CONFLICT MANAGEMENT The Psychology of conflict and conflict ...

Series Foreword
This is the 26th book in the Organizational Frontiers Series of books
initiated by the SIOP. The overall purpose of the series volumes is to promote
the scientific status of the field. Ray Katzell first edited the series. He
was followed by Irwin Goldstein, Sheldon Zedeck, and Neal Schmitt. The
topics of the volumes and the volume editors are chosen by the editorial
board, or individuals propose volumes to the editorial board. The series
editor and the editorial board then work with the volume editor(s) in planning
the volume.
The success of the series is evident in the high number of sales (now
over 50,000). Volumes have also received excellent reviews and individual
chapters as well as volumes have been cited frequently.
This volume, edited by Carsten K. W. De Dreu and Michele J. Gelfand,
is important because it presents current thinking and research on conflict.
Conflict in organizations is pervasive and a necessary aspect of social interactions
between people. The editors point out that conflict has substantial
consequences for individuals, teams, and organizations in areas such as
absenteeism, creativity, communication, social climate, and the quality
of group decision making. They also argue there is a close connection
between conflict and collaborative work and this connection has become
more important with the growing emphasis on collaboration and teams.
The volume has other important strengths. Aside from being a truly
comprehensive overview of the field, the editors and authors stress repeatedly
that conflict in organizations is a multilevel phenomenon, and individual,
group, and organizational antecedents and consequences must be
considered to truly understand it. The editors do a masterful job of identifying
communalities and differences across these levels of analysis. This
multilevel emphasis continues throughout the volume. It also presents
multiple approaches and disciplines to broaden our perspective on conflict.
Finally, it identifies future research needs that will have a significant
impact on conflict research for years to come.
The editors and chapter authors deserve our gratitude for clearly communicating
the nature, application, and implications of the theory and
research described in this book. Production of a volume such as this
involves the hard work and cooperative effort of many individuals. The
editors, the chapter authors, and the editorial board all played important
roles in this endeavor. As all royalties from the series volumes are used
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