Conflict Management and Resolution was being held in the same tiered style classroom that Wilson had used the prior semester. Despite what people might have heard on the radio, the doctor was in attendance for the first class, though he was sitting down behind his desk talking quietly with a blond haired man. Anyone who had taken Traditional Fairy Tales earlier in the day would recognize the other man as Professor Aziraphale.

Laid out on the desk was a sign in sheet and a platter of deviled eggs, cubes of cheese, crackers, veggies and fresh fruit. Wilson simply couldn’t bring himself to serve brownies and cookies just before lunch; at least, not on the first day. There was hot apple cider, tea and coffee as well. Once everyone was in and settled in their seats, Wilson carefully levered himself up to his feet, waving off Professor Phale’s assistance with a soft smile before making his way around to the front of the desk.

“Good morning.” Wilson smiled. “Welcome to Conflict Management and Resolution. I am your professor for this class, Dr. James Wilson M.D. As a few familiar faces can tell you, I taught at the school last semester and have worked on Fandom at the clinic both in years prior and currently. I will be holding office hours on Tuesday mornings from 9:30am until noon but I can also be reached for a specific appointment and you are welcome to stop by the clinic when I am on shift."

Turning to pick up a pile of papers, Wilson nodded to Pippi and Blair, and when they came down, he split the pile of papers between them to be handed out.

“For those of you who haven’t met them yet, I’d like to introduce you to the two TAs for this course, Pippi Longstocking and Blair Sandburg. They will be helping me with some of the more interactive classes and if I am out for any reason will lead the class. In that event I will expect everyone to give them their strict attention and respect.”

Giving the two a smile, Wilson sent them on their way, while carefully levering himself up to sit on the desk.

“Pippi and Blair are handing out the syllabus for this class. On it you will find a breakdown of what we will be studying this semester, my expectations for you and my voicemail as well. Every week there will be a sign in sheet, probably right up here near the food. I ask that you remember to sign yourself in as I’ll keep attendance off this sheet. If for some reason you know you have to miss a class or you’ve missed a class, please get in touch with me ASAP so I can help you catch up with the work you missed. Does anyone have any questions?”

Leaning forward, he let Blair and Pippi finish handing out the syllabus and retake their own seats, also attentive for any questions the students might have. Once everybody was settled once more, he carefully slid off the desk and walked towards an overhead.



“All right, let’s get started. Today I want to talk about the Core Concepts of Conflict, of Management and of Resolution.”

Flipping on the over head, Wilson set down a film that held definitions of Conflict Resolution and Conflict Management.

“Conflict resolution or conflictology is the process of attempting to resolve a dispute or a conflict. Successful conflict resolution occurs by listening to and providing opportunities to meet each side's needs, and adequately address their interests so that they are each satisfied with the outcome. Conflict resolution aims to end conflicts before they start or lead to verbal, physical, or legal fighting. More common but not popular with practitioners in conflict resolution is conflict management, where Conflict is a deliberate personal, social and organizational tool, especially used by capable politicians and other social engineers.”

Leaving the film up for the students to take notes of the two definitions, Wilson leaned against the front of the desk and took a sip of tea.

“We will be studying both concepts throughout this course. Today’s demonstration will focus on the idea of conflict management with an eye towards a mutually beneficial resolution.”

Once he was certain that everybody had the notes, Wilson moved back to the overhead and set up another slide.

Core Concepts
-Conflicts and Disputes
-Intractable Conflict
-Intervention Goals: Settlement, Resolution, Management, and Transformation
-Security
-Power
-Justice
-Peace
-Violence
-War

“All right, so these are the core concepts in the idea of conflict resolution. Let’s go over each of them briefly.”

Another slide, trust me this is better than having to deal with his handwriting!

Conflicts and Disputes: Conflict scholars make a critical distinction between short-term disputes and deep-rooted, long-term conflicts. We’re going to learn why conflicts are so much harder to resolve than disputes.

Intractable Conflict: The characteristics of intractable conflicts are ones that go on and on, are frequently very destructive, and seem to resist any attempts at resolution. Factors shaping intractable conflict such as the parties, issues, setting, and history are among the factors that shape the course of conflicts. Understanding the many factors that determine the course of intractable conflicts is essential in developing effective policies that limit and end them.

Intervention Goals: Settlement, Resolution, Management, and Transformation: We’re going to work on this one as the semester goes along.

Security: Security, or sense of safety, is one of several "fundamental needs" that must be met if conflict resolution is to be successful according to theorists.

Power: Power is the ability to get others to do as one wants them to do. This can occur through the use of force (referred to as "power-over"), through cooperation (referred to as "power-with" or "exchange power"), or through the power of "love" or the integrative system.

Justice: Justice, most simply, is a measure of fairness. It can be measured in many different ways as is evidenced by the different kinds of justice described below. Justice conflicts can be difficult to resolve with mediation as justice is seldom compromised. Without a legitimate adjudicatory body, such conflicts can easily become intractable.

Peace: Peace refers to a state of harmony between people or groups; freedom from civil commotion; freedom form war; a cessation or absence of hostilities between interactive parties.

Violence: Violence is the use of physical force to harm another person or thing; it also can be structural in nature where the harm comes from the nature of the social structure without overt force.

War: According to Quincy Write, war is a wide ranging conflict between peoples and their state structures in which the relative power is sufficiently equal to lead to the extreme intensification of the conflict. This forces the parties to use all powers available to them in a desperate attempt to win.

“These are going to be the core ideas that we are going to focus our study on as we go through this class. Each of these ideas come in to play when looking at a conflict, some more primarily than others but in our attempts to solve conflicts, it is important to be able to look at and understand more than just one point of view.”

Class Exercise:

Flipping off the overhead projector, Wilson shifted back to the desk, perhaps looking a little tired as he leaned there.

“Today’s exercise is going to focus particularly on the ‘Power’ core ideal. I’ve split the class between those of you with a pad of paper and those of you with a pencil. The exercise is to match up, one of you with paper and one of you with the pencil and write a note to me that you will then turn in.”

Wilson paused and grinned. “So, where is the conflict? Only one of you can hand in the paper which means only one of you will get credit for the exercise, unless you can work together and come up with a method by which both of you will receive credit for the assignment. And yes, you must use the paper and the pencils passed out in class. Don’t try to cheat this as Professor Aziraphale can tell and I will flunk you for the assignment.”

[ooc: Wilson definitely is not looking to flunk any of you in this exercise but rather he wants see how you each set about resolving this conflict now at the start of class. So please, throw me any and all off the wall and not so off the wall ideas. A similar exercise might show up in the final exam ;) ]

Once more he called Pippi and Blair up to the front of the class and he gave Pippi a group of paper pads and a list of names and Blair got a cup of pencils and a list of names. The TAs would distribute the items per their individual lists.

Paper
Pippi Longstocking
Marie D'Ancanto
Tyler DurdenJim Ellison
Annette Hargrove
Conner McKnight
Peter Petrelli
Luke Skywalker
Elizabeth Weir

Pencils
Blair Sandburg
Teddy Altman
Phoebe Halliwell
Lana Lang
Haruhi Fujioka
Summer Roberts
Naomi Wildman
Layla Williams
Tori Hanson

Once everybody had a pencil or a pad of paper, Wilson crossed his arms and smiled at the class.

"All right, find someone who has the other item you need and start the negotiations. You have the rest of the class period to complete this exercise."

[ooc: Welcome back to classes! I'm posting this early due to auditors on my planet at work and other reasons. This class will usually go up the night before or early on Monday mornings. OCDs are on the way up! Class is once more in Session!!]