common word in our daily life. There is no place where there are no conflicts. We not only have conflicts with other people we even have conflicts with ourselves. So a quite common phenomenon which if not dealt properly will result in the downfall of oneself, group, organization or a whole nation. The organizational productivity will be affected as conflicts result in reduction of individual productivity. The employees are facing problem in dealing with the day to day conflicts. Thus the conflict management is a much discussed topic in the present scenario. The organizations should develop the strategies like appointing arbitragers, establishing communication channels etc. </em></p></div>

Conflicts and their management in Central Asia have never been prioritised by the osce although five states of the region are among its participating states. This has been due to that unlike in some other parts of the post-Soviet space most of the conflicts did not threaten with military escalation, and the intensity of strategic rivalry is less noticeable in this distant part of the osce area than closer to the heart of Europe. The fact Russia is not a direct party to the conflicts in Central Asia also reduces the interests of many participating states. There was one high intensity conflict in the region, the Tajik civil war that came too early for the osce. Lower intensity conflicts, ranging from border skirmishes, disputes about access to water, violation of rights of national minority groups, rigged elections are monitored and their resolutions are facilitated by the organisation. Some of them, like the 2010 Kyrgyz-Uzbek conflict had such short shelf-life internationally that no consensus-based inter-governmental organisation could have effectively intervened into it. The osce has been successful in conflict management when the party or parties also wanted to break the stale-mate that the Organization could facilitate. Domestic change in some Central Asian states is essential for advancing the osces cooperative security approach.

Is predicting the international community's cumulative response to an interstate dispute possible? Can we predict what form conflict management will take and how it will evolve over the course of a dispute? I employ the concept of a conflict management trajectory to test a forecasting model of conflict management. This model accurately predicts conflict management behavior and uncovers numerous novel insights—including that the initial intervention indicates clearly the resources the international community is willing to spend on managing the dispute. These results confirm the need to theorize further about conflict management interdependence and offer clear advice to the policy community.

Historical and ethnic background of the internal conflict, 1960-82; based on conference paper.

PurposeThe main research purposes of this paper are to: conceptualize Chinese conflict management behaviors as contingent on the hierarchical relations of conflict parties in an organizational context; and investigate individual characteristics as moderators in this contingency framework.Design/methodology/approachThis emic study consisted of two steps: using nine subject matter experts to develop conflict scenarios and conflict management strategies, and using this instrument to collect data from 704 actual employees across China. Multinomial logistic analysis was used to analyze respondents' choice of strategies.FindingsThe findings supported the hypotheses. Chinese role‐playing a supervisor in a conflict with their subordinate tended to use direct, assertive strategies to resolve the conflict, but the results depended on age, education, gender, region and work experience. As a subordinate in a conflict with their supervisor, Chinese chose indirect, harmony‐preserving strategies, particularly when they were older and more interaction adept. In a conflict with a peer, respondents used a broader spectrum of conflict management strategies, depending on their individual characteristics. No "best practices" were found or universal strategies adopted.Research limitations/implicationsThe limitations include the lack of random sampling and a scenario‐based method. The emic evidence for a contingency perspective of conflict resolution framework was provided. The conflict scenarios may be used in organizational training of conflict management.Originality/valueConflict scenarios and management strategies developed by local subject matter experts were used to evaluate Chinese workers' choices of conflict management strategies. The findings call for the re‐conceptualization of conflict management strategies as a contingent and culture‐specific construct.

Standard conflict management studies treat individual conflict management attempts, whether the same or different techniques, as independent of one another across time and space. This article considers the implications and lays out research agenda for several configurations that relax that assumption: (a) multiple approaches in the same conflict; (b) spatial and temporal interrelationships; (c) interactions with ongoing hostilities; and (d) techniques in different phases of the conflict. Included is a discussion of how the articles in the special issue fit within these frameworks.