CONFLICT MANAGEMENT The Psychology of conflict and conflict ...

8 DE DREU AND GELFAND
levels, discuss what might be universal versus culture-specific in terms of
conflict in organizations, and highlight new frontiers of research.
sourCes of WorKPlaCe ConfliCt aCross levels of analysis
Adopting a perspective that includes multiple levels of analysis neither
clarifies the origins of conflict at work nor reveals whether and in what
form these origins exist at each level. To explore these questions we discuss
three broad classes of origins or sources of workplace conflict that
can be found across levels. Acknowledging that there are myriad factors
that affect conflict at different levels, we provide some parsimony of antecedents
by examining three leading theoretical perspectives that can be,
but to date have not been, applied to understand conflict at the individual,
group, and organization levels of analysis. We then conclude this section
with a discussion of how national culture affects sources of workplace
conflict, and whether the sources discussed at other levels may or may not
be applicable across national cultures.
In the sections that follow, we distinguish three root causes of conflict
that are present across levels: (a) scarce resources, (b) a search for maintaining
and promoting a positive view of the self, and (c) a desire to hold
consensually shared and socially validated opinions and beliefs. Consecutively,
we discuss the mixed-motive nature of social interdependencies in
organizations that give rise to resource conflicts (sometimes referred to as
conflicts of interest, or conflicts over outcomes) at different levels; the need
to maintain and develop a positive view of oneself and the group to which
one belongs, which gives rise to ideological and value conflicts (sometimes
referred to as relationship, or affective conflict) at different levels; and the
desire to hold a socially validated and consensually shared understanding
of the world and the tasks that need to be done, which may give rise to
socio-cognitive conflict of understanding (sometimes referred to as cognitive,
or task-related conflict) at different levels (for similar taxonomies, see e.g.,
Coombs, 1987; De Dreu et al., 1999; Rapoport, 1960; Thibaut & Kelley, 1959;
and Thomas, 1992).
Source #1: Scarce Resources and Conflicts of Interest
Resources within organizations are scarce and finite, and the access
to—as well as the availability and distribution of—scarce resources constitutes
one major cause of conflict at all levels of analysis. Individuals
within a team negotiate time off-task, employees demand a greater share
of the team bonus because they perceive their inputs exceed those of some
colleagues, organizations negotiate access to new markets, and so on.
To appreciate and understand resource conflicts, it is useful to use as a
starting point Interdependence Theory (Kelley & Thibaut, 1978; Rusbult &