Suchergebnisse

This study sought to evaluate the success of professional coexistence between Jewish and Arab citizens in Israel, as reflected in joint medical teams, and to explore the generalizibility of coexistence within the teams into mutual national images. Can positive experiences within work-groups mitigate intergroup stereotypes and prejudice, thereby strengthening the Jewish-Arab bond and commitment for peace in the region? We examined the relative strength of the two forces: one stemming from team members' national identity and potentially hampering cooperation caused by adverse residues of protracted antagonism between Jews and Arabs; the other derived from their professional identity and possibly enhancing joint problem-solving among team members. This was a new departure that combined several research domains - research in the area of conflict management, studies on social identity, and research on biases in cognitive processing - that have not yet been integrated. It further entailed a pilot systematic effort to examine the possibility of generalizing from coexistence within joint, binational organic work-teams into overall patterns of relationships between these polarized groups. The study was conducted in a large regional medical center and several ambulatory clinics in Northern Israel. A semistructured interview and a self-report questionnaire served as the research instruments. We found that the success of Jewish-Arab coexistence appears confined to the `local' boundaries of the joint professional teams. No clear evidence was obtained showing that it generalizes into the overall national images and alleviates the protracted antagonism, stereotypes and prejudice. Three categories of explanations are offered for the lack of transfer of successful professional coexistence into global attitudes: these explanations derive from social identity theory, conflict resolution models, and cognitive biases.

AbstractThis article presents an intervention designed to assist trauma relief personnel in their work with victims of protracted conflict among adversary
ethnic groups. The training program presented here incorporates components of conflict escalation and deescalation models and is tailored to the Balkan
conflict, especially victims of the Croatian and Bosnian‐Serbian conflict.

Purpose
This study aim to examine the themes of moral disengagement (MD) and engagement in reasoning regarding a putative governmental right to kill innocent civilians when fighting terrorism.


Design/methodology/approach
In total, 147 participants from Israel, 101 from the USA and 80 from South Africa provided quantitative rating scale responses and qualitative explanations about such a putative right. Qualitative responses were coded for presence or absence of indices of MD and engagement.


Findings
In ANOVAs by gender and country, men scored higher than women on rating scale scores indicating support for the right; there were no significant national differences on these scores. Chi-square analyses with the coded qualitative responses indicated more men than women gave morally disengaged responses, proportionately more South Africans than Israelis provided morally disengaged responses and proportionately more South Africans and Americans than Israelis provided morally engaged responses. Pearson correlation analyses indicated that MD was positively correlated with rating scale scores and moral engagement was negatively related to rating scale scores in all three countries.


Research limitations/implications
Regarding limitations, it is difficult to know how the omission of qualitative explanations of rating scale responses by many participants influenced the statistical findings – or how to interpret the more restricted level of qualitative responses in Israel and South Africa as compared to the USA.


Social implications
Programs designed to counteract MD have the potential for helping reduce support for war and its inhumanities across diverse nations.


Originality/value
This is the first study on MD to compare American, Israeli and South African perspectives on the justifiability of human rights violations in the war on terror. The findings go beyond earlier studies in finding gender differences in MD that occurred across three very different nations in three very different parts of the world.